Article this morning in the Detroit Free Press on the developing leadership of Michigan St. point guard Kalin Lucas, who coach Tom Izzo says could be one of the best he has every had. It is a great article about the coach and the point guard being on the same page. Here is a portion of it:
It was the spring of 2008 when Izzo caught the first glimpse that his young guard might be for real. Michigan State was playing rival Wisconsin in the semifinals of the Big Ten tournament in Indianapolis. The game was tied. Thirty seconds were left. Lucas had the ball.
As he tried to pass, a defender slipped in, swiped it and raced to the other end for a lay-up. MSU lost by two. When the team reached the tunnel as it walked off the court, Lucas began howling:
"It's my fault. It's my fault." He collapsed as he stumbled into the locker room, sobbing.
"I had never seen that from Kalin," Izzo recalled. "Ever."
It was painful. It was enlightening. And he considered it Lucas' first defining moment.
Last week was the second.
MSU was playing Penn State at home. As in the Wisconsin game the year before, the Spartans had blown a big lead. Again, Lucas had the ball at the end. He was on the free-throw line. Twelve seconds were left. MSU trailed by a point.
Lucas missed a free throw to tie it. MSU lost. In the locker room, Lucas broke down, but not in the guttural way he had in Indy. This time he was seething. Partly because he'd missed a crucial shot down the stretch and partly because he hadn't kept a promise to himself he'd made in December, after MSU lost to North Carolina by 30.
The night after that thrashing, he and roommate -- and teammate -- Durrell Summers went to dinner and promised each other they would never be embarrassed again as long as they were at MSU.
Penn State had won by only four, but something didn't feel right about the way it went down. The team lost its way during a 6-minute stretch late in the first half. Championships teams didn't do that. Or if they did, they made plays at the end.
Lucas spent the rest of that day and evening in knots. Finally, about midnight, he pulled out his cell phone and sent a text message to Izzo: "It will never happen again."
Izzo returned his text the next morning: "I want you to trust me."
The coach called it the second defining moment.
After the Carolina loss, the Spartans had ripped off 11 straight wins. Now it was time to respond again. Three days after the Penn State loss, MSU blitzed Minnesota by 29 points. The team did it without Lucas' jump shot.
"I don't have an answer for what happened," he said afterward.
But he didn't need one. A year ago, he might've sulked if he had a poor shooting night. Against Minnesota, however, he shrugged it off, helped shut down the Gophers' starting backcourt -- holding it to 2-for-13 shooting -- and kept feeding Summers, who dropped in threes from all over the court. His roommate scored 21 points on 8-for-10 shooting. And Lucas had helped make it happen.
