'I think this is the lowest point'

EAST LANSING - A 14-point lead disappeared with Michigan State's offense.

With that vanishing act Thursday night in an ugly 48-45 loss to Wisconsin, their second to the Badgers in less than a month, the 20th-ranked Spartan women and coach Suzy Merchant find themselves teetering toward irrelevance in the Big Ten race and scrambling for answers.

"I think this is the lowest point. And if they don't feel that, then there is a problem," Merchant said.

In falling to 11-6 overall and 2-4 in Big Ten play, the Spartans went more than 10 minutes in the second half without a field goal against Wisconsin. They had just one bucket and four points in the final 12:15.

And, despite somehow still being in a position to win or tie, MSU took just one shot in the final two minutes, turned the ball over twice and failed to get a shot off in the last 30 seconds.

"It definitely was a statement game, and we lost it," senior center Allyssa DeHaan said.

"We lost a 14-point lead, we crumbled at the end, we fouled, we acted like we were completely down and out when we were only two points away. That's been a recurring theme, sadly to say - we can't pull it together at the end."

Merchant, in trying to piece together what went wrong, found plenty of blame to go around. She called MSU "a team that wants to talk and not do." She talked about making "major changes" to the lineup and overall philosophy. And she cited a lack of leadership and communication and said "nobody wants to put this team on their back."

"There's just no excuse for how we performed tonight. It starts obviously with the coaching staff and with me. I've got to look at what we're doing," said Merchant, who lost to the Badgers for the fourth straight time and fifth time in the past six meetings. "But at the same time, these players got to kind of look at themselves and step up, because it's a team that we've seen with the same stuff we're running work. And we saw the same stuff running and working with 14 minutes to go and we're up 14.

"Where does the bottom drop off, and why does it drop off? And then nobody responds."

It was a physical game that slogged along and featured long periods of inactivity by both teams.

Leading by four at halftime after not scoring for nearly five minutes at the start of the game, MSU went on a 12-2 run to open the final 20 minutes and held Wisconsin (14-4, 4-3) without a basket for almost five minutes.

Brittney Thomas' jumper with 12:15 to play put the Spartans' lead at 41-29.

Then they went dormant - Lykendra Johnson's layup with just over 2:03 left was the only basket in nine shot attempts down the stretch. They also went 2-for-7 at the free-throw line in that span.

"Wisconsin, in the second half, got us out of our offense. We weren't running it all the way through," senior Aisha Jefferson, who scored just five points. "We started going back to one shot, no offensive rebound. We slowed the game down, we turned the ball over."

Badgers senior Teah Grant hit three straight baskets to slice it to a five-point game with inside of 10 minutes to go. Alyssa Karel's jumper tied it at 43-all with 3:08 left, and a Lin Zastrow free throw shortly thereafter gave Wisconsin it's first lead of the final half.

After Johnson's basket put MSU back in front, Badgers freshman Taylor Wurtz came away with the ball under her own basket and layed it in as the shot clock was about to go off with 50 seconds to go.

The Spartans didn't score again, with Karel plucking the ball from Johnson at the free-throw line with 13 seconds left.

Wisconsin, led by Wurtz's 16 points, had more points in the paint (20-18), second-chance points (10-8), points off turnovers (11-4) and fast-break points (6-4) than the Spartans.

MSU shot just 28.6 percent and finished with as many rebounds as it did points in the game - Johnson had nine, Jefferson eight and Kalisha Keane seven. DeHaan had 12 points, the only Spartan in double figures, and had five rebounds. But she had just four points and two boards in the final half.