Michigan State Basketball: Why Spartans would’ve won 2020 NCAA Tournament

Michigan State’s difficult schedule helped them become an elite team

Most would believe, to win a national championship in college basketball, your team must have been challenged during the regular season. Michigan State played great competition throughout the season as witnessed by their strength of schedule as well as playing in a very competitive conference. Even before the first game was played, the Spartans knew they would face tough competition throughout the season. Michigan State easily played in the most difficult and best conference in all of college basketball this year as well. Izzo and his team were ready for the NCAA tournament.

Michigan State opened up its 2019-2020 schedule against No. 2 Kentucky on a neutral court. In the Spartan third game of the season, they traveled to No. 12 Seton Hall and won a huge road game. After defeating Charleston Southern who would later defeat SEC opponent Missouri on the road, Michigan State traveled to Hawaii in the Maui Invitational. After losing to Virginia Tech from the ACC, the Spartans went on to defeat SEC opponent Georgia and historical blue blood UCLA to finish out the tournament strong. The difficult non-conference schedule was not over as they continue to play good competition.

Michigan State would face off against Duke in the Big Ten/ACC Challenge and then play what would be the most improved team in the Big Ten this season Rutgers, who they defeated at home. From Dec. 8th to Jan. 11th, the Spartans would not lose a game as they would win eight games during that stretch including wins over No. 12 Michigan as well as four Big Ten teams in total. From Jan. 12th to Feb. 20th Michigan State would play seven of eleven games on the road against numerous talented Big Ten opponents. The Spartans would play six top 25 ranked teams over a seven-game period to end regular season play. Izzo and his team won five of those six games against those ranked opponents.

Michigan State did not play in the Big Ten Tournament as it was canceled after the first day of play. Had they played and won the conference tournament, their resume of playing quality opponents on the road and neutral courts would be second to none. Their schedule that they played this past season would have helped them greatly in winning a national championship.