We survived MSU’s best team for the foreseeable future…

Submitted by bballislife22 on

… and we didn’t just survive, we had the better season!!!

Now that they are out, let’s be honest with ourselves. MSU had a VERY talented team this year. Appling, Harris, Dawson, and Payne are all great players. Do they have flaws? Yes. But they were very good.

Yes, MSU did have injury problems this year. Lots of them. But so did we. Maybe not as many, but stuff happens, man. Injuries happen the same as players leaving early for the draft happens (Morris, Burke, Hardaway).

Instead of focusing on MSU’s misfortunes. Let’s look at what this says about our program. We just successfully took MSU’s best shot, and beat them. We won the regular season by 3 whole games. We beat them head to head 2 to 1. We made it just as far, if not further (#BeatKentucky), than them in the tournament. What a fantastic job by Beilein, the rest of the coaching staff, and of course all of the players to take this program where it is today. The tide in this rivalry has officially shifted. No longer are the days when we were terrified of playing at Breslin. No longer are the days where we hoped, PRAYED, for a season split in the series. No longer are the days when we watch Izzo lead his team deep in to March, while we either exited in the first round or didn’t make it at all. Those days are over.

Sparked by Stu’s three pointer on the right wing as the shot clock was winding down, sparked by Draymond missing a floater in the lane as time expired, sparked by Darius Morris shouting, “Get the F%$@ off my court”, sparked by Trey picking Appling’s pocket, and sparked by DEATH FROM ABOVE, a new era has begun.

Time to enjoy it.

EDIT: Mods feel free to delete and replace with a more generic one if you want.

andrewG

March 30th, 2014 at 4:36 PM ^

why do you feel bad for appling? if there's any player on state's roster i feel bad for, it's payne, who by all accounts is a terrific human being. even the best of us make poor choices though sometimes, and his dark moment was committing to state.

CLord

March 30th, 2014 at 4:36 PM ^

True.  Most of the Sparty kids outside Valentine and Costello and that ginger no-name who fronted GR3 seem like good kids, including Appling, but truth be told, Appling never did much of anything.  Pretty average player.  Gary Harris was a major disappointment in terms of coming up clutch for them.  Great stats, but rarely ever clutch.  

55% chance that was Izzo's last game as MSU's coach.  His team next year is average.

CLord

March 30th, 2014 at 4:40 PM ^

Disagree.  We lost our 3 best players this season so everythign past Sweet 16 is house money.  State brought back their entire team and was healthy.

If we go out tonight, the net net is still that Beilein did more with his pieces than Izzo did.

House money.  Would be SWEET to reach the Final 4.  Can't expect much past that.  Wisconsin is loaded and knows us.  Wish Arizona has reached instead.

Wolverine91

March 30th, 2014 at 4:34 PM ^

Beautiful! I would love to hear what dumb ass valenti has to say tmrw afternoon after the tigers game haha! What excuses do state fans now???

Wolverine91

March 30th, 2014 at 4:35 PM ^

Beautiful! I would love to hear what dumb ass valenti has to say tmrw afternoon after the tigers game haha! What excuses do state fans have now???

RobM_24

March 30th, 2014 at 4:35 PM ^

Harris and Payne are great college players. Dawson is a solid starter. However, Appling may be the most overrated player in the history of the B1G.

What did Appling really do well? He couldn't shoot, he was turnover prone, his defense was just average -- he could floorslap with the best of them I guess. I just don't understand why people lump him in with the best of the B1G.

Smidgens

March 30th, 2014 at 4:35 PM ^

Poor Appling, terrible last game. I'm not quite like you guys with the MSU hatred, only been a UM grad student for 2 years (fuck OSU though, didn't take long to hate them) so I was pulling for the 3 B1G team final four. I swear if Wisconsin is the only B1G team in the FF..