Couch: 3 quick takes on Michigan State basketball adding big man transfer Szymon Zapala
1. MSU adding big man Szymon Zapala is revealing of Izzo’s thinking
If there was any doubt where Tom Izzo stood on his evaluation of his own big men and/or his willingness to potentially rock the boat by taking a swing at landing a high-profile and expensive center in the transfer portal, he answered it definitively with the addition of 7-footer Szymon Zapala, who committed to the Spartans on Tuesday.
Zapala, who played last season at low-major Longwood University in Virginia after spending three seasons at Utah State, will give Michigan State needed depth and insurance and some extra size on the interior. He will not replace juniors Jaxon Kohler or Carson Cooper. Nor will he cost MSU’s Spartan Nation NIL collective more than the team’s most high-profile players in salary.
And that was the point of using MSU’s final available scholarship on Zapala. He fills one need — the Spartans would have been risking disaster to begin the season with Cooper, Kohler and sophomore Xavier Booker as their only experienced frontcourt players taller than 6-5. They’d be one injury away from a real problem. MSU’s other remaining need, however — a viable Big Ten-caliber center who can hold up against the nation’s top big men — is being left to Cooper and Kohler.
That’s a sizable risk, given that those two as sophomores weren’t ready for that level, albeit Kohler’s season was ruined from the start by a foot injury.
Izzo isn’t leaning heavily into his returning big men to spite MSU fans. I’m sure he thinks this is best for his roster as a whole, for his own curiosity about what Kohler can become, and for his program culture and, thus, winning. If he’s wrong, he may lose the faith of part of the Spartan fan base which has been screaming from Breslin Center and beyond to upgrade the center position for a couple years.
Pre-2020, Izzo and those staffs had success developing several centers who were ready for the challenge when it was time — notably Xavier Tillman and Matt Costello. For the sake of this team — and a coach who two months ago said he planned to restore the program to contender status or “die trying" — he needs to be right. Otherwise his words will start to ring hollow.
Izzo has earned a lot of latitude over three decades. But there have been enough shortcomings in the paint in recent years to where only seeing is believing. Kohler and Cooper — and now Zapala — are going to have to prove Izzo right.
2. Zapala could be a useful player
There’s an old Jud Heathcote line about how at the end of the game when everyone else is tired, 7-footers are still 7-feet. In college basketball, the importance of having capable big men is only increasing as the NBA sees less need for traditional centers. The Hunter Dickinsons of the world — who MSU will face early in the Champions Classic when the Spartans play Kansas — will spend as much time in college as they can. You’d better have one of these guys or at least have a defensive counter if you hope to contend for titles.
Zapala gives MSU another 7-footer — Carson Cooper and Xavier Booker are both close — and one with some meat to him. As a player, he showed some things last season at low-major Longwood — which made the the NCAA tournament as a 16 seed — that could translate to the high-major level. The 23-year-old from Zaborze, Poland, known as a wickedly smart student, has good touch around the basket and, I'm told, a knack for keeping possessions alive, a boon for an MSU program whose rebounding numbers have fallen off in recent years.
Zapala’s numbers last season at Longwood — 9.8 points, 5.6 rebounds, about 1 block per game — came in less than 17 minutes an outing. He’s never been a minutes-eater at the college level. He played sparingly in three seasons at Utah State before this past winter, when he showed he could be an efficient big man in the Big South. In the Big Ten, we’ll see whether he’s athletic enough to hold his own.
3. How Zapala fits into MSU’s roster
Bringing in a low-major big man transfer with one year of eligibility remaining shows that Izzo and his staff have faith in what Kohler and Cooper can become. I think they’re curious about what Kohler would have been a year ago, coming off a stellar summer, if he hadn’t lost more than half the season to a foot injury. I think they still believe in Cooper and realize they might have just been a year ahead of schedule in their hopes for him. Their mistake was perhaps thinking that Mady Sissoko had another level to him.
Zapala essentially replaces Sissoko, who transferred to Cal this offseason. Zapala is a very different player — not as athletic, but with better hands and feel and a taller frame and more length. I don’t think he’ll be asked to play major minutes, unless there’s an injury, but he’ll provide another look, another guy who can go full bore for whatever time he’s out there. And, if there is an injury, he might be capable of a serviceable 12 to 15 minutes at the center spot.
There is a lot of uncertainty with this year’s MSU team, which has both a low floor and high ceiling. MSU will have a new point guard, sophomore Jeremy Fears Jr., a new featured scorer at shooting guard in senior Jaden Akins, a new player altogether on the wing in senior transfer Frankie Fidler, a new starting 4-man with NBA upside in Booker and two returning centers who still have to prove themselves at this level.
MORE: Couch: 3 quick takes on Michigan State basketball landing transfer Frankie Fidler
Zapala is, at minimum, insurance and maybe added flexibility. He makes it possible to consider redshirting freshman Jesse McCulloch, if it makes sense. And he gives the Spartans one more option against opposing bigs. While he is not the inspiring signing many fans had perhaps hoped for at center, he’s worth adding, I think.
Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: MSU basketball adds center transfer Szymon Zapala: 3 quick takes
