Ad Disclosure
ESPN’s Seth Greenberg explains why Michigan State is the sleeper team of the tournament
Published:
Seth Greenberg isn’t sleeping on Tom Izzo and Michigan State in this year’s NCAA Tournament.
On Tuesday, Greenberg joined ESPN’s Get Up to talk about the start of this year’s March Madness tournament, with the First Four getting underway on Thursday. Asked about picking a sleeper team, the college hoops analyst says the Spartans have a good chance to surprise some team.
Greenberg pointed to Michigan State’s performance down the stretch, knocking off three ranked opponents and winning five of its final seven games of the regular season before suffering a Round 2 loss to Maryland in the B1G Tournament.
“Think about the wins that Michigan State has down the stretch,” Greenberg said. “Ohio State, Illinois, Michigan — you’re talking about two No. 1 seeds and a No. 2 seed. Why? Aaron Henry. He got it going in those games — 18 points a game, six rebounds, 45 (percent) from three. They defend better and they’re running people off the three-point line, which is so important. Michigan State, look for them for the upset over BYU.”
Michigan State will play a First Four game against UCLA on Thursday, with the winner playing No. 6 seed BYU. If the Spartans beat the Cougars, they would then play either No. 3 seed Texas or No. 14 seed Abilene Christian.
Even though this was a down year for the Spartans, everyone seems to know that Izzo’s teams are always capable of making deep runs in March. It’ll be an interesting team to keep an eye on this weekend.
Dustin grew up in the heart of Big Ten country and has been in sports media since 2010. He has been covering Big Ten football since 2014. You can follow him on Twitter: @SchutteCFB