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Tribune News Service
Tribune News Service
Sport
Chris Solari

Michigan State basketball escapes Illinois with hard-fought win, 70-69

CHAMPAIGN, Ill. _ This was everything Tom Izzo has hoped to see from Michigan State on the road.

Aggressive offense. Hellacious defense. Everyone else making things easy on Cassius Winston.

For a half. And then it turned into a complete dogfight.

Then came the turnovers. Then came the defensive lapses. Then came foul after foul for Winston. Then the 25th-ranked Spartans' 20-point lead vanished.

But Xavier Tillman elevated and slammed home a Winston miss with 6.6 seconds to play to help MSU escape with a hard-fought 70-69 road win Tuesday night.

Rocket Watts scored 21 points to lead the Spartans (17-8, 9-5 Big Ten), who host No. 9 Maryland on Saturday at Breslin Center. Tipoff is 6 p.m. (ESPN). Winston finished with just 12 points, while Tillman had 17 points and 10 rebounds and Aaron Henry scored 11.

Ayo Dosunmu scored 17 points, Andres Feliz 15 and Kofi Cockburn 11 for the Illini (16-8, 8-5).

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