Threesome makes Spartans hard to contain
Michigan State could be headed to the Final Four behind its potent upperclass threesome, Pat Forde writes.
Tom Izzo is among the top five coaches in college basketball today, maybe in the top three. But sometimes even the best in the business are guilty of game micromanagement.
Case in point: Wednesday night in Ann Arbor, Michigan State is down three in the dying seconds against rival Michigan. Center Paul Davis puts up a wild 3 -- a poor shot, but hey, he gets the ball back off a scramble. Then Davis spies teammate Maurice Ager on the wing in front of the Spartans bench and fires him a pass.
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Ager rises up and splashes the 3, ties the score breathes new life into Sparty. Overtime appears inevitable.
But wait a minute. That maniacal figure hopping around behind Ager, before the ball arrived and he took the shot? That was Izzo, calling timeout.
No basket. And when Ager missed a scripted 3 coming out of that timeout, it was game over. Major upset for the maize and blue.
This shows why college basketball would be a much better place if teams got three timeouts per game instead of five. (Maybe even two; one per half?) You'd have fewer players taking those odious, falling-out-of-bounds timeouts, and fewer coaches interfering with the flow of the game.
Izzo stood by his decision after the game, saying his team was "kind of discombobulated out there." There was some truth to that, but Michigan State has guys who can play through momentary discombobulation and make something beautiful out of it.
Their names are Davis, Ager and Shannon Brown. And they're the three-headed reason the Spartans can return to the Final Four.
A lot of teams have a one-two scoring punch, but nobody can score in triplicate like Michigan State. This is the only team in the country with three players averaging more than 17 points per game: Ager leads the way at 20.1, then Davis at 18.1, then Brown at 17.6 in Izzo's fast-break offense.
"They play at a pace that is definitely tough to defend for 40 minutes," said Indiana coach Mike Davis, whose team was lit up for 59 points earlier this month by the threesome. "Two of those guys are going to definitely be on every night. Anytime all three of those guys are on at the same time, there's no way you can beat them."
This was not the case last year, when Alan Anderson and Kelvin Torbert were part of the equation. Without them, Ager has increased his scoring by six points a game; Davis has added 7.3; and Brown has gone up 8.4. That's a huge upgrade by committee.
But points do not define all they do. The three are also combining for 17.6 rebounds, 7.9 assists, 3.4 steals and 1.5 blocks per game, and they force defenses to make difficult choices: sag on Davis and leave Brown and Ager loose on the wings, or close out and open up the paint?
"When you've got them running the wings and me down the middle, you can't cover all three of us," Davis said.
The power of three has taken Michigan State to a 15-5 record, 3-3 in the Big Ten. That's not as dazzling as Duke, UConn, Memphis or Texas, but it's also a bit deceptive.
The Spartans lost twice before Thanksgiving in Hawaii, the second an epic, 109-106, triple-OT defeat against Gonzaga in the Maui Classic -- the best game of the year nationally. Although having three Big Ten losses complicates State's title chances, all of those missteps came on the road, at Illinois, Wisconsin and Michigan -- and let it be known that nobody is winning on the road in this league this year.
The top seven teams in the Big Ten constitute the league's power base. As of Thursday, those seven teams are a combined 21-1 at home in league play. The lone home loss was by Ohio State -- against Michigan State (in double OT).
The Spartans face only one more ranked team on the road (at Indiana, Feb. 26), which means they should enter the postseason with significant momentum. And this group knows what to do in March, having made a surprise Final Four run last year.
Michigan State got to see in St. Louis how the power of three can carry a team a long way. Illinois rode the brilliant guard trio of Deron Williams, Luther Head and Dee Brown to the national title game last year -- where the Illini were conquered by a North Carolina team led by the troika of Sean May, Raymond Felton and Rashad McCants.
In both those cases, you're talking about juniors and seniors. Same with Sparty's party of three. Ager and Davis are seniors, and Brown is a junior. They know the game, know what Izzo wants and know what it takes to reach a Final Four.
Now they want it all.
"I think they're better this year because there's a real hunger from the three guys to win -- even more than from their coach," Izzo said. "I think that's a positive sign."
Said Davis: "The goal this year is to not go out. The goal is to win the championship. That's our only goal this year."
One of the key realizations this team has made in its quest for that goal is to run its initial offense through Davis. This year, the Spartans are 7-0 when Davis attempts at least 13 shots and 8-5 when he takes fewer. Conversely, State is 13-3 when Ager attempts fewer than 16 shots and 13-2 when Brown takes fewer than 16.
"After the Wisconsin game [an 82-63 defeat Jan. 8 in which Davis took just six shots], we knew we didn't get to Davis enough," Izzo said. "We realized our offense has to go through him because he, too, is a good passer."
What Davis has never been is a natural leader. His deep monotone voice makes Bob Newhart sound overstated, and his demeanor has matched. That was difficult for Izzo, whose molten intensity is plainly visible on the sideline, to handle.
"I think I took away years from his life, just coaching me the last couple years," Davis joked. "He was wondering every night, 'What's he going to do?' Now I think he has that trust. He knows what I'm going to do."
Now, maybe, the years are being returned to Izzo's life expectancy at the end of Davis' college career.
"It's been well-documented that Paul Davis has gone from maybe a softer player to a much more physical player, a much better leader, a much more vocal guy," Izzo said. " ... You become part of the environment you're in."
Izzo's on-court creator of that environment is Brown. He's the true heat source for this team, its emotional flame.
"I've got to be the energy guy," Brown said. "You might see me doing some little antics out there, getting the crowd involved, getting my teammates going. Whatever needs to be done to win the game."
Ager is the emotional tweener, but he's also in the running to be the team's two-time Most Improved Player. Last year, he established himself as a scorer, averaging 14.1 points per game; this year, he's scoring even more but rounding out his game.
He worked hard on his ballhandling and passing in the offseason. As a result, Ager has more assists than turnovers for the first time as a collegian. He's also a dependable rebounder (averaging a career-high 4.1 per game) and lethal on the break.
"My decision making is better," Ager said. "That comes from watching film and from experience."
Izzo should now know from experience that when one of his big three has the ball in his hands at a crucial moment, don't call timeout. Let 'em play, and there's a good chance Michigan State walks out a winner.
Pat Forde is a senior writer for ESPN.com. He can be reached at ESPN4D@aol.com.
