EAST LANSING, MI – The Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets will face Michigan State at 8:00 P.M at the Breslin Center on Thursday night to kick off the ACC/Big Ten Challenge. Michigan State returns to East Lansing after its trip to Oregon for the Phil Knight Invitational last weekend. In Portland, MSU lost to both No. 5 Iowa State, 80-49, and No. 18 Oregon, 86-78. 

For the Yellow Jackets, they competed in the Gulf Coast Showcase last weekend, where they played three games against South Florida, Air Force and Belmont. Georgia Tech went 2-1 on the weekend, capped off by a nail-biting win over Belmont, 58-52.

Michigan State has a 6-2 record, with an undefeated record at home in five games this season. During last week’s game against Oregon on Nov. 27, senior guard Kamaria McDaniel exploded for 28 points and gained four rebounds and seven assists. Although the Spartans lost, she carried the team throughout the entire game and played 37 of the possible 40 minutes. McDaniel was quintessential in MSU’s comeback from being down as much as 17 points in the first half. Sophomore forward Isaline Alexander also played well as she tallied 15 points during the contest.

Georgia Tech has a record of 5-2 overall with losses to Georgia and South Florida. Senior guard Cameron Swartz is averaging 12.7 points per game this season as well as 4.7 rebounds. Close behind is senior guard, Bianca Jackson, averaging 12.6 points per game and shooting an impressive 40% from the floor. Jackson is coming off a big weekend at the Gulf Coast Showcase where she scored 12 points against Air Force and exploded for 24 in the win over Belmont.

This is only the third meeting ever between MSU and Georgia Tech. All previous meetings have also come in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge. In 2008, Georgia Tech won by a score of 70-57, but in 2014, the Spartans exacted revenge and won 79-73. 

This will be the final ACC/Big Ten Challenge due to the Big Ten’s new television contract that begins in 2023. The deal agrees that ESPN will not be broadcasting any Big Ten games, so if there were to be an ACC/Big Ten challenge, the challenge series would have to be split between both ESPN and Fox, where the home games from each conference would be covered by their television contract.