1.  Michigan State's Big Ten title chances took a major hit yesterday, as Michigan beat them handily 79-70.  The Wolverines thoroughly dominated the second half, outscoring MSU 45-34.

Michigan's perimeter players greatly outplayed MSU's.  Nik Stauskas and Caris Levert were awesome, scoring 25 and 23 points respectively.  Meanwhile, Keith Appling still can't shoot outside of ten feet because of his wrist injury, and was forced to guard the much bigger Stauskas for parts of the game.  Stauskas was able to shoot over Appling easily.

Gary Harris had another poor shooting game from behind the arc, making just 4-13 three point attempts.  Harris has struggled from the outside lately, shooting 31% from three his last 5 games.  He is only making 33.9% of his three point attempts this year, compared to 41.1% last year.

Michigan leads the conference title race by half of a game now, and has a favorable schedule the rest of the way.

3. The MSU Women's team had the weekend off, but gets back in action tonight against Minnesota. The Gophers are 6-7 in Big 10 play.  The Spartans won their first meeting 81-56 on January 4th.

4. The Men's hockey team had a rough weekend, losing two games to #8 Wisconsin.  On Friday, the Badgers knocked off MSU 5-2.  On Saturday Wisconsin shutout MSU 2-0.

5. The Pistons got beat again Saturday, falling 113-102 to the Dallas Mavericks.  Josh Smith played really well scored 32 points, but the team's defensive effort was poor once again.  Dirk Nowitzki scored 24 points, and the Mavericks outrebounded the Pistons by 11.  The Pistons are now 2.5 games back of the final playoff spot in the east.

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Steve Miller is on-air from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. producing ‘Mad Dog in the Morning’ on The Game 730 AM.  He also co-hosts Prep Basketball Weekly from 10 a.m. to 12 p.m. on Saturdays, and can be heard on high school basketball broadcasts.  Follow him on Twitter @SteveMilllerWVFN.

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