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All four former Michigan State players (Branden Dawson, Brandon Wood, Javon Bess, and Nick Ward) have seen their teams eliminated from The Basketball Tournament.
Dawson and Wood’s team Heartfire lost in their first game to a team of Purdue alums after leading in the second half.
Ward and Bess’ team won their first game, with Ward scoring 18 points, in the first round, but fell today to a team of Dayton alums. BigX, which also included a number of other B1G alums, had a six point half-time lead, but Ward, who had nine first half points, Bess, who had a solid first half, and Treveon Hughes, the Wisconsin alum who had 15 first half points, were all quiet in the second half, as the offensive execution fell apart (Ward had maybe four touches in the entire second half) and the offense failed to score for long stretches.
Player-coach Andrew Dackich played significant minutes in both halves, which did not help BigX, whose bench, in general, failed to do much of anything outside of a handful of three-point shots in the third quarter.
Ahh well Spartans, until next year!