All it took was six games for Michigan State to make believers out of college basketball experts. The Spartans are off to a roaring 6-0 start to the season and they look like one of the best teams in the country and probably the second or third-best squad in the Big Ten.
The Spartans are dominating opponents left and right, winning each of the past four games by at least 17 points en route to the No. 11 ranking in the latest AP Poll.
Tom Izzo has done an excellent job with a team that not many gave a chance to contend in the Big Ten this season. He had four key core players return (Jeremy Fears, Jaxon Kohler, Carson Cooper, Coen Carr), but he lost most of his production from the 2024-25 Big Ten champion team. Jase Richardson, Tre Holloman, and Jaden Akins were the biggest names to leave the program, forcing Izzo to put in overtime to make sure the NCAA Tournament streak didn’t come to an end in 2025-26.
Six games into the year, the Spartans are undefeated with two top-15 wins under their belts. They beat Arkansas in a thriller a couple of weeks ago, and then dominated Kentucky at the Champions Classic last Tuesday.
Since then, Michigan State has added two blowout wins over Detroit Mercy (84-56) and East Carolina (89-56). This team is firing on all cylinders, and the chemistry is building by the game.
That has led to some experts jumping on the hype train, including ESPN bracketologist Joe Lunardi who posts an updated bracket projection every Tuesday. Last week, he had the Spartans as a 5-seed after a 3-0 start with a win over Arkansas. This afternoon, he boosted Michigan State up to a 3-seed.
While it’s still very early for this kind of projection, Michigan State does look like a top-three seed, and probably closer to a 2-seed. Of course, Michigan State is projected as the 3-seed in the same bracket as Duke (1) and UConn (2). It wouldn’t be a bracket projection if Michigan State wasn’t in the same region as one — or both — of those powerhouses.
The hype train is leaving the station, and Lunardi made sure to hop on before it’s too late.