EAST LANSING – Carson Cooper stepped to the free throw line with plugs stuffed into a bloody nose after being on the receiving end of a flagrant foul.
Jaden Akins wasn’t feeling well before the game but that didn’t prevent him from locking down defensively in the second half while also hitting a triple and rattling the rim with a two-handed slam to spark a rally.
And then there was freshman guard Jase Richardson, who put together a career-best performance to key a comeback win for a shorthanded team down 14 at the half.
All this happened in No. 9 Michigan State’s 86-74 victory against Oregon on Saturday afternoon with program royalty watching from behind the bench. It was a gritty and fitting outcome the same day Tom Izzo’s 2000 national championship team was honored at the Breslin Center.
“When I sat there and looked behind the bench and those guys were all sitting there,” said Izzo, who tied Bob Knight’s record with 353 Big Ten wins, “it was a memory-making moment, to say the least.”
That comment was made after the Spartans rallied with a 50-point second half. At the same time Izzo was making adjustments in the locker room, stars from the 2000 squad were just outside the door reflecting on the 25th anniversary of the program’s second title.
“We didn’t play our best all of the time,” former All-American Morris Peterson said of the 2000 team during halftime on Saturday, “but we made sure that they didn’t play their best all the time when we could play defense and do the effort things and that’s something that coach Izz has instilled in us for years and it trickles down.”
Before returning to his courtside seat to witness a comeback, Peterson reached back a quarter century to his days in green and white. If it was the middle of the night and he wanted to get some shots up at the Breslin, a student manager would immediately answer the call and head over to meet him.
“That’s what it’s all about,” Peterson said. “Everybody was in it for each other and that’s why we won.”
Izzo was the architect of that team with Mateen Cleaves serving as the project foreman. The point guard embodied the leadership and grit his former coach still lauds to this day.
“It was not about who scored the most points, who got the most rebounds, it was about winning,” Cleaves said. “That’s all it was about – doing your job and help the team win a championship.”
A battle-tested squad that won the Big Ten three years in a row finally broke through by beating Florida for the 2000 title. Although Izzo has reached the Final Four eight times, that remains his only team to finish on top.
After tying Knight for the Big Ten wins record, Izzo downplayed the individual achievement but said he was going to dial back the intensity and enjoy the evening. A few minutes later, he was upstairs in the Breslin lobby named after him wearing a wide smile amid a private ceremony honoring the program’s former players, including the 2000 squad.
“That’s something I will never forget,” Cleaves said of the program rise culminating in a national title, “because there were two people probably crazy enough to think we could actually win a national championship.”
Cleaves, Peterson and Jason Richardson were in-state products who helped key Michigan State’s dominant run. Flash forward to Saturday afternoon and it was a new generation doing damage as Jase Richardson scored a career-high 29 in his first start.
“For Jase to come out have a big day like he did today,” Jason said, “I couldn’t have dreamed of that.”
The players who sparked Michigan State’s program resurgence bought stock early. They also built the foundation for one of the nation’s most-consistent programs that has reached the NCAA Tournament 26 straight years.
“I just hope that Spartan nation can appreciate our team because it was a lot of blood, sweat and tears, a lot of sacrifice,” Cleaves said. “I just hope people can really appreciate because it ain’t easy to do. A lot of stuff got to go your way obviously but we had a group, man, that trusted each other, believed in each other.”
The same group is now greying a bit but remains a cornerstone for the program. There’s a new generation clawing to make its own mark with Saturday’s win showing determination the 2000 team can appreciate.
“You talk about an ultimate team effort,” Izzo said about the win. “For me, it just doesn’t get any better than that.”