Seniors Preparing for Last Career Home Game
3/4/2016 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
By Steve Grinczel, MSUSpartans.com Online Columnist
EAST LANSING, Mich. â€" Denzel Valentine, Matt Costello, Bryn Forbes and Colby Wollenman will turn a momentous page in their Michigan State basketball stories on Saturday afternoon.
Valentine's approach to Senior Day is philosophical as he continues his pursuit of national player of the year honors and even greater postseason team glory, while the emotional Costello's take on his final home game in a Spartan uniform portends a scene that is sure to be a tear-jerker.
The sweet-shooting Forbes hopes to add to the feel-good vibe he has provided during his two seasons with MSU, and Wollenman, the latest of Coach Tom Izzo's walk-ons to make a profound impact on the program, is the rags-to-riches character in this narrative.
"My senior leadership as a group has been really good," Izzo said. "Costello does his thing and Colby is still going to be a guy nobody will appreciate but me, but he's done a great job. And when you've got leaders like Denzel and Bryn, and as they all say, when your hardest workers are your best players and your best guys, you've got a chance.
"And that's what we've got right now."
And if the Spartans follow the four protagonists' script exactly against Ohio State, each will be able to follow a longstanding tradition by kissing the floor at midcourt before heading to the bench in the Breslin Center for the last time.
"I just feel like the time is right (to move on)," Valentine said. "This time was going to come eventually, so I'm not really hoping there was more and I'm not hoping that it was at the end. I'm having mixed feelings about it but it just comes with getting older, I guess.
"I played four years here, so it's probably enough."
Figuratively speaking, of course.
"We still have a national championship to win," said Valentine. "It's going to be emotional, but at the same time, we've got a lot of season left."
Still to be determined for Valentine, who will finish his career with prominent placements throughout MSU's record book and among its greatest leaders, is his legacy.
"Hopefully I'm moving up the list, but I haven't a won a championship yet," he said. "The biggest part of a legacy at Michigan State, at least, is who won a national championship or who won the most games because there have been a lot of great players and a lot of NBA players to come through here."
Valentine led the Spartans to last season's Final Four, but the Big Ten regular season title will elude him for a fourth straight year because Michigan State can finish no higher than second. But, he could help add a second conference tournament trophy to the one MSU captured during his sophomore season, and a third NCAA crown in school history.
"The ones who have separated themselves are the people who went to multiple Final Fours and are championship players," he said. "I want to be a part of that group. This program is built for having great years, so we're not satisfied unless we win it all."
Costello got choked up before playing his last game at Michigan earlier this season, so he can imagine what it will be like when he puts his game uniform on for the last time in the locker room.
"I still feel like I'm a freshman, on the inside," said Costello, who isn't playing like it, coming off his ninth double-double of the season. "I feel more comfortable being here in the situation I'm in, but I feel like I just got here.
"It's crazy how fast it's flown by and I'm going to be bawling like a baby on Saturday, so please, nobody make fun of me â€" it's going to be really bad."
At least Costello has gained some experience in dealing with his passionate feelings.
"I'm going to do my normal routine for a 12 o'clock game, and go from there," he said. "At Michigan I was struggling through the first couple minutes because I was still emotional. So it's just about trying to focus in and then after the game letting everything come out."
Costello responded with 14 points and seven rebounds in the victory against the Wolverines and is five blocked shots away from his 143rd, which would move him ahead of former teammate Branden Dawson atop MSU's all-time blocked-shot list.
It would also further enhance the senior class' impressive profile for success.
"We're excited but sad at the same time," Costello said. "I was talking with Colby about it and I don't think it's possible to digest it right now. We still have a lot of stuff we're shooting for, so now is not the time; we'll digest it when the season's over."
However, Costello is anticipating carrying on the tradition Shawn Respert started in 1995 when he stopped at the center-jump circle to kiss the block S, which has since been replaced with the Spartan helmet logo, before walking off the court.
"That's huge," Costello said. "It's one of the traditions at Michigan State and it's something you talk about. You want to be able to do it during the game, so we have to play our best and give ourselves an opportunity to do that."
Of course, the Buckeyes will do their best to push the Spartans' floor-kissing ceremony to after the game.
Forbes has evolved into one of the Big Ten's top players in two short years since transferring from Cleveland State and joining Valentine, his former Lansing Sexton High teammate, in the MSU lineup. His ascent -- he just broke the single-game Big Ten 3-point field goal record with 11 at Rutgers and he leads the nation in 3-point field goal percentage at 51.5 percent -- has been stunning.
"It's kind of eye-opening with how fast it's went and that we're almost out of college," Forbes said. "Coming here, I'm kind of happy with the road I had to take. I've had a good time being here and everything that comes with this team and this school.
"I knew that no matter what happened, it would work out for me. I've been around this program my whole life. I knew the team, I knew the coaching staff pretty well before I even came here so it was an easy transition for me. Every summer, I was here even when I was in high school, so I always felt like I was part of the group. I had a feeling it would work out for me, and it has. It's the end of one chapter in my life and the beginning of another. I'm not saying I'm ready to go yet, but it's also something that has to happen."
Forbes cleared up the nature of an idiosyncrasy he repeats often throughout each game when he brings both hands up to his mouth. He's neither blowing on his "hot" hands nor kissing them for luck; he's flicking his thumbnails off his two front teeth.
"I'm biting my nails," Forbes said. "I don't bite them off; I pop them. Sometimes it just happens. I don't even think too much about it. I probably started doing it when I was at Cleveland State â€" I'm not sure."
Headed for one of the nation's top medical schools after MSU, Wollenman will be remembered far more â€" Izzo would say infinitely so â€" for his selflessness than his career 0.96 points and 1 rebound per game. Although he has put in just as much work as any senior starter, it's not reflected in his playing time.
Rather, it can be measured in terms such as the progress freshman power forward Deyonta Davis has made under Wollenman's watchful eyes.
While Wollenman often questioned the wisdom of persevering through a thankless job on the court while tending to his daunting academic load, he's proud of the way he stuck with it and lamenting the inevitable.
"It's hard to explain," Wollenman said. "It's bittersweet in the sense I've got a lot of good memories and a lot of great things to look back on and I wouldn't take back any of it. And it's weird to be coming to an end, hopefully in the national championship game.
"It means a lot for Coach Izzo to acknowledge what I've tried to do. He's never been one to overlook any effort I've tried to make, and is always encouraging me to continue to do what I do in terms of helping other guys and speaking up when I think there's something I think needs to be said. I appreciate him allowing me to have that role because I don't have the same role on the court some of the other guys have, but I want to contribute and be a part of it in any way I can."
Wollenman is the standard-bearer of a walk-on legacy that began at MSU with "Jumpin' Johnny" Green in the 1950s and has flourished under Izzo with the likes of Tim Bograkos and Austin Thornton.
"I don't know if I consider myself in the same category as those guys, but to be mentioned with that group is an honor because those are some pretty incredible players and people who have come before me," Wollenman said. "I've tried to adhere to the principles they have set and the work ethic they displayed.
"I think it's a tradition that will carry on as long as Coach (Izzo) is here and maybe even after."
Wollenman provided context to what it means to be a Spartan who gets to kiss the floor on Senior Day.
"This was not an opportunity I felt like I ever had chance at, so to be a senior and kiss the floor, and be part of a group that has so much history behind it, and that I went through and did it, I think ‘grateful' is the best word.
"I'm going to just say, ‘Wow, I'm so lucky I've had the chance to do all this.' "
