Michigan State basketball: 3 takeaways from horrible loss to Iowa

2. It's the simplest mistakes that keep killing this team

The absolute simplest mitakes just keep crushing this team over and over. The mistakes that they make are so elementary that it makes anyone who played even a second of organized basketball in their lifetime shake their head in disgust.

OK, let's start with kicking the game off with a Mady Sissoko post touch that led to a horrible fadeaway jumper from two feet out (the conversion rate on this shot has to be in the single digits). And then there's the failure by the bigs to catch passes from driving guards in the post. Carson Cooper and Mady Sissoko have to butter their hands before games, I'm convinced.

And then there's the missed layups. I could name three different missed layups that crushed this team's momentum. Two were by AJ Hoggard and one was by Malik Hall late in the game when he could have cut the Iowa lead to three. One of Hoggard's missed layups actually went the other way and turned into an and-one for the Hawkeyes. That's a five-point swing.

Oh, and the fact that this team cannot seem to defend a back-door cut to save its life. Just horrible when the defense had some good possessions and breakdowns led to easy buckets. Or how about fouling 3-point shooters?

Is that all not enough? What about the fact that Michigan State was 7-for-14 from the free throw line. Yes, seven missed free throws and guess how much the Spartans lost by? That's right, seven.

These mistakes always seem to pile up and it led to a horrible loss on Tuesday night.