And, for whatever reason, MSU can sometimes fluctuate early in the season from a bewildering team into one that is suddenly a contender. It happened again this season.
It cost us again this season, as well. Our poor start is what dropped us to an 8-seed. A few more early wins and we may have been a 5-seed or so and we might have still been playing on the second weekend.
You can point to the yearly transfers as a significant reason that we struggle early. A lack of consistency from year to year and it takes a few games to find our rhythm.