I'll have some updated info and stats about the Spartans later Wednesday.
I neglected to mention above that Michigan State has a Go Green, Wear White
promotion for Saturday's game, requesting that their fans wear white shirts. (They did the same for Arkansas, and will do it a third time against Michigan.) Will the Blue Devils suddenly become disoriented, thinking they're outside and surrounded by snow? Probably not. Will the home viewers have to adjust their TV settings for a picture that's easier on the eyes? Maybe. Duke fans are pretty handy with their remotes, though, after years of dealing with the weird yellow tinge of games at Wake Forest.
Tom Izzo is in his 31st year as head coach of Michigan State. You know, 30 is a nice round number, and he had just finished a 2024-25 season with a Big Ten regular season title (by a massive 3-game margin) and an Elite Eight appearance, losing to Auburn. That team starred the one-and-done son (Jase Richardson) of a national champion he'd coached
25 years earlier (Jason Richardson). And yet, he chose to return, and it looks like he is hardly winding down his career, based on his resurgent and ridiculous
2026 recruiting class. The question is no longer
"When will he retire?" but
"How much is he going to accomplish before he finally decides to hang it up?"
This year's Spartans
roster may or may not have an automatic first round NBA pick like last season did or next season likely will, but it's deceptively solid. It would have benefited from having a healthy Kaleb Glenn, the Florida Atlantic transfer forward who suffered a non-contact knee injury in June and is probably out for the season.
PROBABLE STARTERS
6-10 senior forward
Jaxon Kohler #0 (14.3 pts, 9.9 reb, 1.5 ast, 1.1 blk)
6-2 redshirt sophomore guard
Jeremy Fears Jr #1 (12.3 pts, 3.4 reb, 9.4 ast, 1.6 stl)
6-6 junior forward
Coen Carr #55 (11.3 pts, 5.1 reb, 2.0 ast, 1.0 blk)
6-11 senior center
Carson Cooper #15 (9.6 pts, 5.9 reb, 1.4 ast)
6-4 senior guard
Trey Fort #9 (5.8 pts, 1.6 reb, 0.9 ast)
KEY RESERVES
6-9 freshman forward
Cam Ward #3 (9.0 pts, 5.1 reb, 0.4 ast)
6-5 sophomore guard
Kur Teng #2 (6.1 pts, 1.8 reb, 1.1 ast)
6-3 sophomore guard
Divine Ugochukwu #99 (4.0 pts, 0.8 reb, 1.0 ast)
6-11 redshirt freshman forward
Jesse McCulloch #35 (3.5 pts, 1.6 reb, 0.3 ast)
6-8 freshman forward
Jordan Scott #6 (3.0 pts, 3.0 reb, 0.6 ast)
BENCH PLAYERS
5-11 senior guard
Nick Sanders #20 (0.6 pts, 0.2 reb, 0.2 ast)
6-3 grad guard
Denham Wojcik #10 (0.5 pts, 0.3 reb, 1.0 ast)
6-8 redshirt freshman forward
Brennan Walton #40 (0.5 pts, 0.5 reb, 0.0 ast)
6-8 redshirt freshman forward
Colin Walton #43 (0.0 pts, 0.3 reb, 0.0 ast)
INJURED/OTHER
6-7 junior forward
Kaleb Glenn #8 (knee surgery in June; could miss 2025-26 season;
link)
Coach Izzo has addressed Glenn's absence by promoting
dunk specialist Coen Carr to the starting lineup, splitting another starting spot between shooting guards Trey Fort and Kur Teng, and working freshmen forwards Cam Ward and Jordan Scott into the 10-man rotation. (According to Izzo's
postgame presser, Ward sat out Tuesday's Iowa game after spraining his wrist against UNC last week.
MSU Content speculates that he'll return to action for the Duke game.)
This is a team with some experience, even against Duke. The two teams played in November 2023 -- Duke won by 9, and it was the first time Duke's Caleb Foster
went off in Chicago's United Center, with 18 points off the bench. A trio of current Spartans -- Carr, Carson Cooper, and Jeremy Fears Jr -- combined to play 40 minutes as reserves. Miami transfer Divine Ugochukwu hosted Duke last season, and while the Hurricanes lost by 37, he was a bright spot for them, getting 6 points, 10 rebounds, 2 assists, and 3 steals in 34 minutes as a starter.
Here's a pair of comparison tables, now with NET rankings added. Unless otherwise specified, stats are from
Sports Reference.
