EAST LANSING — Jaden Akins has taken over, hoping to put an end to it Michigan State Basketball game Sunday at Northwestern with a victory.
The 23-point lead had been cut to single digits with less than a minute to play. The senior made three trips to the line, calmly making each of his six free throws.
Ball game.
In the days leading up to the Spartans’ 78-68 final victory over the Wildcats, Akins learned he was nearing the 1,000-point mark. He didn’t care.
“Someone told me I was nearby,” Akins said outside the locker room at Welsh-Ryan Arena. “I told him, ‘Don’t tell me how far away I am.’
Akins entered the game with 10 points to become the 57th player in MSU history to hit a big. The two he hit with 34.6 ticks remaining crossed the line, the last four securing his main goal: a ninth straight victory.
The Farmington native called reaching the individual mark a “blessing” but preferred to focus on keeping the Spartans on track to pursue the higher goals he helped set early in his last season.
“I just want my teammates to know that I never get too high or too low,” Akins, who finished with 14 points despite going 3-for-11 from the field, said after Monday’s practice. “In the middle of games, in moments, sometimes we do a lot of good things and it’s easy to think, ‘Oh, we’re just good for the rest of the game,’ even with a lot of play left. And then when you’re depressed, you can’t think you will ever be depressed, you have to think you can get through it so I think staying calm and level-headed helps a lot.
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MSU (14-2, 5-0) returns home atop the Big Ten standings as it prepares to host Penn State (12-5, 2-4) on Wednesday. Tip-off is at 7:30 p.m. (Big Ten Network) at the Breslin Center.
A big reason for the strong start — aside from Coen Carr’s electric dunks, the emergence of freshman Jase Richardson and the tenacity of point guard Jeremy Fears Jr. — has been the play and leadership of Akins, composed and stable.
The 6-foot-4 captain leads MSU’s all-around scoring effort with 14.1 points per game. And after a rough start from the outside to start the season for the second year in a row, Akins bounced back from the slump and drained 37.2 percent of his 3-point attempts over the final eight games. He hit two more in three attempts Sunday despite his overall shooting struggles.
“It’s really important because you have to have someone at the end of the day who can keep your team focused and focused on their goals,” said Richardson, MSU’s second-leading scorer at 9.7 points per game. “So having someone like Jaden who can keep us balanced in big moments is key.”
The last time MSU won nine in a row was Akins’ first year in 2021-22. The Spartans were 14-3 and 5-1 in league play at this point three years ago after beating Minnesota on January 12, 2022. They would lose the next home game to Northwestern, beginning a downward spiral in losing 10 of their last 19 games to finish 23-13 overall and out of contention for a conference championship at 10-9.
It’s a lesson that has helped make Akins a leader this season, and something he wants his teammates to be aware of at this stage of success.
“It helped me a lot, with the experiences I had in the first three years and the different types of games I played in,” Akins said. “I feel like it’s helping me throughout the matches I’m having right now. My first year, we had a hot start like that, and then things started to go downhill from there. So I just want to take this experience and not do the same thing and just continue what we’ve been doing.
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Fears, a redshirt freshman, said he and his younger teammates rely on both Akins’ knowledge of the game and understanding of their coach’s demands. This makes the veteran somewhat of a translator for Izzo to keep the team on track.
And he does it, Fears said, by not causing trouble and not being too demanding because he “keeps things simple.”
“Jaden has obviously lived and been around this rodeo, so he kind of knows what to prepare us for,” Fears said. “And mentally to (prepare) for whatever happens.”
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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Next up: Nittany Lions
Match : No. 14 Michigan State (14-2, 5-0 Big Ten) vs. Penn State (12-5, 2-4).
Trick : 7:30 p.m. Wednesday; Breslin Center, East Lansing.
Television/radio: Big Ten Network; WJR-AM (760).
This article was originally published on Detroit Free Press: Michigan State basketball’s Jaden Akins emerges as leader of team needs
