Jeremy Fears Jr. scored a career-high 21 points and added 11 assists and No. 9 Michigan State recovered from an 11-point, first-half deficit to post a 114-97 victory over Cornell on Monday night in nonconference play at East Lansing, Mich.
Coen Carr added 19 points and six rebounds, Trey Fort scored 14 points and Divine Ugochukwu had 12 as the Spartans (12-1) dominated the second half while winning their fourth straight game. Jaxon Kohler added 11 points and 10 rebounds.
Michigan State scored 59 in the second half while registering a season best for points.
Cooper Noard scored 19 points for Cornell, which was 15 of 44 from 3-point range. The Big Red entered the contest as the national leader with 14.2 made 3-pointers per game.
Jake Fiegen and Adam Hinton added 15 points apiece for the Big Red (6-6) and Mateen Rafiq scored 11.
Cornell made 45.7% of its field-goal attempts and was noticeably tired in the second half while playing just its second game in 22 days due to final exams and the holiday break.
Michigan State shot 55.4% from the field, including 13 of 28 from 3-point range. Kur Teng added 10 points for the Spartans, who held a 45-33 rebounding advantage.
Noard opened the second half with a 3-pointer to give Cornell a 56-55 lead before the Spartans responded with a 14-2 spurt.
Cameron Ward capped the burst with a jumper to give the Spartans an 11-point lead with 15:40 left in the contest.
A dunk by Carr pushed the lead to 80-65 with 12:03 remaining as part of an 11-0 run that increased Michigan State’s lead to 22. Carr made two free throws to end it and make it 87-65 with 9:27 to go.
Meanwhile, Cornell missed 15 of its first 16 3-point attempts in the second half and the Spartans led by as many as 26 while closing it out.
The Big Red led most of the first half before Michigan State eventually inched ahead 55-53 at the break.
Noard and Fiegen each scored 15 first-half points for Cornell, which did not trail until Teng drained a trey to give the Spartans a 37-35 lead with 5:46 remaining in the half.
The Big Red held a 46-43 lead after a 3-pointer by Corbin Zentner with 3:28 left before Michigan State scored eight of the next nine points en route to the two-point halftime lead.
Fears scored 15 in the half for the Spartans.
–Field Level Media
