First-half run helps Michigan State basketball to sloppy, 78-68 win at Northwestern

Connor Earegood, The Detroit News on Jan 12, 2025

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EVANSTON, Ill. — Welsh-Ryan Arena erupted. Chris Collins called timeout. Jeremy Fears Jr. threw his hands up like a gladiator. As an Xavier Booker alley-oop gave the Michigan State men’s basketball team a 22-point lead to cap off a 27-5 run in the first half, a Sunday afternoon trip to Evanston felt like any another game at Breslin Center.

Michigan State needed that run, too. After a dominant first half, No. 16 Michigan State (14-2, 5-0) faded in the second half, but survived Northwestern 78-68 on the road. Despite a 27-point showing from Northwestern star Nick Martinelli, the Spartans' first-half run created just enough separation for the win.

Fourteen points from guard Jaden Akins broke the 1,000 mark in his career. Guard Jase Richardson chipped in 13 points for Michigan State, while Fears hit double figures with 11. Martinelli's 27 points led Northwestern.

As has been a habit as of late, Michigan State turned to the paint right away, feeding center Szymon Zapala at the post as he scored five of his team’s first seven points. Forward Jaxon Kohler contributed with strong passing on a career-high five-assist performance. But as Zapala got going, his teammates got a late start. The Spartans played sloppily, missing defensive assignments and giving up offensive rebounds to a scrappy Northwestern (10-6, 1-4) attack. And as Martinelli hit shot after shot en route to a 13-point first half, Michigan State couldn’t pull away with any substantial lead.

It took until halfway through the first half for Michigan State to pull away in any real sense, with a layup from guard Tre Holloman — the first fast-break points all game for the Spartans — putting his team up 21-16. Key to the play was the heads-up play of a maligned bench transfer, forward Frankie Fidler, whose shooting slump this season has taken him from the starting five to the 10th man off the bench. But in this game, Fidler was panacea to many of the Spartans’ woes.

On the defensive side, Fidler matched up well with Martinelli, limiting him to an and-one after scoring nine of Northwestern’s 16 points up to that point. And when he wasn’t on Martinelli, he took the other Wildcats star, Brooks Barnhizer, out of the action.

When the Spartans got those stops, scoring is where Fidler really showed his breakthrough. He moved the ball in transition, making a heady pass to Fears that led to Holloman’s separation layup. Then he scored on his own. A baseline drive led to a layup that crawled over the rim and in, giving Fidler a visible shot of confidence. His next shot — a jumper — landed flush. And if those didn’t fire up the transfer, then his late-man dunk to go up 32-19 had to have done the trick. And to think, the usual free-throw ace didn’t go to the line once in the first half.

By the time Booker made his dunk, the Spartans had pulled away to a 22-point lead, aided in part by seven points from Richardson. Northwestern shrunk the deficit with back-to-back 3s late in the half, but Michigan State still took a 47-28 lead to the locker room. The Spartans took the cheers of the crowd with them, too.

To start the second half, Martinelli heated back up with seven of his team’s first nine points. Barnhizer joined him on the stat sheet six minutes in with his first bucket. As Michigan State struggled to finish at the rim, Northwestern pushed its deficit back into the teens, making for a much more manageable game and winning back its portion of the crowd. And Martinelli didn’t cool off, either. He hit a big three with 11 minutes left, then center Matthew Nicholson (Clarkston) used his size advantage to score in the post.

But these buckets really didn’t matter much, because Michigan State matched them with makes of its own. Halfway through the second half, the Spartans looked up at the scoreboard and still saw a 17-point advantage from halftime, just one bucket off its halftime lead. But compared to such a strong stretch in the first, the stretch comparatively felt like a slump.

Give or take a basket, the game remained in this state until under four minutes remained in the game, when a timeout gave the Wildcats time to regroup. A Barnhizer second-chance layup cut put Northwestern down 11. With 46 seconds left, Martinelli hit two free throws to trail by single digits. In the end-of-game sequences, Fears struggled to hit free throws in a game he went 3 for 7 from the line. But Akins sealed the win with free throws to end the game with a double-digit win.

But even if Northwestern won the second half, 40-31, to make it close, Michigan State's crowd-popping first-half run was just too much to overcome.

For the second straight game, and the ninth straight win, Michigan State showed its ability to put together dominant stretches early to down its opponents. While Sunday’s second half ended the game on a low, Michigan State survived in a building that can give ranked teams fits.

The win ties the best start since 2021-22, when the Spartans also began the season 14-2. Michigan State will have a chance to match it against Penn State on Wednesday night at Breslin Center.

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