Post-Game Notes - Ohio State
2/14/2015 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
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EAST LANSING, Mich. -
• Michigan State has won 28 of the last 42 games in the series versus Ohio State and the Spartans now lead the all-time series, 68-57, including a 43-17 advantage in games played in East Lansing.
• With Saturday's 59-56 score, seven of the last eight games, including the last four in East Lansing, have been decided by four points or less.
• MSU is now 23-14 against OSU under head coach Tom Izzo.
• Saturday was MSU's first win this season over a ranked opponent.
• The Spartans improved to 12-4 at home on Valentine's Day and are now 14-10 on Feb. 14.
• Junior guard Denzel Valentine's game-winning three-pointer with 3.2 seconds was his fifth of the game, his most in a game this season during Big Ten action and one shy of his career-high, but was Valentine's fourth-straight game with four or more treys and third game this season with five or more ... Valentine is now shooting .486 (17-35) from three-point range in the last four games after shooting .289 in the previous eight league games.
• With a game-high 17 points, Valentine scored in double-figures for the fourth game in a row and the 19th time this season, as MSU is now 13-9 when he score in double-figures ... It was Valentine's 40th career double-figure outing and the Spartans are 31-9 when he scores in double-figures.
• Senior forward Branden Dawson registered his eighth double-double of the season and 20th of his career with 15 points and 11 rebounds ... He has logged a double-double in seven of 12 Big Ten games this season ... MSU is now 6-2 this season and 16-4 during Dawson's career when he logs a double-double ... Dawson has posted a double-double in three of the last five games ... He has snared double-figure rebounds in 10 of MSU's 12 Big Ten games.
• Dawson's 11 rebounds Saturday moves him to a tie for 10th place on MSU's career rebounds list, matching Lindsay Hairston with 803 rebounds.
• Dawson swatted a career-high five blocks Saturday and was his fifth game in a row with multiple blocks, including three or more in the last three games ... The five blocks is a season-high for any Spartan player, as MSU had four previous games with a player logging four blocks.
• The five blocks gives Dawson 117 rejections for this career, tying former Spartan great and current NBA player Draymond Green, who was in attendance Saturday, for third on MSU's career blocks list.
• With four assists Saturday, Dawson also tied his season-best and was one shy of his career-high.
• Senior guard Travis Trice dished out a team-high five assists, marking his sixth-straight game with three or more helpers.
• Freshman guard Lourawls "Tum Tum" Nairn, Jr., tallied seven points and dished out four assists, logging his second-highest point total, while his four helpers was his highest in a Big Ten game.
• Michigan State dished out 19 assists for the second-straight game and the third in the last four games.
• The Spartans improved to 15-2 this season when leading at halftime.
• Saturday was just the second time this season that MSU and its opponent were tied in the rebounding category and the Spartans are now 2-0 when they have equal boards with the opposition.
• Saturday was also MSU's first win this season when scoring less than 60 points, but improved to 11-1 when allowing less than 60 points.
• MSU's 4-7 free throw shooting ties a season-low for makes and is a season-low attempts from the charity stripe.
