EAST LANSING — Michigan State men’s basketball was selected as a 3 seed in the NCAA Tournament during the Selection Sunday bracket reveal show.
The Spartans are set to face the 14 seed North Dakota State out of the Summit League.
Before MSU head coach Tom Izzo grinds hours of tape to prepare for the Bison, he has a few quick takeaways.
“I don’t know a lot about North Dakota State yet…27-7 and won both the regular season in the conference tournament. I don’t know the head coach, Dave Richmond, but he’s had 11 seasons there, and this his fourth NCAA tournament appearance at different schools. So he has some experience,” Izzo said.
“Four players scoring double figures, they shoot a lot of threes, team average 23-25, threes and 80 points a game alone and only allow 69 so they’ve got to be pretty good defensively, like they pressure a little bit, they average eight and a half steals a game,” Izzo said.
NDSU will feature mostly small ball lineups, which sets the possibility for the Spartans to take advantage in the paint and rebounding margin.
The Spartans are in need of a bounce back after a disappointing loss to UCLA in the Big Ten Tournament.
MSU senior forward Carson Cooper said the Spartans need to change their mindset and focus on the task at hand and not look too far forward, as one loss will end their season.
“I think one of the things that made us look too far ahead was losing to Michigan, and right away we’re thinking, we want to meet these guys again,” Cooper said.
This tournament appearance adds to MSU head coach Tom Izzo’s record for most consecutive March Madness appearances with 28.
The Spartans have been assigned to play their first weekend games at the KeyBank Center in Buffalo, New York. If the Spartans advance past the First Round, they will have the winner of the 6 seed Louisville vs. 11 seed South Florida matchup.
The Spartans are included in a stacked East Region with Duke as the one seed and UConn as the two seed. There are four National Championship-winning coaches in the region: St. John’s head coach Rick Pitino, Kansas head coach Bill Self, UConn head coach Dan Hurley and Izzo.
Michigan State tips off its tournament run on Thursday at 4:05 p.m. Catch the radio broadcast from Buffalo, with Joe Dez and Jack Stager on the call.
