Michigan State basketball stuns Crisler with 75-62 win over Wolverines to take Big Ten lead

Posted by author February 22, 2025 Basketball

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In a mettle-testing moment, Michigan State basketball once again dug deep and found its resolve.

And the Spartans will wake up this weekend back in first place in the Big Ten.

Tre Holloman sparked yet another comeback with three straight 3-pointers, scoring 11 of his 18 points in the second half, and Jase Richardson finished with 21 points for his third game of 20-plus this season as No. 13 MSU rallied for a 75-62 victory over No. 12 Michigan on Friday night at Crisler Center.

After falling behind by as many as eight points in the first half, the Spartans surged out of the break and hit 53.3% of their second-half shots. They finished off a third straight victory and fourth in the last five games with a 9-0 run over the final four-plus minutes.

The win gives MSU (22-5, 13-3 Big Ten) a half-game lead atop the conference standings over the Wolverines (20-6, 12-3), who lost their first home game of the season hours after U-M signed first-year coach Dusty May to a contract extension in his first year.

MSU’s third win in six days culminated in chants of “Go Green, Go White” in the final two minutes as the Spartans bled out the clock on a hard-fought battle that improved Tom Izzo’s record against the Wolverines to 35-21 all-time.

Jeremy Fears Jr. scored eight of his 10 points in the second half, including two of the Spartans’ six 3-pointers in the final half. Jaden Akins added 11 points as MSU held U-M star Danny Wolf to just 11 points on 5-for-11 shooting despite the 7-footer adding eight assists and seven rebounds. Vladislav Goldin had 21 points and five boards for the Wolverines but committed four of their 15 turnovers.

The Spartans travel to No. 20 Maryland on Wednesday (6:30 p.m./BTN) and No. 11 Wisconsin on March 2 and head to Iowa on March 6. They host the Wolverines in the regular-season finale March 9.

Surviving the waves

Going into the game, MSU coach Tom Izzo pointed to turnovers as being a potential deciding factor. The Wolverines were committing 14.4 a game to the Spartans’ 11.8

By halftime, MSU had given the ball away nine times, which led to nine U-M points. Two of those came on missed lobs to Coen Carr on consecutive trips, the first a pass too high from Tre Holloman smacked off the board and led to a Nimari Burnett breakaway dunk the other direction. The second, an attempted quick push back to Carr, resulted in a second straight giveaway by Holloman.

It also didn’t help that MSU struggled to make shots. After hitting five of their first eight to build a 13-6 lead in just under six minutes, the Spartans went ice cold as U-M heated up. MSU went 1 of 12 over an 8:08 stretch and missed eight straight shots as the Wolverines ripped off a 15-0 run to take the lead for the rest of the half.

The hole grew to as many as eight points with 2:21 left before MSU chipped away before halftime. Richardson’s tip-in of his own miss and two free throws, part of his 11-point first half, got the Spartans back within 38-34 at the break.

Guards carry Spartans to victory

Where MSU’s guards struggled early, they took control immediately after halftime. Particularly Holloman. The Spartans committed just two turnovers in the final 20 minutes.

A tide-turning 23-11 burst over the first nine-plus minutes out of the break changed the game. Richardson and Fears opened the final half with 3-pointer to help the Spartans seize the lead again for the first time since the midpoint of the first. Then after Michigan got a pair of Goldin buckets to jump back in front, Holloman started to take control.

First, the junior from Minneapolis delivered a lob for a Cooper alley-oop. Then, Holloman flipped out a breakout pass to Richardson, who converted a spin-move layup around U-M’s Tre Donaldson. May called timeout as MSU went up four.

Then it was Holloman’s outside shooting that took over. He went around the world with a 3-pointer in the right corner, then the top of the key, then from the left wing on three straight trips. The Spartans’ lead swelled to eight.

And after a Kohler layup and a Richardson free throw, Fears attacked from the top of the key and sliced through U-M’s zone to finish through contact for a layup. MSU’s lead grew to double digits for the first time, 62-51, with 7:39 left and silenced the Maize-Out Crisler crowd.

The Wolverines chipped away again, cutting it back to six. But Fears banked in his second triple of the half, sending fans to the exits as the Spartans started grabbing one offensive board after another in the final two minutes.

Contact Chris Solari:csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.

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