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So much talent has run through the Michigan State Spartans in the most postponed way possible since the early 2000s. It seemed like Draymond Green was a small forward floor general for nearly a decade. That Shannon Brown and Maurice Ager flew on the wings for nearly every Final Four trip feels entirely feasible. There’s so much truncated longevity among these Spartan legends that it’s difficult to realize Travis Trice and Branden Dawson are seniors, and Denzel Valentine is already a junior.
Two of the trio have played on an aircraft carrier, all three have played in Germany and in last year’s Elite Eight. Yet, at least for me, it feels like they just got here. Perhaps I’m confusing it with the fact that all three of these Spartans have finally arrived. Trice, Valentine and Dawson are the new cellular identity of these Spartans reborn by March. Trice is the efficient nucleus, Dawson the powerhouse mitochondria and Valentine the ever-present cytoplasm.
Cell-makeup metaphors aside, the Spartans’ big three is a bigger impact than many realize. Over the regular season, Trice, Dawson and Valentine produced 57.4 percent of the Spartans’ points, just one percentage point off the pace set by Gary Harris, Adreian Payne and Dawson in 2014. In the 2015 NCAA tournament, this trinity supplied 87 of the Spartans’ 130 points for nearly a 67 percent impact.
The “Big Three” talk commands the company of many very successful teams. Most recently the 2010-14 Miami Heat, the recently-surging Cleveland Cavaliers and the last real “America’s Team,” the early-90s Dallas Cowboys. Comparing NCAA basketball to the NBA is apples to oranges and correlating it with pro football is nearly an abstraction. The road will certainly get tougher for Michigan State, but if good things keep coming in threes for the Spartans, the offbeat analogies could continue for at least another week.
Jerry Landry is a writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow Jerry on Twitter at @Jerry2Landry, “Like” him on Facebook or add him on Google.
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