{"id":27336,"date":"2014-12-17T10:25:00","date_gmt":"2014-12-17T10:25:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/spartans-set-sights-on-soaring-eagles\/"},"modified":"2014-12-17T10:25:00","modified_gmt":"2014-12-17T10:25:00","slug":"spartans-set-sights-on-soaring-eagles","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/spartans-set-sights-on-soaring-eagles\/","title":{"rendered":"Spartans set sights on soaring Eagles"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>East Lansing, MI (SportsNetwork.com) &#8211; After upsetting in-state rival Michigan over a week ago, the Eastern Michigan Eagles will try their luck against the Michigan State Spartans in a non-conference bout at Breslin Student Events Center.<\/p>\n<p>Eastern Michigan sports an 8-1 record on the season, with a lone loss coming against Dayton on the road, 73-64, just prior to the team&#8217;s win over Michigan, 45-42.<\/p>\n<p>Michigan State just moved back up into the Top-25 after an 87-61 win over Oakland. The Spartans have won back-to-back contests immediately following a two-game skid, and will look to take the high-flying Eagles down a peg here.<\/p>\n<p>The all-time series between Eastern Michigan and Michigan State isn&#8217;t even close. The two squads have met 32 times, while the Spartans hold a 28-3 lead over the Eagles. In East Lansing, Michigan State has been even more dominant, owning an 18-1 advantage.<\/p>\n<p>After Michigan took a 21-19 halftime lead against Eastern Michigan, the Eagles made a second-half comeback to grab a 45-42 lead with time winding down in regulation back on Dec. 9. A 3-point attempt for the Wolverines at the buzzer didn&#8217;t fall, allowing the Eagles to hold on for their eighth victory of the early season. Jordan Price was the only EMU player to register a double-digit point total in the contest, scoring 11 on 4-of-9 shooting. Karrington Ward brought down seven rebounds to help the cause.<\/p>\n<p>Raven Lee enters this game as the Eagles&#8217; leading scorer, netting 15.0 ppg on 50 percent shooting from the field. He&#8217;s the primary scorer on a team averaging 70.3 ppg this season. Ward chips in with 12.9 ppg, and Mike Talley contributes 10.1 ppg with a team-high 38 assists. Eastern Michigan made it a point to add size in the offseason, which clearly helped considering the Eagles grab 41.8 rpg through nine contests.<\/p>\n<p>Oakland proved to be no match for Michigan State as the Spartans used a 55.7 percent shooting touch to run to a double-digit first-half lead. Five players scored in double figures for the Spartans, who were paced by Denzel Valentine&#8217;s 19 points. Branden Dawson scored 15 with six assists, Marvin Clark Jr. and Bryn Forbes each added 12, and Matt Costello chipped in with 11 points in the lopsided win.<\/p>\n<p>Valentine paces the Spartans this season in scoring, averaging 15.0 ppg. The team as a whole is netting 76.3 ppg on 50.4 percent shooting. Travis Trice contributes 14.3 ppg, Dawson adds 11.6 ppg and Forbes, the transfer from Cleveland State, is scoring at a 10.5 ppg clip in his first year in East Lansing. Dawson&#8217;s team-leading rebound average checks in at 8.7 rpg, while Trice&#8217;s 57 assists is another team high. Opponents are scoring just 61.0 ppg on the Spartans this season.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>East Lansing, MI (SportsNetwork.com) &#8211; After upsetting in-state rival Michigan over a week ago, the Eastern Michigan Eagles will try their luck against the Michigan State Spartans in a non-conference bout at Breslin Student Events Center. Eastern Michigan sports an 8-1 record on the season, with a lone loss coming against Dayton on the road, [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[242],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-27336","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-ncaa-basketball"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27336","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=27336"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/27336\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=27336"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=27336"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.stub.com\/hq\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=27336"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}