CHICAGO, Ill. – It was a short Big Ten Tournament run for Michigan State, as the Spartans fell in their first game to UCLA, 88-84 on Friday night.

The Spartans fell behind by as much as 15 points in the second half, cutting the deficit to two points late in the second half, but MSU couldn’t match UCLA’s aggressiveness and intensity

Spartans head coach Tom Izzo was impressed by UCLA’s gumption and disheartened by his squad’s response.

“Really disappointing how we played. I give a lot of credit to UCLA. We beat them by 30 at our place, and Mick, as he should do, he got his team ready, and they played harder, tougher,” Izzo said.

“It doesn’t happen to my team very often, but for some reason, we didn’t answer the bell coming out. We miss some shots, but they probably missed a play or two. They definitely kicked us from start to finish. They deserved to win the game,” Izzo concluded. 

Here are three takeaways from the quarterfinal loss:

UCLA’s physicality shocked Michigan State 

Michigan State showed some rust in the first few minutes and UCLA jumped on the opportunity. The Spartans were sloppy on offense, committing seven turnovers, which turned into easy offense on the other end for the Bruins.

“They played desperately tonight. I absolutely love that. I love the team that played desperate and came at us and took us two-thirds of the game to respond,” Izzo said. 

MSU forward Jaxon Kohler saw a double team almost every time he touched the ball in the post. This limited the senior forward to four points on 1-of-4 shooting.

The Spartans couldn’t convert at the rim due to the pressure from the UCLA defense. The Spartans were 2-for-9 on layups.

It’s hard to beat any team that shoots it that well from three

Give UCLA its credit, the leading three-point shooting team showed up and connected from long range. It seemed every time the Spartans made a push, the Bruins found an open shooter and made the three. 

The Bruins are 10-2 when they shoot better than 42 percent from three-point range.

Coming off a triple-double against Rutgers, UCLA guard Donovan Dent boosted his BTT Player of the Tournament case with 23 points, 12 assists, six rebounds and four steals. Dent also made every timely basket when the Spartans made things close. 

“He played great tonight. Overall, he’s just got to spots wherever he wanted on the court. He got his guys open shots, and he did what he needed to do to help the guys win,” MSU guard Jeremy Fears Jr. said. “I didn’t do my job in trying to contain and make it hard for him. So he was able to be successful tonight. Credit to them, they played great. They made a lot of open shots and got whatever shot they wanted. So we didn’t do our part on defense.

Michigan State’s defense is at its best when it can play the gaps but when a team like UCLA can stretch the floor with five shooters, MSU struggles to get stops.

Late-game execution

This is the second straight game that MSU has had game-losing mental mistakes, committing a foul that sealed the loss. 

After a Kur Teng corner-three, the deficit was cut to two points with enough time to get the ball back with a stop on UCLA. But freshman forward Jordan Scott fouled, which put the Bruins up by four with 30 seconds remaining. 

“Got to coach better, definitely got to coach better. You’re right, there’s a couple of things that didn’t make sense. Not fouling on the layup didn’t make sense to me. We’ve just got to situationally coach better, and that is me. I deserve to take the blame for that because if people aren’t doing that, there’s a reason they’re not doing it, and that’s where the coach has to take some responsibility,” Izzo said. 

The next mental blunder in a close game could cost the Spartans their season. So, late-game execution will be paramount going forward. 

The Spartans are now 25-7 and await their NCAA Tournament path on Selection Sunday at 6 p.m., after the conclusion of conference tournaments.