This is a game between a pair of top 10 defensive teams, based on both scoring stats and KenPom. Going a bit beyond the tables below, MSU and Duke are both able to limit opponents' field goal makes (10th and 15th best, respectively) and 2-point makes (10th and 12th best). Sparty is better at preventing opponents from rebounding (4th best, versus Duke's 69th best). Meanwhile, the Devils have held opponents' outside shooting to only 25.9 percent (15th best), compared to teams that hit 28.2 percent of their threes against Michigan State (42nd best).
Bart Torvik may be considering home court advantage by predicting Michigan State to win, 70-68.
TABLE 1
| Category | Michigan State (8-0) | Duke (9-0) |
| Points Scored | 78.6 (167th nationally) | 89.1 (34th) |
| Points Allowed | 60.4 (7th) | 59.6 (5th) |
| Scoring Margin (NCAA.org Stats) | +18.2 (34th) | +29.5 (2nd) |
| Bench Points (NCAA.org Stats) | 25.0 (185th) | 27.0 (142nd) |
| Total Rebounds | 41.6 (43rd) | 42.0 (36th) |
| --- Offensive Rebounds | 14.4 (31st) | 12.1 (141st) |
| --- Defensive Rebounds | 27.3 (91st) | 29.9 (20th) |
| Assists | 19.38 (18th) | 19.44 (17th) |
| Assist/Turnover Ratio (NCAA.org Stats) | 1.67 (37th) | 1.86 (11th) |
| Steals | 6.8 (232nd) | 7.4 (162nd) |
| Blocks | 4.6 (57th) | 5.0 (37th) |
| Turnovers | 11.6 (121st fewest) | 10.4 (60th fewest) |
| Personal Fouls | 16.6 (97th fewest) | 17.0 (118th fewest) |
| Field Goal Percentage | 47.4% (105th) | 51.2% (23rd) |
| 2-Point FG Percentage | 54.4% (153rd) | 64.7% (6th) |
| 3-Point FG Percentage | 33.3% (197th) | 36.0% (101st) |
| Free Throw Percentage | 72.9% (142nd) | 71.6% (177th) |
TABLE 2
| Category | Michigan State (8-0) | Duke (9-0) |
| NET Ranking (NCAA.org Stats) | #9 (NET Summary) | #2 (NET Summary) |
| --- Strength of Schedule | 66th | 126th |
| --- Quad 1 | 3-0 | 3-0 |
| --- Quad 2 | 1-0 | 1-0 |
| --- Quad 3 | 1-0 | 0-0 |
| --- Quad 4 | 3-0 | 5-0 |
| KenPom (Ken Pomeroy) | #10 | #3 |
| --- Offensive Efficiency | 32nd | 6th |
| --- Defensive Efficiency | 3rd | 5th |
| --- Tempo | 303rd | 242nd |
| Fastbreak Points (NCAA.org Stats) | 15.3 (66th) | 16.2 (45th) |
| T-Rank (Bart Torvik) | #6 (T-Page) | #2 (T-Page) |
| --- Experience | 1.889 (196th) | 0.897 (363rd) |
| --- Talent | 66.531 (14th) | 89.738 (1st) |
| --- Effective Height | 81.650 (35th) | 81.481 (46th) |
| --- Average Height | 78.460 (32nd) | 79.435 (5th) |
NET quadrants
explained:
The quality of wins and losses will be organized based on game location and the opponent's NET ranking.
Quadrant 1: Home 1-30, Neutral 1-50, Away 1-75
Quadrant 2: Home 31-75, Neutral 51-100, Away 76-135
Quadrant 3: Home 76-160, Neutral 101-200, Away 135-240
Quadrant 4: Home 161-353, Neutral 201-353, Away 241-353
Ken Pomeroy
defines efficiency as an extrapolated measure of points scored (offensive) or allowed (defensive) per 100 possessions against an average opponent. The more points you score and the fewer points you allow, the better. Tempo refers to the number of possessions per 40 minutes against an average tempo: the higher the rank, the faster the tempo. Faster isn't necessarily better; Houston is among the 10 slowest teams, and is currently KenPom #8.
Bart Torvik offers some clarification in the comments
here.
Experience
"is based on class year (3 for senior, 0 for freshman) with caveat that it actually counts how many years a guy has played 10 games in, so if a guy is listed as a soph even though he's played two full years already, he'll count as a junior."
Talent
"is based on composite recruiting ranks weighted for minutes played."
Effective Height
"is an attempt to calculate minute-weighted height of the 4s and 5s. So it's basically the average height of the tallest 40% of minutes."
Average Height
"includes all minutes, not just the bigs."
www.foxsports.com
