EAST LANSING- The No. 23-ranked Michigan State women’s basketball team held an exhibition game against in-state foe Michigan Tech on Wednesday, Oct. 22. After a successful second season under head coach Robyn Fralick, the Spartans started off Fralick’s third year with a dominating 101-58 exhibition victory.
“Great to get the game lights on, play another opponent,” Fralick said. “I thought our start was excellent. I thought we did a great job of setting the tone for the game.”
Once the ball was tipped, MSU’s all-around play was aggressive. Senior guard Theryn Hallock set the tone, driving into the paint, and was rewarded with two free throws. Hallock’s aggressiveness continued as she ended up scoring Michigan State’s first eight points of the game.
On the defensive end, the Spartans started the game in a full-court-press, whenever the Huskies inbounded the ball. This caused havoc for Michigan Tech’s offense and led to MSU’s defense holding the Huskies scoreless until there were just under three minutes left in the first quarter.
Fralick credited her team with the defensive effort but thinks there are things they have to clean up when they execute the full-court-press.
“When we do it right, it’s disruptive,” Fralick said. “It changes the speed of the game. The second quarter we fouled way too much while we were pressuring. So, when we do it right, it creates a chaos and a tempo and a pace that we are comfortable with.”
Heading into the second quarter, Michigan State held a 38-6 lead. The Spartan offense was firing on all cylinders, and it started with senior guard Jalyn Brown finding redshirt sophomore guard Kennedy Blair on the baseline, who finished the play with a beautiful reverse layup.
The standout of the second quarter was senior guard Emma Shumate. At one point Shumate drained three straight three-pointers in less than a minute which put MSU up 51-9.
Shumate said she focused on keeping her shot sharp over the summer and knocking down open threes. That certainly showed tonight as she went six for eight from beyond the arc.
Fralick was proud of Shumate’s all-around game and liked how she played coming off the bench.
“Shot when she was open, created space; she had a pick six in the passing lane,” Fralick said. “We need that out of her; it was so good to see her shoot it really confidently.”
Heading into halftime, the Green and White held a healthy 65-21 lead, and Fralick believes her squad came into the second half, not playing as aggressively as she would’ve liked.
“I really didn’t like our second half,” Fralick said. “We played the score, instead of playing the game the right way. The second half gives us a lot of film and things to work on.”
To start the third quarter, Michigan Tech found its shots falling more frequently and when the Huskies’ sophomore guard Kendall Standfest hit a shot from downtown and continued to do so in the third quarter, leading to a 16-10 Michigan Tech run and Fralick calling her first timeout.
In the middle of all of this, Blair went down and struggled to get back up. She eventually returned to the game and put up fourteen points and six boards.
“I was just cramping really bad,” Blair said. “I went back out there for a couple minutes, and my quads just hurt really bad, so clearly next game, I need to make sure that doesn’t happen.
After Fralick called timeout, Michigan State only let up four more points in the quarter. Heading into the fourth quarter, the score stood at 80-39 in the Spartans’ favor.
A big reason why MSU won this game so comfortably is because of their aggressiveness on the glass. The Green and White ended the night with 51 total rebounds and 20 of those were on the offensive end, and this led to 25 second chance points for Michigan State.
Senior forward Grace Vanslooten capitalized on these second chance opportunities and started off the fourth quarter with an easy lay in, due to great offensive rebounding. Vanslooten ended the night as the Spartans’ leading scorer with 22 points.
“What we love about Grace is her impact on the game comes through her competitive spirit and her effort,” Fralick said.
Next on MSU’s agenda will be the first game of the 2025/26 regular season. Michigan State is set to take on Mercyhurst on Tuesday, Nov. 4, with tipoff at 6:30 p.m. EST.
Josh Lee and Brian Rivers will be on the call, and it can be listened to locally on 88.9 FM or streamed at https://impact89fm.org/.
