Michigan State basketball pulls off a not-so-great 80-78 win vs. Illinois

On January 20, 2025By Littum

EAST LANSING – Michigan State basketball passed its first big test of the season.

That makes for 11 straight wins, a perfect start to Big Ten play and a striking display of strength and determination to come back in the second half.

The 12th-ranked Spartans got nine critical second-half points from Frankie Fidler and Tre Holloman hit two free throws with 5.4 seconds to play to ice their 80-78 victory over No. 20 Illinois on Sunday afternoon at the Breslin Center.

Holloman had 17 points and both Fidler and Coen Carr scored 11 as MSU (16-2, 7-0 Big Ten) extended its longest streak since winning 13 straight in the 2018-19 season.

However, the Spartans got a ton of all-around contributions with nine points and six assists from Jeremy Fears Jr., eight points and six rebounds from Jaxon Kohler and eight points from Jaden Akins.

Will Riley scored 16 of his 19 points in the first for Illinois (13-5, 5-3), but he went 1-for-5 for 3-pointers in the second half. Kylan Boswell had 13 points and nine rebounds, but he committed a critical turnover with 5.9 seconds to play when his no-look pass to Tomislav Ivišić ran out of bounds before Holloman’s free throw.

The Spartans made Illinois star Kasparas Jakučionis a non-factor, holding the freshman to three points on 1-for-3 shooting in just nine minutes. The 6-foot-6 Lithuanian fouled out with 6:39 to play.

Stops the star

Before Sunday, Izzo’s big mission was to get his defense to stop Jakučionis. The Spartans found one way to do that – by parking the freshman phenom on the Illini bench.

MSU got Jakucionis in early foul trouble, with Jeremy Fears Jr. pulled the Illinois star’s second just 2:54 into the game and forced coach Brad Underwood to quickly sit his star, who came in averaging a team-leading 16.7 points with 5.4 rebounds and 5.4. helps.

It actually worked in the Illini’s favor. Riley came off the bench red-hot and scored in almost every way possible in his first 7-minute, 40-second stint as Jakučionis’ replacement. The 6-foot-8 forward from Kitchner, Ontario, scored 16 of 18 points in one stretch as Illinois built its lead to as many as 10 points with 13:05 left in the half.

Just as the Spartans looked to be in some trouble, Izzo went to his most athletic lineup and got strong minutes and effort from Xavier Booker, Jaxon Kohler and Tre Holloman. That group in particular, along with Jaden Akins and Jeremy Fears Jr., pressed down defensively and closed the half on a 17-5 burst over the final 7:19, a stretch that started with a Booker 3-pointer and an acrobatic three-pointer. game by Akins. Kohler’s tip-in with 4 seconds left sent the two teams into the locker room tied 36-36.

Holloman led the way with 11 points in the first half, and the Spartans held Riley scoreless over the final 10:08 of the half after his outburst. But MSU struggled on the boards against Illinois, the nation’s best in rebound margin and on the defensive glass. The Illini’s 11 offensive rebounds proved to be no problem, however, as the Spartans limited them to just six second-chance points. MSU was also outscored 25-17 overall and scored 24-16 in the paint.

A close finish

A back-and-forth first few minutes of the second half led to the same circumstance as the opening period for Illinois.

Jakučionis again took himself out of the game in foul trouble, picking up his third less than 2:30 in and then a fourth on a loose ball rebound with 16:34 remaining. Only this time, Riley didn’t save the lost offense.

That allowed MSU to slowly creep out to a lead, starting with a 3-pointer from Fidler with 11:05 left that sparked an 18-9 run. The big moments came after Fears chased down Tre White on a 3-point attempt and the Illinois guard made just 1 of 3 at the line. Akins got the rebound off the third-down miss, got it to Fears to start the break, and the redshirt freshman lobbed it to Carr for an alley-oop that escalated the Breslin Center energy and noise level. Then Fears slid through traffic and connected on a midair layup, finishing the three-point play at the line where MSU had some trouble all day.

The other big offensive moment came when Fidler used his body control to lift for a jumper and foul Jakučionis with 6:39 left. The Illini guard had begun to take over in his final 58-second stint after returning with a three-point play and assist before picking up his fifth.

Back-to-back layups by Carr and Holloman made it 72-65 and prompted Underwood to call timeout with 5:16 to play and it appeared the Illini coach picked up a critical technical foul with 3:18 back that gave MSU two points on the Fidler free throw, but the coach said after the game it was a bench technical.

The Illini closed to within one point on a Morez Johnson Jr. layup and free throw in the final two minutes, but Akins hit a hard slant layup with 1:13 left. Illinois had one last chance and Boswell missed a free throw on purpose, but his follow-up shot with one second left was ruled illegal as it went over the backboard.

Fear threw the ball in to Cooper 3/4 the length of the court to run out the clock.

Contact Chris Solari: [email protected]. Follow him @chrissolari.

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