Big Ten Basketball: 5 takeaways from the 2018 Big Ten/ACC Challenge
By Adam Childs
Will the real Michigan State please stand up?
Michigan State started off the season by getting down big to Kansas before making that game close at the end. The thought was maybe the Spartans could not hang with the big boys this year. Then they rolled off five straight wins including a 68 point shellacking of Tennessee Tech and then wins against UCLA and Texas in Las Vegas.
The Spartans looked like their normal self and again looked like a legitimate top ten team, if not higher.
Instead, they came out on Tuesday and looked like anything but a top ten team. They did have to play on the road at Louisville but were favored to win the game. They had to make up a six-point halftime deficit to force overtime and then ultimately lost the game in the extra frame.
Louisville is not a bad loss, but they were coming in just 3-2 with losses to a very good Tennessee team and a mediocre Marquette team who had gone blown out by IU a couple of weeks ago. This was a game the Spartans should have won and judging by how they played in Vegas they could have easily come away with a victory.
Instead, they came out flat and let the Cardinals do about anything they wanted against them. The talent is there for the Spartans to beat about anyone in the country, but will they put it together. If they continue this Jekyll and Hyde type of play the big boys of the Big Ten are going to pass them by, More importantly, they look like just the second best team in the state. Which leads us to their bitter rival Michigan.