2017-18 Michigan State: The Bad and the Ugly
The Spartans had 2 distinct stretches of poor play, with many common themes. What doomed the Spartans in these contests?
This is the 2nd in a 3 part series about the 2017-18 Michigan State Spartans. Part 3 will be released on Monday, Dec 14. Check out my archive to read Part 1 and my articles on other teams.
As I mentioned in my introductory article about 2017-18 Michigan State, they had 2 stretches in the season where they played all 7 of their worst games. The first was between Jan 7-13 when they played Ohio State, Rutgers, and Michigan; the Spartans went 1-2 with the 1 win requiring overtime against Rutgers. The second stretch was between March 2-18 when they played Wisconsin and Michigan in the Big Ten Tournament, and Bucknell and Syracuse in the NCAA Tournament. The Spartans were 2-2 in this stretch, with the wins by 7 total points over a Wisconsin team with a losing record and a Bucknell team that got a #14 seed in the NCAA Tournament.
All told, in this 7 game stretch the Spartans went 3-4, with none of the 3 wins by more than 4 points and none over a team ranked higher than 70th by KenPom. The 4 losses were by 39 total points, with only 1 by less than 10 points; that loss was by 2 points to a Syracuse team given an 11 seed in the NCAA Tournament. Michigan State posted an adjusted margin of +4 points per 100 possessions over this stretch (excluding garbage time), compared to +28 for the full season; that’s the difference between a top-5 caliber team and one rated about 125th. What went wrong in this stretch for the Spartans?
Falling apart late
The biggest issues were that Michigan State’s shooting, especially 3 point shooting, fell apart and the Spartans became foul-prone. Michigan State was 13th nationally in 3 point FG% at 40% for the season, but hit just 29% during these 7 games combined. They only broke 31% in 1 of the 7, against Rutgers. Michigan State failed to hit 31% of their 3s in a game 9 times all season, and 6 of them were in this stretch.
The fouling was not really a cause of poor play, but more of a symptom. Because so many of these games involved Michigan State trailing in the last minute, they had to foul to try to extend the game. If you looked at the final box scores, you might see that Michigan State shot only 138 free throws compared to 165 for their opponents and think that overzealous referee whistles doomed the Spartans, especially since Michigan State outshot their opponents from the line by 248-153 in their other games combined. But the fouling was caused by the fact that the Spartans were trailing. During the first 35 minutes of these games, Michigan State was no more foul prone that they were in games they played well. It was the closing stretches where they sent opponents to the line, futilely trying to come back from deficits.
While the Spartans were trailing with 5 minutes left in 3 of their 4 losses in this stretch, in only 1 were they truly out of the game. But in every single one of these games they failed to outscore their opponents, turning comfortable wins into dramatic escapes and sending thmselves tumbling out of the NCAA Tournament. The issue was that the Spartans forgot how to shoot, and their opponents did the opposite of that:
This massive disadvantage in shooting accuracy doomed the Spartans. They got outscored by 23 points just on attempts from the field in these closing stretches. Considering they were outscored by 29 points total over this stretch, the problem was more field goal shooting than getting burned at the foul line. So what caused these twin offensive and defensive collapses late?
Smaller lineups proved less effective
In the closing stretch of these games, Michigan State went to smaller lineups with 1 big man much more often. They played with 1 big man on 57 of their 80 possessions (71% of the time) compared to just about 40% for the full season. These lineups were largely disastrous, losing by 28 points. Looking through the data and watching what film of these games I could find online, I noticed two main issues:
1) Rushed offense: Michigan State led the nation in percentage of field goals that were assisted. They relied on solid ball movement, which led to a lot of catch-and-shoot threes. 91.4% of Michigan State’s three point makes were assisted on the year, a number that ranked 15th in the country. But when Michigan State turned to smaller lineups late during these games, they took more threes off the dribble than usual. For example, against Wisconsin in the Big Ten Tournament Michigan State went 1-6 on threes in the last 5 minutes. 4 of these 6 threes were classified as “off the dribble” instead of “spot up” by Synergy; the Spartans went 0-4 on those.
The strange thing about this is that Spartan lineups with 1 big man had no trouble running their offense during the rest of the season. These lineups hit 41% of their threes and assisted on 68% of their made baskets, plus 95% of their made three pointers. But when they got impatient, bad things happened.
2) Matador defense: Playing just 1 big man sacrificed some of the Spartans advantage during the season as the premier shot blocking team in the nation. Michigan State allowed opponents to take just 34% of their shots at the rim and to hit just 46% of them; that latter figure was 2nd in the country. When playing 1 big man, Michigan State was almost as effective, limiting opponents to 48% shooting at the rim. But during the closing stretches of their worst games, the Spartans allowed opponents to take 44% of their shots in the paint and hit an unreal 91%. Watching film, it appears the issue was guards allowing the ballhandlers to get by them unimpeded and get into the lane. There may have been a psychological effect from 1) trailing in games and/or 2) missing shots on offense. Whatever caused the lack of defensive focus, it got compounded by giving up so many quality shots to opponents.
Oddly enough, 1 big lineups were tremendously effective in the first 35 minutes of these very same games, and in these exact areas! They were +17 in 148 possessions earlier in these games, hitting 49% of their threes and limiting opponents to 56% in the paint. But it just didn’t carry over to the end!
When Michigan State found themselves trailing or in a tight game late, they often turned to smaller lineups. However, these lineups failed to execute in these situations at the same level they did in the rest of the season. A combination of rushed outside shots on offense and lapses in on-ball defense doubly doomed Michigan State to a series of poor performances, and ultimately ended their season.
The strange thing about this is that many observes thought the Spartans were at their best with 1 big man in the game that season. That may include the coaching staff, since they leaned heavily on these groups when in trouble. In my next Hoops Hindsight article, I’ll looked at how Michigan State managed their big man rotation and why so many wanted the Spartans to play small more often.