Tom Izzo is searching for answers

Reading the postgame quotes, you would think Michigan State needed a buzzer beater to take down The Citadel. In reality, the Spartans won by 14, and The Citadel never got closer than 8 points in the second half, and never closer than 10 points in the last 10 minutes. Still, the frustration is understandable, because The Citadel is not a good team, and yet was able to grab 15 offensive rebounds (to be fair, MSU also had 15 boards on less misses, but hey, they're the perennial powerhouse here). Combined with The Citadel's outside shooting (40% from 3), and these guys posted 0.98 points per possession.

MSU's offense was tremendous in every area...except turnovers. Raymar Morgan had a great game with a 26/10 dub-dub on just 12 shots, but the 21.2 TO Rate is too high for this team to be posting against the likes of The Citadel, one of the worst teams in the country at forcing turnovers. As regular readers of Spartans Weblog know all too well, turnovers have been the achilles' heel of Izzo's teams for a few years now. And what's more frustrating is how mysterious they are. Last night, the box score makes clear who the main culprit was (the same guy we identified in our preseason preview), but Mr. Walton hasn't been the culprit in every game. As of now, my pet theory is that another big component is Goran Suton's minutes have been limited due to injury, and as a result the turnover-prone Marquise Gray has been seeing the floor more. In any event, Izzo will likely be searching for a cure all season.

Ohio State began its regression to the mean last night, pulling away at the end with a 81-68 win over Jacksonville in a 66 possession contest. Yep, that's right, for the first time this season an OSU opponent averaged over a point per possession. What's more is that Jacksonville actually shot 53% from inside the arc, which so far this season had been a no-fly zone monitored by the capable Dallas Lauderdale. In this contest, Lauderdale had 0 blocks, bringing his block percentage all the way down to 20%. But what the Buckeyes lacked in defense they made up for in offense. For just the 3rd time this season, OSU averaged over a point per possession themselves. And considering how well the Buckeyes shot, you can forgive me for thinking those rims were not regulation size. OSU shot 68% from 2 and 59% from 3, and were led by David Lighty's 21 points (on 8 shots). Shooting that well, it didn't matter that the Buckeyes only grabbed 3 offensive rebounds (true, there weren't a lot of offensive rebounds to be had, but this was still a very low number), or that they turned it over 15 times (22.7 TO Rate). Box score.