Michigan State University Basketball Blog

In MSU’s first official game of the season, the Spartans didn’t disappoint in a 86-53 ass-whipping of Chicago State. After barely going 1-1 against Division II GLIAC opponents, the Sparty men manned up and showed the basketball world what they are really made of. It was good to see, considering they got schooled by Grand Valley and then schooled by Marquette native Tim Strom.

Raymar Morgan put in 25 points and 15 boards for his personal best. Let’s hope he stays another year or two to raise those totals to an even higher margin! Freshmen studs Chris Allen added 13 points while Durrell Summers pumped in 12.

Coach Tom Izzo seemed to be finally pleased with the Spartans: I guess I have a wonderful sense of the obvious, but there were a lot of guys who did some good things. I thought Kalin Lucas did a great job pushing the ball early, he got a lot of people the ball. I thought (Raymar) Morgan - it was one game, but it was one game that he played a little bit more possessed. I thought (Morgan’s) points were great, and the rebounding led to a lot of points. I think on six offensive rebounds, he scored on five of them. I thought Drew Neitzel did a good job, he was hot early. I don’t know if we just did a good job of getting him the ball there for a minute, but with eight assists and no turnovers, it was a great night for him. I thought Travis (Walton) did a good job coming off the bench. I thought our young guys, especially (Durrell) Summers played well. Our bigs have a ways to go yet, but we made some progress.

Box Score