The Hillsdale College men's basketball team has picked up an exhibition game in October to help prepare for the 2023-24 season to come, and it's a big one.
On Wednesday, Oct. 25 the Chargers will travel to East Lansing, Michigan and the Jack Breslin Student Events Center to take on a consensus top 10 team in the nation at the NCAA DI level and a national title contender -- the Michigan State Spartans.
Hillsdale will be one of two exhibition opponents for Michigan State, which has played at least one NCAA DII or DIII opponent from the state of Michigan in an exhibition game for seven of the last eight seasons, with the abbreviated Covid-19 season in 2020-21 the lone exception.
This is Hillsdale's second trip to the Breslin Center, as the Chargers also played an exhibition contest against the Spartans on Nov. 3 to being the 2017-18 campaign. Michigan State won the contest 75-44 in a game where the Spartans featured current NBA players Miles Bridges, Jaren Jackson Jr. and Xavier Tillman.
This year's Spartan squad is expected to be equally talent-loaded, as Michigan State returns five of their top six players, including an All-Big Ten backcourt of senior guards Tyson Walker and A.J. Hoggard, both of whom turned down consideration for the NBA Draft to return for one more run with the Spartans and legendary coach Tom Izzo, now in his 28th season.
To that core, Michigan State is adding a star-studded freshman class headlined by consensus five stars Xavier Booker and Jeremy Fears. While no official poll has been released yet for the 2023-24 season, both ESPN and Sports Illustrated have the Spartans fourth in the nation in their early power rankings, and both CBS and The Athletic have Michigan State comfortably in their top 10.
Hillsdale will bring a team looking to continue a historic run of success over the last six seasons in 2023-24, under the leadership of a new head coach in Keven Bradley. Bradley took over for John Tharp this spring as Tharp vacated the position to become Hillsdale's new Athletic Director.
Under Bradley, who helped Hillsdale to three consecutive NCAA DII Tournament appearances and an Elite Eight berth in 2021-22 as Tharp's top assistant, Hillsdale will look to reload after the loss of five seniors who all played key rotational roles on the 2022-23 team.
While those graduation losses are significant, Hillsdale still has plenty of talent returning, headlined by second-team All-G-MAC honoree and starting forward Joe Reuter, who averaged 12.5 points per game for the Chargers in 2022-23. Along with Reuter, Hillsdale also brings back Charles Woodhams, Eric Radisevic and Ashton Janowski, all of whom were important off the bench for the Chargers last season and will get an opportunity to expand their roles this winter. Hillsdale also has a hungry group of second and third-year players and true freshmen who will compete for a spot in the rotation.
The start time and broadcast details for Hillsdale's exhibition contest with Michigan State have yet to be announced -- stay tuned to hillsdalechargers.com for more details as they become available.
Photo by Isabella Sheehan