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The State News sports reporters discuss all MSU sports.
Hello, and welcome back to the sports roundtable podcast. I'm your host Bella. And today it is going to be just me last show of the semester, so I thought that we could do a little bit of a recap of what's been going on this year. So we're gonna start off really quick with Hockey. Hockey is a whole different story from last season, I think I know I've talked about it before, the team has made a complete 180 from last season, obviously new coach a bunch of new players, but even when you look back and you think about players who were here last year, they are playing at a completely different level. And that just is a
testament to the way that coach Knight and Gallup has been able to develop his players. Like take Jagger Joshua, for instance, he this season, he had more goals. I believe that in the past three years he's played at Michigan State like That's insane. And you can see it with a bunch of other players as well. And obviously this new era of Michigan State hockey brought so many more fans back to mine. It's the season started off kind of slow. There weren't many people in the building. But by the end of the season, I think I believe the last six games were sold out and the energy was incredible. Obviously, you look towards the end of the season, the team had their first playoff win against Notre Dame, and they made it out of that first series, eventually to lose to Minnesota. I don't think that last Minnesota is something that you should hang your hat upon. Minnesota is a great team made it to the Frozen Four. I believe they made it to the championship game. Yeah, they did. So I don't think that's a loss to to get hung up on it.
Somebody was going to lose to Minnesota eventually. And I think just the way that the team panned out this year, we're in for a really, really exciting year next year. A few players have entered their name in the transfer portal. Like Jesse Tucker, Pierce Charlson, and Zach Dubinsky. Jesse Tucker's gonna be playing at Clarkson next year. And then Zach Dubinsky, I believe is going to Vermont. Moving on to women's basketball, they had a very eventful year, to say the least. I mean, it started off pretty strong. They had that great upset over winter break against number five, Indiana. They were playing decently well, they weren't necessarily winning games, but they were playing at the same level that some of the top teams were playing. And you could see that during the Iowa game. I went to overtime. They were in that game till the very end. And I think they had a very, very good start to the season. And then obviously at the end of January, Coach merchant got in an accident due to a medical incident, which led to associate
head coach Jim Lockwood, taking over as the interim head coach. So he was that in that position till the end of the year. And then unfortunately, after the end of the season, after the loss to Indiana in the second game of the big 10 tournament. It was announced that coach merchant would be stepping down due to health reasons and that coach Robin frolic would be taking her place. So Coach Fralick is coming from Bowling Green, and she announced that she's bringing a lot of her staff with her. So there are four of the new staff members are going to be coming with Fralick from Bowling Green, which would be Associate Head Coach Ken Cameron, assistant head coach, Maria Casca, and director of art director of recruiting Joel Weimer and director of basketball operations Monique Rosati. So those are four new faces that are going to be behind the Michigan State Women's bench this year. There will also be assistant head coach Marvin Miller and he came from Minnesota. He said it's been one year with the Golden Gophers. And before that, he was an assistant coach for Ohio University. All these coaches are bringing so much to the table, especially with the Bowling Green staff that she is bringing with her.
They've had a huge turnaround in their program spearheaded by that staff. It'll be really, really exciting to see what they do here. And then a familiar face that is going to remain on staff is going to be Dean Lockwood. He is Moving down from associate head coach, he's going to end up the director of player development. When coach frolic announced her staff, this is just like a fun little tidbit of information. She talked about how coach Lockwood was one of her husband's college basketball coaches, and it's nice that they have that connection. I think it's going to allow them to work well together. And it'll be it'll be nice to see a familiar face behind the bench. And I think especially for players that are going to be returning, and obviously new coach, lots of changes that are going to be some transfers. So as of right now Matilda AK tire parks and Jayla James entered the transfer portal. And parks are going to be huge, huge losses for the Spartans, Matilda, AK is going to end up or she committed to Virginia Tech. And then parks and James are still up in the air. But all three of them played Super important roles on the team
and it's definitely going to be tough without them. All right, on the men's side of things, it was a very it was a solid season. It was a pretty good season. I don't think it's anything astonishing. I don't also don't think it's anything to be to frown upon. They did a really great job this year. They went up against some really tough teams, especially at the beginning of the season. You see Gonzaga, Kentucky, Villanova, Alabama, that first stretch was tough. And I'm, I'm pleased with how they came out of it. They came out with wins against Kentucky, Villanova really, really close last to Gonzaga, that was that aircraft carrier game. winning against Oregon went against Portland, and then a loss to Alabama. But moving into conference play, they started off with that loss against Northwestern, which was definitely not the way to start the conference season. But after that, they went on a pretty long win streak all the way from December 7 to January 10. So that was over a month. consistently throughout the season, we saw the men's team having huge issues with dominant bigs at the center position you saw it with like Ed, you
saw it with tres Jackson Davis. That is just something that from the get go, they had a really hard time defending and produce going to be without Zach Ed next year in Indiana is going to be without Jackson Davis, it'll be interesting how the big 10 is going to shape up with without those two like super dominant players. But I believe the schedule came out for next season, and Purdue and Indiana are Both gonna be games on the road. Those are two tough arenas to play in. So it's definitely gonna be a testament to their character. A team was playing super well during the tournament, I think they were making shots, they were defending really well, which I think is something that they struggled with earlier in the season. But obviously, they didn't have any dominant big players that they had to defend, which is something that they found troublesome in big 10 play. But at I mean, the season ended, they went farther than I
personally expected them to, I thought that they were going to go home and that Marquette game, but they ended up pulling through going farther than I expected them to. But even by by the end of that game. I felt like there was just something left like that. I don't know, there was like unfinished business, there was something more. So it's going to be really exciting to see them play next year. They have incredible recruits coming in. I've said it a million times. And I'll say it a million times again. Tyson Walker and Willie call Both announced that they're going to be staying, which is huge for leadership aspect play aspect offensively and defensively. It's really, really important to have them to are those two back and then this past week or two, AJ Hougaard and Jane Aikens declared for the draft, a huge distinction that they made in their posts was that they are holding on to their college eligibility. So oftentimes, you'll see players when they do something like that. They're just looking to, like, hear what scouts think of them, get a feel for where they're at. And the draft and all of that good stuff. And even Tom Izzo said previously that he thought that those two were going to put their name in just to hear it out, but he did expect them to come back and I I do as well, I don't think either of them would or I I think Both of them would benefit from another year in college, I think they have more growing to do, they're obviously going to get more play time. And they're two, they're two great players.
