Rutgers vs Michigan State College Basketball Picks, Odds, Predictions 1/28/21

The Michigan State Spartans and the Rutgers Scarlet Knights meet in college basketball action from the RAC on Thursday night.

The Michigan State Spartans will look to bounce back from a 55-54 loss to Purdue last time out. Aaron Henry leads the Spartans in scoring and assists with 13.9 PPG to go along with 3.7 APG and 5.6 RPG while Joey Hauser has 11.8 PPG with a team-high 8.1 RPG to make up the duo of double-digit scorers for Michigan State coming into Thursday’s matchup. Romeo Watts has 9.7 PPG and 3.4 APG while Joshua Langford has 8.9 PPG this season. As a team, Michigan State is averaging 76 PPG on 44.8% shooting from the field, 34.7% from behind the arc and 76.6% from the foul line while giving up 71.3 PPG on 41.8% shooting from the field and 32.9% from 3-point range this season.

The Rutgers Scarlet Knights will look to build off of a 74-70 win over Indiana in their last game. Ron Harper Jr. leads Rutgers in scoring with 18.3 PPG along with 6.5 RPG while Jacob Young is 2nd in scoring with 14.6 PPG while leading the way in assists with 4.1 APG this season. Montez Mathis has 11.3 PPG to make up the trio of double-digit scorers for Rutgers coming into this game while Geo Baker has 9.6 PPG, Myles Johnson has 8.1 PPG and a team-high 8.6 RPG and Paul Mulcahy has 3.4 APG this season. As a team, Rutgers is averaging 73.4 PPG on 46.7% shooting from the field, 35.4% from 3-point range and 57.9% from the foul line while giving up 71.1 PPG on 43.1% shooting from the field and 33.4% from 3-point land this season.

Michigan State is 1-8 ATS in their last 9 games overall and 1-4 ATS in their last 5 games against a team with a winning record while the under is 16-7-1 in their last 24 road games against a team with a winning home record. Rutgers is 15-7-2 ATS in their last 24 home games and 20-8-1 ATS in their last 29 games against a team with a winning record while the over is 10-4-1 in their last 15 home games. The road team is 4-1 ATS in the last 5 meetings between these two teams.

This feels like a ton of points to give up with Michigan State, considering you rarely get points with the Spartans and they beat Rutgers by 23 points a few weeks ago, holding the Scarlet Knights to just 45 points. However, Michigan State has not played in three weeks so there’s bound to be some rust that’ll take time to shake off. Rutgers got a nice confidence-building win over Indiana and there’s still a lot of scoring punch on this Rutgers roster with Ron Harper Jr. and Jacob Young leading the charge. This game is big if the Scarlet Knights want to have a significant resume to present to the tournament committee come Selection Sunday. I’ll lay the points with Rutgers in this one.