After a tough loss earlier in the week against Penn State, the Rutgers Scarlet Knights suffered yet another disappointing loss to the nation’s eighth-ranked team, the Michigan State Spartans, at Madison Square Garden.
The Scarlet Knights started out firing on all cylinders with the crowd behind them, jumping out to an early 10-3 lead against the Spartans. But as the game progressed the Spartans settled in and started playing more defense and it became difficult for the Scarlet Knights to keep up as they were held to a 33% field goal percentage for the contest.
After one half of play, the score was pretty close with the Spartans only having a three-point lead. As the second half started things took a turn as it was all Spartans from that point forward, they jumped out on a run and led by as much as 13 with 01:55 to go in the contest ultimately winning the contest 81-74.
This loss puts Rutgers’s record at 10-10 for the season with a 3-6 record in the Big Ten conference, with only 11 games left, they will look to make a push to get into the Big Ten tournament and potentially the NCAA tournament in March.
Star Freshman Dylan Harper was struggling with an ankle injury he suffered in the last outing, and that limited him to only playing 13 minutes, in which he scored 6 points.
After the game, Rutgers head coach Steve Pikiell spoke on the team’s latest injury bug and the toughness shown by the freshman Harper to even play in this game.
“We are banged up right now; I didn’t even think Jordan was going to play… Dylan Harper did everything possible to try and get back to play for this game… I’m proud of him to give it a try”, said Pikiell.
Jordan Derkack was also dealing with an injury but started in Harper’s place and led the team in scoring with 26 points on 7-11 shooting and 4-7 from the three.
Meanwhile, Ace Bailey, the other Star freshman for the Scarlet Knights, struggled with his shot, shooting 4-17 from the field, totaling 19 points on the game with nine rebounds.
Ace Bailey and Jordan Derkack spoke on playing in this type of atmosphere at Madison Square Garden in front of a crowd of over 17,000.
“I’m a Jersey kid, so playing at MSG today was really cool for me… Our fans traveled today, they got out here… it was loud,” said Jordan
“A lot of people don’t get to play in the Garden; it was my first time playing in the Garden… to play in front of 17,000 Rutgers fans… it was dope, it was fun, they gave us life towards the end when we started trapping and everything, we were feeding off the energy they were giving us,” said Bailey
Coach Pikiell spoke on the outlook of the season so far, a season that had a lot of hype and optimism coming into it.
” You have to win the games; this is the best league in the country… you have to beat the Michigan State’s… it’s a journey, we’ve started four freshmen… you gotta earn wins… There’s still plenty of season left; we can go on a little run here, I think we’re close, I’m proud of these guys,” said Pikiell.
After the game, the Scarlet Knights were complimented for their efforts in the contest by Michigan State’s legendary head coach Tom Izzo.
” It’s not as easy as everybody thinks… I’ve been impressed with Steve, and now he’s starting four freshmen. I don’t care where you are or how good your players are, that’s a hard thing to do… Dylan is a hell of a player, that was an advantage for us he wasn’t out there today even though the other kid (Derkack) went off … we did a decent job on Bailey, but he’s really good… I’m telling you he’s (Piekell) a hell of a coach, trust me, ” said Izzo.
