EAST LANSING— The last six seconds of the Michigan State-Illinois matchup were vigorous.
With 5.9 seconds left the score was 78-77, MSU, and the ball went out of bounds resulting in a turnover from Illinois. The Breslin Center crowd was on its feet. Junior guard Tre Holloman got fouled after the inbound and went 2-2 from the free throw line to make it 80-77, with 5.4 seconds left.
Illinois then inbounded it, and redshirt freshman guard Jeremy Fears Jr. fouled junior guard Kylan Boswell. Boswell went 1-2 from the free throw line to make it 80-78 with one second left on the game clock.
Fears inbounded it for the Spartans and made a long pass to junior center Carson Cooper to seal the deal.
No. 12 Michigan State defeated No. 19 Illinois 80-78 to improve to 16-2 on the season and 7-0 in Big Ten play.
“I really do believe they’re the best team in the league right now,” MSU head coach Tom Izzo said of Illinois. “I’m not sliding us. I’m not sliding Purdue. I’m not sliding Michigan or anybody else. I just think right now, that was a tough team to play.”

The first half was controlled by the Fighting Illini. Illinois shot 38.5% from the field, 25% from behind the arc and 60% from the free throw line in the first half. Comparatively, MSU shot 44.8% from the field, 16.7% from behind the arc and 64.3% from the free throw line in the first half.
With under six minutes left in the first half, the Spartans began to pull within the Fighting Illini. MSU cut the deficit within three points after senior guard Jaden Akins went 1-1 from the free throw line, marking the closet score since the first minute of the game.
MSU continued to fight to close the first half. The two teams went into the locker room tied 36-36 after junior forward Jaxon Kohler hit a jumper.
“We didn’t play as good the first half, we got to play better second-half,” Izzo said. “Those are the kind of things that we’re trying to get through to our guys.”
Coming out of the half, the Spartans had a new wave of energy. With under eight minutes to play MSU pulled away to a seven-point lead marking the largest held lead by the Spartans.
The Spartans didn’t see the Fighting Illini ahead of them for nine minutes and 32 seconds after claiming the lead when senior center Szymon Zapala went 2-2 from the free-throw line.
Holloman led the way for MSU with 17 points, and he was followed by senior forward Frankie Fidler and sophomore forward Coen Carr with 11 points each.
“I’d say we did play a good 40-minute game, but I say in a way we still only played 30 because the first 10 minutes, I didn’t think we played the first 10 minutes,” Izzo said. “All in all, that was our best 40 minutes of the year.”
Up next, MSU will take on Rutgers at Madison Square Garden in New York on Saturday with the tip-off set for 1:30 p.m. Matt Merrifield and Allie Cohen will be on the call for Impact 89FM.