Couch: Matt McQuaid was great for Michigan State vs. Indiana - so why isn't he more often?

Graham Couch
Lansing State Journal
Matt McQuaid, right, reacts with teammate Jaren Jackson Jr., after scoring while being fouled during the first half of Friday's MSU win over Indiana at Breslin.

EAST LANSING – There are games when I think Matt McQuaid could be an All-Big Ten player.

Then there are weeks when I forget about him.

Man, was McQuaid good Friday night in Michigan State’s 85-57 win over Indiana. So good that it leads to the question – why can’t he be this every night?

“Sometimes McQuaid gets in his own way,” MSU assistant coach Mike Garland said.

That means, gets in his own head. When McQuaid believes, all things are possible.

Like Friday night, when he drove the baseline, drew contact and finished with a score while being fouled midway through the first half. By that point, he was walking on air. 

It all began when time forced his hand. The shot clock was winding down, and he had the ball on the wing with MSU trailing 10-9 early on. He couldn’t just shoot over his defender. There was nowhere and no time to pass. So he drove just inside the free-throw line, rose up and let it fly. Bucket. From there, he looked like a player.

“It definitely sparked my game a little,” McQuaid said. “The shot clock was going down a little and I got two feet in the paint and made a play. Coach (Dane) Fife’s been working on that with me. I was prepared to use it. Two feet in the paint and making plays.”

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McQuaid finished with 13 points on 4-for-6 shooting, with three rebounds and a couple assists in 21 minutes. It was the best overall game of the season for the 6-foot-4 junior guard. Better than his 20-point, all-behind-the-arc outburst in the fourth game of the year against DePaul. 

If he doesn’t wind up with the ball at the end of the shot clock, I’m not sure if any of it happens. MSU needs to make it happen again and again — perhaps throw McQuaid the ball the first few times the shot clock hits 5 seconds and make him go to work.

“I think Matt’s defense helps his offense,” Miles Bridges offered as an explanation. “Once he gets a stop or two, he’ll be great on offense. Once he sees his first shot go in, he’s going to be tough to stop. We need him for us to be aggressive in order for us to win."

That last line is not entirely true, but there’s no question it helps.

“McQuaid would be a big, big, big key if we could get him going,” Tom Izzo said.

I made the mistake of asking Izzo about McQuaid with the first question of Friday night’s postgame presser — before he was done saying everything else he wanted to get off his chest. So his analysis of McQuaid mostly wandered onto other players. Foolish on my part. Never ask the first question. 

(Watch Tom Izzo's postgame press conference below.)

Garland, however, was willing to take a deeper dive on McQuaid.

“There are times that he passes up shots,” Garland said. “He just needs to have a little more of a cutthroat mentality when it comes to shooting the ball. 

“Whenever we come out and our energy level is up, watch out. He’s no different than the rest of our guys and probably even more so — when that energy level gets ramped up, he gets lost in the game. Now he’s not apprehensive about shooting.

“And he’s one of our better defenders, too.”

I don’t think most people realize that about McQuaid. 

“I’m sure they don’t,” Garland replied. “But he is.”

“I think it’s just a choice,” Garland continued. “It started happening last year. He’s particularly good on the ball. Very rarely do you see his man go past him. Very rarely.

“He’s got some toughness. And because of the conference he played in in Dallas, he played against all athletes. So he’s accustomed to it. That doesn’t bother him. He’s not afraid.”

So you have a capable athlete, a strong natural shooter and fearless competitor ... who sometimes disappears. 

It’s a matter of confidence.

“Yeah,” McQuaid acknowledged.

Matt McQuaid #20 of the Michigan State Spartans drives to the basket and draws a foul from Juwan Morgan #13 of the Indiana Hoosiers at Breslin Center on January 19, 2018 in East Lansing, Michigan.

I don’t think I’ve ever seen the confidence of a player of this caliber ebb and flow as much as it does with McQuaid.

“I’m just taking what the defense gives me,” McQuaid tried to explain. “I’m going to take my shots, good shots and I’ve got to remain confident and make plays when I’m required to. My teammates are giving me confidence. That gave me great passes tonight.

“One thing I’ve got to keep doing is being aggressive.”

Part of McQuaid’s lack of consistency might also be caused by a lack of shots. Garland brought this up. McQuaid barely averages five shots per game. He hasn’t taken more than eight in a game all season.

He’s always been a complementary piece, which, at MSU’s level, is probably the right role. But it’s still a challenging role.

“Part of making shots is rhythm,” Garland said. “Part of making shots is comfort and your teammates knowing when they throw you the ball, where to throw you the ball, the timing of the pass. Are they giving you a pass you can shoot or are they just throwing it? All those things come into play. He’s been through that ever since he’s been here. I don’t know if Matt’s ever had a game where he’s had 13 shots.”

He hasn’t. When he scored 20 against DePaul at the PK80 in Portland, he did it on eight shots, a hot shooting night from beyond the arc.

“That’s big time,” Garland said. “Folks don’t realize that.”

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For the season, McQuaid is averaging 6.9 points and hitting 37 percent of his 3-point shots. That’s only fourth-best on the team, which isn’t great for a guy who’s taken 83 of 106 shots from beyond the arc. 

“I think we need to do a better job of getting him more opportunities,” point guard Cassius Winston said. 

Perhaps that starts with forcing McQuaid to create for himself once in a while. And McQuaid forcing that on himself. He’s got it in him. He's shown it before. He showed it Friday night.

Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.