I'm not saying that they're not good enough to play in the NBA, I just think that Both of them are going to gain more from another year at least. And then we also recently saw the transfer of pure Brooks, he's gonna end up at Butler, I think that's probably the best option for him. He's a great player. I just don't think with the roster that the team is going to have next year that he was going to get much playing time. And I think for him as a player, he needs more time on the court to develop. And he I, I don't believe that he was going to get that here. So all of us for him, I think Butler's gonna be a great fit. And I'm excited to see what he does. The final team that I'm going to recap, is the gymnastics team because they had the most outstanding season out of, I would say any Michigan State sport, particularly this year. I mean, they ended the year with a 80.6% win percentage, which is huge. They fell behind just six teams, only one of the conference, undefeated at home, they had a really, really good year. It started off with a loss to Alabama, which was tough considering that Alabama's the team that edge them out of Nationals last year. They started off with that loss to Alabama. And then they just took off running.
I mean, they were at NC State with a win a travel back home for Michigan for their home opener, and had a huge win there. That was their first win over Michigan since 20, or 2006, I believe 2006 or 2007. Michigan was ranked number three at the time I believe. And a win against Maryland when we went to Penn State. Their only conference last during the regular season was against Iowa. Iowa has a great team. That was an away game and I did not get to catch that match, but their score was a little lower than usual. It was a 195 seven to five. I'm not sure what happened because I wasn't there to see the meet. But it's definitely an unusually low score for them, particularly this year. They went to the Big Five meet and had a massive program record score 197 675. They previously set that record at regionals last season. So they broke that record at the Big Five meet then went up against Illinois. When that meetings occurred the regular season a big 10 championship is the first time they did it. It was a huge deal. So they got that big 10 championship on the road against Illinois. They were co big 10 champions with Michigan, Both having lost just one big 10 team to try me over at Eastern Michigan against Long Island, Eastern Michigan defeated Both of those teams. And then this is the meet where it just like went crazy. So this was the Bowling Green Long Island try me at home. So it started off with freshmen Nikki Smith getting a perfect 10 on the vault, it was the first 10 of the season. And then joy jacket also got a 10 on the uneven bars. She was the first bar in ever to get a perfect 10 on bars.
They set records on vault bars and beams and tied their program record on the floor. And then obviously with that huge 10 from Nikki Smith, she managed to set a new program record all around score with a 39 775. He also ended this meet with a new final program record of 198 2251 98 is like a massive number of gymnastics like if you hit 198 You are competing with the top dogs. And that when they were at the time, the eighth team to get a 198 this year, and they had the highest score of any team that particular week. was a really, really great meet for them. So they broke, yeah. They broke a lot of records this season that me in particular was just a very, very eventful one. They traveled to the big 10 Championship, where they got second behind Michigan with a 190 755 Another huge score from then and then Until regionals, they went to the Pittsburgh regionals. They started off at the second rounds, the first round is like a plan round. So they got second place in that first round to advance to the regional final round. And then that regional final round, they were edged out by just point one five of a point. Which is awful. It's it's hard to win. Gymnastics comes down to tenths of a point. And it's a matter of an extra stuck landing, not bending your legs on one jump like it's, it's, it comes down to the smallest little technicality. So all four teams that were there at that regional final were incredible teams. And I would say that all of them deserve to move on to Nationals. But it ended up being Florida and Cal Berkeley, who moved on to the National Championships in Texas. And the way that gymnastics works is if you don't, if your team doesn't qualify, there are specific ways that you can qualify as an individual either as an all round individual or on a specific event. So Both Gabby Stephen and Delaney Harkness got to travel as individuals to the national championship. Gabby, Stephen was competing on beam and then Delaney Harkness was competing on floor. So those four teams, their seasons are completely wrapped up. baseball, softball and tennis are still going going strong. Tennis, I believe just has the postseason left.
And then baseball and softball still have quite a few games left. Those seasons go pretty pretty decently in the summer. I don't think any other performances from any of Michigan State's teams this year, well, this semester. This semester, I need to frown upon. All four of these teams had great years. I would say that hockey and gymnastics were standout surprise years. I think they did extremely, extremely well, especially when you look back on the past few years. I but I think all of these teams are in the position to continue getting better. I don't, I cannot look at any of these teams and tell you that there's going to be like a couple years, a couple off years or a rebuilding year like all of these teams are looking pretty positive in my eyes. The biggest one up in the air obviously is women's basketball with a new coach and the new staff and some new players coming in. But I don't think it's anything frowned upon and I'm really excited to see where they go from here. And for the last time this semester, thank you so much for listening to the sports roundtable podcast. You can find it wherever you find your podcasts