EAST LANSING — When Jase Richardson looks into the stands Saturday, he’ll see his father, Jason. Alongside a whole bunch of “uncles” who also know what the Michigan State basketball freshman is going through.
It’s the family coach Tom Izzo has built over 30 years.
The elder Richardson and his 2000 Spartan teammates will be honored guests and among the former players back for the alumni reunion weekend as No. 9 MSU hosts Oregon (noon, Fox).
“When alumni come back, you want to show them that what they were doing back then is still being taught today and is still being executed today,” junior forward Jaxon Kohler said after practice Thursday. “And that’s something we have in mind every game, but specifically alumni games. We want to show them, ‘Hey, we never forgot what you did for us and for this program.’
“It’s kind of our way of saying thank you for all the hard work that you put into this program, to make this reputation what it is today. And we want to make sure that they know that we’re trying to uphold those same standards as they did.”
And as Jason Richardson watches his son, as he has a few times this season, he will see a lot of himself in Jase — a talented freshman coming off the bench and trying to make a big-time contribution to a Big Ten title-chasing team.
One trying to again find stability after its first two-game losing streak of the season.
The Spartans (18-4, 9-2 Big Ten) snapped a 13-game win streak with back-to-back defeats at USC last Saturday and UCLA on Tuesday. In those two losses — 70-64 to the Trojans and 63-61 to the Bruins — MSU was held to two of its three lowest point outputs of the season. The Spartans also committed 29 turnovers combined, getting 18 total fastbreak points between the two games despite entering averaging 18.5 a game.
“I feel like we got a little unorganized,” Richardson said after practice Thursday. “We were taking our time bringing it up to court, and then we’d only had about 16, 18 seconds to get into our offense. So I feel like for us, we needed to push the ball more in those pressures. And unfortunately, it got us out of rhythm.”
Richardson, who played through knee pain and got the wind knocked out of him in the UCLA game, went just 2-for-12 on the trip and scored 12 points. The 6-foot-3 combo guard remains second on the Spartans at 9.3 points per game while shooting a team-leading 40% from 3-point range and 52.3% overall.
Richardson, who had knee surgery in high school, said he and his teammates have focused on taking care of their bodies and minds after the long trip and first taste of adversity this season.
“I think when we got back, the first thing was recovery,” said Richardson. “It was a long five days. We were there for five days and played two games, and I think the first thing was recovery and just getting our bodies back and recovered to 100%. And now it’s dialing in and getting ready for Oregon.”
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MSU’s losses to former Pac-12 opponents also paused Izzo’s pursuit of tying Bob Knight for the record of Big Ten conference victories. He’ll have a third chance to equal Knight’s 353 wins Saturday with many of the players who built his program in Breslin Center. Along with winning the Spartans’ last national championship, much of that group of early Izzo recruits went to three straight Final Fours between 1999-2001 and won four straight regular-season conference titles.
“Now they can bring their wives and kids. Some of their kids are players — I got one of them,” Izzo said Thursday. “It’s fun to see them grow. It’s fun to see what they’ve done with their careers, most of them are making pretty good lives for themselves. It’s a proud moment, and it’s an exciting moment for me to know that that group really is the group that started the Tom Izzo era. And I will be eternally grateful.”
A win Saturday would give Izzo an opportunity at home Tuesday night to surpass Knight’s record against his former program, Indiana. But first, MSU must beat Oregon (16-7, 5-7) and impress Richardson’s dad and the rest of the championship team. All while continuing their own quest for the program’s first Big Ten title since 2020, which would tie Izzo with Knight and former Purdue coach Ward “Piggy” Lambert with 11.
“We want to win every game. I mean, we wanted to win those games in California, they just didn’t go our way,” Kohler said. “Obviously, our next game, we want to win it. And to have it on alumni weekend and for coach’s record and here, that just kind of puts a cherry on top. We’re gonna get this win for coach, and we’re going to get this win for the alumni. And we’re gonna get it for what we couldn’t accomplish out west.”
Oregon, which has lost four straight and five of six, dropped an 80-76 game Wednesday at No. 22 Michigan. Coach Dana Altman’s team has three players scoring in double figures, led by 12.7 points and 7.2 rebounds from 7-foot senior forward Nate Bittle. All five starters average 9.7 or more points, but the Ducks are getting outscored by five points per game in Big Ten play, 76.8-71.8.
“One of the more offensively talented teams that there is,” Richardson said of Oregon. “They got some really good scorers, so we gotta dial in defensively.”
It’s MSU’s first game against the Ducks since a 74-70 win on Nov. 26, 2022, at the PK85 in Portland, Oregon. The series is tied 2-2 all-time, with this being the first non-neutral court meeting and the first as a Big Ten game.
“The mood has been (about) getting back on the court and getting ready for this game Saturday,” Richardson said. “We’re all kind of frustrated how the trip went — 0-2 wasn’t what we expected going into that trip. … I feel like we got one of the best atmospheres in the country, and it’s always fun playing at home in front of the crowds, especially in the Big Ten.”
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan State vs Oregon prediction with 2000 title team watching
