Huskers can't keep up with No. 9 MSU in 91-76 defeat

For the second game in a row, Nebraska traveled to the state of Michigan to play a top-10 opponent under complete buzz saw circumstances.

Just like last week at Michigan, the Huskers took on No. 6 Michigan State in a Senior Night game that the Spartans had to win in order to stay in the hunt for a Big Ten regular-season title.

Unlike in Ann Arbor, though, the final score wasn’t nearly as indicative of how the game actually played out.

After trailing by as many as 20 points to open the second half, Nebraska was able to fight back and pull as close as seven before finally running out of gas in a 91-76 defeat on Tuesday night in East Lansing, Mich.

James Palmer Jr. scored 30 points and Glynn Watson had 25, but it wasn’t enough to keep up with an MSU team that shot 53.3 percent and hit 12-of-24 from behind the arc. Two Spartans finished with career scoring nights, as Kenny Goins dropped 24 points and was 6-of-9 from downtown while Matt McQuaid finished with 22 and was 6-of-7 from the field.

After starting the season 11-2, Nebraska has now lost 11 of its past 13 games and falls to 15-15 overall, 5-14 in Big Ten play.

“They play like Big Ten Champions,” head coach Tim Miles said of Michigan State on his post-game radio show on the Husker Sports Network. “You have to credit them. Coach (Tom) Izzo and how hard they play and the things they do, and they shot the ball so well tonight… It’s hard to overcome.”

Watson scored eight of Nebraska’s first 10 points to start the night, but a quick 6-0 spurt gave Michigan State (24-6, 15-4) a17-12 lead midway through the first half.

That would eventually turn into a 19-2 run for the Spartans that pushed their lead up to 30-14 with just over eight minutes left in the half while the Huskers went more than six minutes without a field goal.

A layup by freshman Amir Harris, who got his first career start in place of the injured Thomas Allen (ankle), finally got NU on the board again with 6:55 left, but MSU would go on to outscore Nebraska 36-17 over the final 12:56 of the half and went into halftime with a comfortable 47-29 lead.

The Spartans shot 59 percent from the field, 9-of-14 from 3-point range, and made 13 of their last 16 shots to end the first half. That included Goins surpassed his previous career high of 19 points with 21 in the first 20 minutes of play.

Nebraska, on the other hand, was 31 percent from the floor with seven turnovers. Palmer and Watson scored 24 of its 29 points.

“We’re just short on numbers right now, unfortunately,” Miles said. “You look at it, we got 55 (points) out of the two seniors, and then we just didn’t get enough out of everybody else

Nebraska got something going with a 7-0 run to open the second half and pulled within 12, and a layup by freshman Brady Heiman cut it to 55-44 with 15:07 left to play.

A layup by Watson with 12 minutes to go got the deficit to its smallest margin since midway through the first half, and then Isaiah Roby’s free throw made it 62-55 with 11:37 remaining.

But a flagrant foul on sophomore Nana Akenten turned into a five-point MSU possession that helped push the Spartans’ lead back up to 69-55. That proved to be the turning point, as Nebraska never got within single digits again the rest of the way.

Roby posted 10 points, nine rebounds, five assists, and two blocks in the loss, while Harris was the only other Husker to make more than one field goal and finished with four points. Nebraska was 14-of-24 from the free throw line, while Michigan State was 15-of-17 and held a 41-32 edge on the glass.

“You have to credit Michigan State; they shot the ball so well that they just weren’t going to let us in,” Miles said. “We didn’t make enough free throws to chip away even more. Just think if we’d made even a reasonable amount of our free throws, instead of (being down) seven it was probably going to be one or two or even a tie ball game.”

Nebraska will return to action on Sunday for its regular-season finale and Senior Day against Iowa, which will tip-off at 1 p.m. CT and will be televised on Big Ten Network.

“We’ve still got fight left in us, and this kind of effort will do us well on Sunday,” Miles said.

1. Defensive woes showed up again

Stop me if you’ve heard this before: Nebraska went on the road and its opponent shot the arena lights out and an unexpected player had a career night. That scenario once again played out to a T on Tuesday night, as the Spartans – who did come in ranked second in the Big Ten in 3-point percentage (.381) and made threes per game (8.2) – came out firing from the opening tip and the senior Goins had his best scoring night as a Spartan. The 91 points were the third-most NU has allowed this season, and it marked the fourth game in a row that Nebraska has given up at least 75 points. It was also the third time in four games an opponent had shot 53 percent or higher.

2. It was a two-man show

Palmer and Watson put up impressive point totals in the final box score, but their big nights meant little because there was no one else on Nebraska’s roster to help pick up the slack. That duo not only scored 32 of NU’s first 39 points on the night, they combined to shoot 20-of-41 from the field while the rest of the team went 6-of-21. To his credit, Roby had 10 points and led the team with nine rebounds and five assists, but as far as putting the ball in the basket, there wasn’t nearly enough help.

3. Winston was contained, but still made his mark

Generally speaking, when you hold Cassius Winston to eight points on 4-of-9 shooting, including 0-for-3 on 3-pointers and missing his only free throw, you’re probably going to have a decent chance at knocking off Michigan State. But the junior point guard still managed to have a major impact on the game despite having an off night. Arguably the frontrunner for Big Ten Player of the Year, Winston also finished with 10 assists that resulted in 24 points for the Spartans. Give credit to Watson, who was the primary defender on Winston for the game and forced him to commit three turnovers. But guys like Winston are what separate teams like MSU from most everyone else.