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MINNEAPOLIS — They know the difficult task at hand familiarly. Particularly since it hasn’t even been two weeks since Michigan State basketball’s big men last faced Zach Edey.
Since then, the Purdue star captured another Big Ten player of the year award. Meantime, the Spartans’ revolving door on the low block continues to spin.
But the key for Xavier Booker, Carson Cooper, Jaxon Kohler and Mady Sissoko remains the same: try and slow down Edey to give No. 8 seed MSU a chance at the upset against the top-seeded Boilermakers in Friday’s rematch.
The Spartans (19-13) pulled away from gritty No. 9 seed Minnesota on Thursday afternoon, 77-67, to set up the quarterfinal showdown against No. 3 Purdue (28-3).
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Their reward? Facing the 7-foot-4, 300-pound Edey for the second time in two weeks. The Boilermakers won the first one, 80-74, in West Lafayette, Indiana, on March 2 to clinch a second straight Big Ten regular-season title. They have won the last four in the series against the Spartans and eight of the last nine meetings.
“Losing that game was really hard,” said Kohler, who had season-highs against the Gophers with seven points and 20 minutes while equaling his season-best of six rebounds. “But at the same time, we had a sense that it’s not impossible. And I feel like there’s a lot of guys on our team that have a fire, ready to come and try to play them again. We’re all gonna be ready for it.”
In his past three games against MSU, the reigning national player of the year has scored 102 points on 37-for-65 shooting with 41 rebounds. Edey also is 28-for-39 at the free-throw line in those meetings.
In the most recent matchup, Edey went 14-for-20 at the line and scored 32 points with 11 rebounds. However, the Spartans pestered him with double-teams from their guards and kept the game close in the second half.
“I think the main thing for him is trying to not let him get so deep in the paint, because that’s where he’s most effective at, getting really deep in the paint,” said Booker, who scored 11 in the first meeting with Purdue and against Minnesota had six points and three rebounds. “So we just gotta kind of keep him up towards the free-throw line, and I feel like we’ll be good.”
MSU led by as many as eight points in the first half at Purdue, then trailed by as many as 15 early in the second half. The Spartans rallied back within three points with inside 9 minutes to play but couldn’t get any closer down the stretch.
MSU also struggled against Boilermaker sophomore guards Braden Smith and Fletcher Loyer, who combined to make 8 of 10 from 3-point range. Smith had 23 points, nine rebounds and three assists, while Loyer scored 15 points. The rest of Purdue’s players combined for 10 points beyond Edey, Smith and Loyer.
Smith joined Edey on the All-Big Ten first team earlier this week, and Izzo believes the point guard “has made a big, big difference’ for the Boilermakers this season.
“They’re good,” Izzo said. “I mean, they’re the best team in the league, I think they’re one of the best teams in the country. Because they’re well-coached, and they have versatility — they can beat you different ways. I mean, if Edey was out, are they the same team? No. But can they win without him playing great? I think they can, because I think they got enough other weapons.”
Since facing Purdue, Izzo has started three different centers in the past four games.
Sissoko started against Edey at Purdue but played just six scoreless minutes while battling foul trouble. The 6-9, 250-pound senior started MSU’s win over Northwestern four days later, but he played just 9 minutes in that one, the most recent of his 26 starts this season. Sissoko came off the bench for 9 minutes and two points at Indiana and played only one scoreless minute in the first half Thursday against the Gophers.
Booker started against the Hoosiers but struggled defensively, then Kohler opened the second half of that 65-64 loss to close the regular season Sunday. Against Minnesota, Izzo gave Cooper his fifth start of the season but his first since Dec. 5 against Wisconsin.
Those three youngsters each had moments against the Gophers.
Booker, who backed up senior Malik Hall on Thursday, had a pair of dunks after entering the game early then added a third later in the first half for his six points. The 6-11 freshman also contributed two steals, one in his 10 first-half minutes and one in his five-minute scoreless second half.
“We all prepared for the game pretty well,” Booker said. “We obviously had our game plan for (the Gophers), so I think we all executed it. I think we started off the game pretty well.”
Cooper struggled offensively, scoring three points with five rebounds, but played physically on defense. Though he got to the free-throw line twice early, the 6-11 sophomore missed three of his four attempts there and also missed a hook shot on a designed set play for him near the end of the first half. Cooper grabbed four of his rebounds before halftime, and his only bucket came at the outset of the second half.
That’s because much of the second half belonged to Kohler, who logged 12 minutes and flashed at both ends of the floor. After missing the first 14 games this season after October foot surgery, the 6-9 sophomore on Friday showed deft footwork around the basket on a pair of up-and-under layups, one in each half. Then with Minnesota attempting to mount a late comeback, Kohler crashed the boards to tip in a Tyson Walker missed layup with 1:50 to play.
Those two things, half-court post-ups on the block and interior clean-up work off misses from the guards, are things MSU’s offense has lacked all season. It helped that Kohler said he hit the reset button and “kind of just took a breath” coming into the Big Ten tournament.
“Whatever happened in the regular season, that happened. Move on, and that’s history. There’s no point in looking back on it with regret,” said Kohler, who entered averaging 1.6 points and 1.8 rebounds while shooting only 39.4%. “The only thing you can do, if you’re gonna look back on it, is add it to the fire for motivation. And that’s what I did.”
That same process of seeking redemption also will serve as the fuel for Friday’s rematch with Purdue, another opportunity to show the NCAA tournament selection committee that MSU is much closer to the team people believed they were in the preseason than the one which has struggled in close games all winter.
“I think all of us here are just ready,” Cooper said. “I think we feel like we owe them. We gave them a good a good run at their place — a tough atmosphere, and we gave it to them and we made it a competitive game. … We didn’t play them too long ago, so it’s still pretty fresh.”
Contact Chris Solari:csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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