EAST LANSING— No. 8 Michigan State men’s basketball is headed Eastward to take on No. 16 Maryland for its third out of four straight ranked matchups on Wednesday night.
MSU is on a three-game win streak, with most recently taking down its rival now-No. 15 Michigan on Friday evening in Ann Arbor, 75-62.
The Spartans had four players finish in double-digits including freshman guard Jase Richardson with 21 points, junior guard Tre Holloman with 18, senior guard Jaden Akins with 11 and redshirt freshman guard Jeremy Fears Jr. with 10.
MSU went 28-61 from the field, 9-22 from behind the arc and 10-15 from the free throw line on Friday. The Spartans also put their depth to use with 31 bench points, compared to the Wolverine’s 13.
Richardson was named Big Ten Freshman of the Week on Monday afternoon. He is second on the team in scoring with 10.8 points per game and leads the team in field goal percentage with a shooting average of 53%.
Friday night marked Richardson’s 14th game in double-figures. He has been averaging 17.2 points per game and 4.2 rebounds per game while going 29-53 from the floor since joining the starting line up five games ago.
MSU leads the all-time series with Maryland 16-8 and is 5-3 when playing in College Park. The Spartans have taken seven of the last 10 matchups against the Terrapins, including the last six straight.
Scouting Maryland
Maryland is 21-6 overall and 11-5 in Big Ten play. The Terrapins are currently on a four-game win streak, and they have only dropped one game at the XFINITY Center this season against then-No. 8 Purdue on Dec. 8.
Most recently, Maryland took down USC on Thursday 88-71. Five players finished in double-digits for the Terrapins against the Trojans including sophomore guard Rodney Rice with 22 points, junior guard Ja’Kobi Gillespie with 20, senior forward Julian Reese with 19, freshman center Derik Queen with 13 and fifth-year guard Selton Miguel with 11.
The Terrapins are shooting 48.8% from the field, 37.6% from behind the arc and 74.7% from the free throw line this season. They are also averaging 37.3 rebounds per game, 15.1 assists per game, 10.6 turnovers per game, 7.4 steals per game and 4.4 blocks per game.
Five players are averaging double-figures for the season in points for Maryland including Queen, Gillespie, Reese, Rice and Miguel. Reese leads in rebounds with 9.3 rebounds per game and Gillespie leads in assists with 4.8 assists per game.
MSU and Maryland will go head-to-head on Wednesday with the tip-off set for 6:30 p.m. The game will be broadcast live on the Big Ten Network.
