Lucas will drive team's success

In my short time covering the MSU men’s basketball team, one thing about head coach Tom Izzo has stood out more than anything else: He’s not easily excited.

Izzo doesn’t gush when his team blows out a team like Alcorn State, and doesn’t overreact when his team earns a gritty road win against a team like Texas. Instead, his demeanor remains patently indifferent after a win, indicative of a coach whose expectations can’t be met during the regular season, and certainly can’t be achieved during the nonconference schedule.

But after Saturday’s game against Oakland, Izzo simply couldn’t help himself. Like a proud parent, he enthusiastically sang the praises of his team, which he said competed hard and executed well under the ominous circumstances of playing so closely to Christmas.

Izzo was proud of each of his players, but it was clear that one player had separated himself from the rest of the pack, and he made sure that player received special recognition.

“I think that might have been Kalin (Lucas)’ best game as a Spartan,” Izzo said. “He won’t believe that, because he had 15 points and six assists, not 25 and 15, but he did exactly what I wanted him to do. He controlled the tempo, he showed poise and he got the ball to the guys that were open.”

Although Lucas didn’t flood the boxscore with dazzling statistics, he engineered MSU’s offense like a wizard. The soft-spoken sophomore agreed with Izzo that it was one of the best games of his career.

“I just came out here and played hard, competed, and just ran the team,” Lucas said. “That’s one thing coach looks for me to do, just to run the team and be solid. I just had a solid game today.”

Distributing the ball has been Lucas’ forté all season, and he’s beginning to take notice for it. Lucas leads the Big Ten with 6.5 assists per game, and more impressively, leads the nation in assist-to-turnover ratio among players with more than 20 assists this season.

In what figures to be a very competitive Big Ten, Lucas’ ability to create for his teammates could be the single most important factor in the Spartans’ success.

If he succeeds, MSU should find little resistance in its pursuit of its first Big Ten title since 2000-01.