s official visit, he stayed with senior guard Tum Tum Nairn, the teams univers | Forum

Editors note: The 2016-17 college basketball season will be the Year of the Freshmen,?featuring what could be the best class weve ever seen. Wander Suero Nationals Jersey . Over the next two weeks, we will get familiar with the best of the best, examining who they are and where each of the top 10 prospects in the 2016 ESPN 100 came from.Read more: No. 10 Dukes Frank Jackson | No. 9 Kentuckys Malik Monk No. 8 Michigan States Miles Bridges | No. 7 Washingtons Markelle Fultz No. 6 Kentuckys DeAaron Fox | No. 5 Kentuckys Bam Adebayo No. 4 UCLAs Lonzo Ball | No. 3 Dukes Jayson Tatum No. 2 Kansas Josh Jackson | No. 1 Dukes Harry GilesThe Washington Marriott Wardman Park is a sprawling maze: 195,000 square feet of meeting rooms, breakout rooms, and ballrooms of various sizes designed to, as its web site explains, provide an ideal setting for whatever youre planning, regardless of size or scope.Salon 3, the ballroom into which Miles Bridges has just walked, is laughably surplus to current requirements. In a few hours, in an identical room next door, the setting will be far more ideal. Coaches and players will camp at team-specific conference tables; cameras and microphones will rove between them in packs.It will be hectic, but the scope will make sense -- especially for Bridges.The No. 8-ranked player in the class of 2016 might be Michigan State coach Tom Izzos most talented recruit ever. At minimum, the 6-foot-7 wing is the gem of the Hall of Famers most lauded freshmen class, a group State fans have called, simply enough, The Class. Bridges is the likeliest among them to be in the NBA less than a year from now. His athleticism and 1-through-4 versatility represent the most obvious key to the Spartans 2016-17 season. Given MSUs personnel losses last spring, its practically the start of a new era.Even Bridges presence at the event elicits a noise unto itself: In 21 seasons, hes the first freshman Izzo has ever taken to media day.Then, of course, theres the small matter of Bridges hometown: Flint, Michigan, the same place that birthed Michigan State legends Mateen Cleaves, Morris Peterson and Charlie Bell, better known as the Flintstones.And then theres this:I think Miles Bridges is the next Flintstone, Izzo said. Hes a blue-collar superstar. Which fits me, and our program, perfectly.BACK IN SALON 3, the only noise is the 18-year-olds voice, explaining how he dabbled with the idea of walking away from his own ideal setting -- between coach and recruit, player and team, program and hometown.Its true. For a minute there (or a few months, or maybe a whole year), Bridges was interested in breaking the Flint-Sparty mold.Everybody, literally everybody, from Flint goes to Michigan State, Bridges said. I wanted to switch it up at first. I wanted to be different.There is something to be said for forging ones own path. Or, at the very least, not wearing the same button-down shirt every other dude at the party is wearing. The impulse of Michigan State mens basketball could apply to the entire region: 40 minutes north of Flint on I-75 is Saginaw, Michigan, the other half of what Izzo calls the Flint-Saginaw group, which produced former Spartans stars Jason Richardson and Draymond Green, among others. But Flint, specifically, shares an elevated place in Michigan State basketball lore, and in Izzos heart.Every night when I go to bed and every day when I drive in to work, I realize the cars I drive, the house I live in, the summer Im going to have is probably because of the Flintstones, Izzo said in February.Its a hard act to follow. Its also a hard place to grow up.Few American cities were so thoroughly hollowed out by the prevailing economic and demographic forces -- deindustrialization, globalization, white flight, urban decay -- of the late 20th century. In 1908, General Motors was founded in Flint. In 1978, it employed nearly 80,000 people in the area. In 2010, it employed 8,000. Between 2010 and 2014, when U.S. median household income was $53,482, Flints was $24,679.In 2015, according to U.S. Census data, Flints poverty rate was 40.1 percent. Few cities are more violent per capita. In just the past year, a federal public health state of emergency was declared when lead poisoning -- from a contaminated local water supply -- was discovered among thousands of residents.Or, as Bridges put it: Everybody knows its tough out there.Bridges parents divorced when he was a kid; he felt like the man of the house by 11. He saw fights at schools, drugs sold in plain view, and, among peers, an understood goal: get out.In my generation, not a lot of people do, he said. They become victims to society.By his freshman year of high school, it was clear basketball would be Bridges chance. Before the start of 10th grade, he transferred to powerhouse Huntington Prep in Huntington, West ?Virginia, and, more or less, started over.Izzo and his staff had known Bridges since he was in eighth grade. They had built a strong relationship, gotten used to seeing him around. After the move to West Virginia, though, Bridges kind of disappeared for a while, Izzo said. The Spartans were still chasing him, of course, but his path was no longer so preordained. He looked at Kentucky, Iowa State, Indiana, UConn. He had left home, forced himself to come out of his own shell, matured as a young man and in my game, even interned under a circuit court judge. If he was tempted to make a clean break, to leave Flint behind for good, who could blame him?Then came his official visit to East Lansing.A few months later, on the first day allowed by NCAA rules, Bridges mailed Izzo his letter of intent.I just felt it, Bridges said. I felt like I belonged there.TOM IZZO CAN?be self-critical to a fault.Example No. 1: He is haunted by last seasons first-round loss to Middle Tennessee State. This is understandable. The No. 2-seeded Spartans were a heavy Final Four favorite, led by senior guard Denzel Valentine, before they gave up 90 points on 68 possessions to Conference USAs seventh-best offense. That one stings. Fair enough.Less fair, perhaps: Izzo blames himself for not calling a timeout until Middle Tennessee had opened its early 15-2 lead. (Nobody else, I made the mistake, Izzo said last month. This year, if we get down 12-0, there will be a timeout called. And I mean that sincerely.) In reality, theres no one to blame for Middle Tennessees 40-minute, out-of-body experience. Basketball can be weird.Example No. 2: It took Izzo until this summer?-- after 19 straight tournament appearances, seven Final Fours and induction into the Hall of Fame -- to admit his program had built a culture.Early on, after we won the national championship, everybody was ready to canonize us, Izzo said. I thought, come back in 10, 12 years. Weve had some really good teams, but we had a couple of years where in my mind we were good but the culture wasnt the same.Its different now. Last season, Valentine and Matt Costello led one of the tightest-knit, hardest-working teams of their coachs career. Those good vibes have become self-sustaining. Seniors and juniors carry them forward. The Spartans are already equating this teams chemistry to last seasons, remarkable given the turnover in personnel. Meanwhile, it has become a bona fide recruiting advantage: Prospects want playing time and a chance to go pro, sure, but some are just as interested in being part of a family.When Bridges took his official visit, he stayed with senior guard Tum Tum Nairn, the teams universally beloved Bahamian, a born leader, one of Izzos favorite people in the world. What could have been a casual arms-length weekend was, instead, a two-day crash course in bonding.I believe its one of