As most Virginia LRA observers know, tangles between Michigan State and UVA have provided some of the lows of recent UVA history
With 33 tournament appearances, MSU is a top-level organization. Add to that that MSU has played in 10 final fours and won two championships. OK, that school has put lots of good squads on the floor.
To be sure, MSU’s big runs in 1979 (Magic and pals over Larry Bird and buddies) and in 2000 (Mateen Cleaves and others over the young, 5th-ceded Florida with Matt Bonner & Udonis Haslem) were impressive. However, they are 20 years ago.
Now, the ‘Hoos have a national championship much more recently. And the teams’ overall records after the 2014 season are pretty comparable. UVA is 148-29 not counting the aborted '19-'20 season. MSU is 138-45 (did I add those correctly?).
Of greater interest, in my view, is that MSU has dinged UVA repeatedly in the NCAA Tournament over several of the last few years:
- 2014 third round: UVA 59, MSU 61
- 2015 second round: UVA 54, MSU 60
We don’t want that to happen again this year, in the tournament or in the regular season. So, let’s see which UVA team turns up to play Wednesday. It’s an early season match-up and coaches are still determining line-ups, but it should be interesting.