The Michigan State Spartans are rising up the rankings, coming in at No. 6 in the latest Coaches Poll and riding a five-game winning streak, which includes wins over the then-No. 3 Ohio State Buckeyes and then-No. 17 Wisconsin Badgers. They last outing was a solid win over the Purdue Boilermakers on Feb. 19 and with four games left before the madness begins, they can't afford to falter.
Their remaining schedule contains matchups with OSU, Indiana and Nebraska. They're also got the Minnesota Golden Gophers, and they're up next, with a showdown on Wednesday. While it's potentially the easiest game remaining on their schedule, the Spartans need to make sure they don't let up. Minnesota has lost three-straight games, but they've been competitive in all of them. They took Wisconsin to overtime and made their game against Ohio State interesting.
Minnesota has a very tough schedule to close out their season, and they'll be playing as hard as ever to pick up wins where it counts. Michigan State will need to make sure they don't let up, but it's not likely they would, given the play of Draymond Green. MSU is going for their sixth consecutive regular-season sweep of Minnesota in this game.
Michigan State will next play on Feb. 25 against Nebraska. First, they've got this matchup at 8:30 p.m. ET on Wednesday.
For more on the Michigan State Spartans, go to The Only Colors. You can also head over to SB Nation's main NCAA Basketball hub at SBNation.com/NCAA-Basketball.