Southern Utah Thunderbirds vs Michigan St. Spartans Box Score on Dec 09, 2017

The Sports Xchange
Dec 9, 2017

EAST LANSING, Mich. -- Sophomore forward Miles Bridges racked up 17 points, 11 rebounds and six assists and No. 3 Michigan State stretched its winning streak to eight games with an 88-63 victory over pesky Southern Utah on Saturday at the Breslin Center.

Freshman Jaren Jackson supplied 17 points and 13 rebounds, while Nick Ward also scored 17 points for the Spartans (9-1). Cassius Winston contributed 15 points and five assists.

The Spartans could rise to the top spot in the weekly rankings when the next Associated Press poll is released. No. 1 Duke lost to Boston College on Saturday and No. 2 Kansas fell to Washington on Wednesday.

Jadon Cohee, Dre Marin and Jacob Calloway each scored 12 points for Southern Utah (5-4). The Thunderbirds made 11 of 26 3-point attempts.

Michigan State led 42-30 at halftime. The Thunderbirds hung around by making 6 of 14 attempts from long range.

The Spartans got off to a sluggish start but back-to-back 3-pointers by Winston midway through the half gave them a 22-10 lead.

Calloway made a 3-pointer with four minutes left in the half to cut Michigan State's lead to 32-23. Ward made the first 3-point attempt of his career later in the half with the shot clock about to expire. Ward picked up a technical for trash-talking a short time later.

The Thunderbirds made a handful of 3-pointers in the first 7:35 of the second half, including one from Calloway that pulled them within five at 56-51.

Jackson's three-point play with 8:21 remaining nudged the lead back to 10, 66-56. An 18-3 Michigan State outburst put the game away.

NOTES: The teams were meeting for the first time. The Spartans are now 6-2 all-time against Big Sky Conference opponents. ... Michigan State has a 152-12 record in non-conference home games since Tom Izzo became head coach in 1995. ... The Thunderbirds get a week off before hosting Central Michigan on Saturday. The Spartans have a similar gap before facing Oakland (Mich.) at Detroit's Little Caesars Arena. ... Southern Utah needs one more victory to match last season's win total, when it finished 6-27 in Todd Simon's first season as head coach.