Oakland University mens’ basketball will be taking on Michigan State University  at the new Little Caesars Arena on in downtown Detroit.

The teams have the privilege of playing in the arena set to replace both the Joe Louis Arena and the Palace of Auburn Hills in it’s historic first season. The arena will seat 20,000 during hockey games and 21,000 during basketball games. 

Little Caesar’s Arena will be the new home of the Detroit Red Wings and Detroit Pistons and is also expected to host big names in music like Kid Rock, Imagine Dragons and Ed Sheeran after it opens on Sept. 17. 

The game is set to be a doubleheader, with Oakland taking on MSU and the University of Michigan taking on Detroit Mercy. These match-ups are sure to draw crowds, and bring out the college rivalries all around Detroit. With two rivalries in the house, the games are expected to be heated. 

Oakland has gone up again MSU 15 times and fallen short every time, the most recent being in 2015 at the Palace of Auburn Hills. Nonetheless, it is expected to be a thrilling match-up, especially if it is anything like the 2015 game in which Oakland narrowly fell to the Spartans 99-93. In the sold out game, Oakland led for most of the match until falling behind in overtime. Despite the last game being so close, both the team and head coach Greg Kampe want a win. 

Senior Martez Walker said that he is very confident going into the faceoff and is looking forward to a great game. After losing out in the first round of the Horizon League tournament as the No. 1 seed, the team has work ahead of them. But Oakland is determined to come back strong. 

“I’m excited to see where we go with the team coming back from last year,” Walker said.

With the loss of Kay Felder and Sherron Dorsey-Walker in the last few years, winning is up to the team’s new upperclassmen. Jalen Hayes , a senior on the team, is hoping this game will give the Golden Grizzlies a chance to best MSU before he has to hang-up his Oakland jersey for good at the end of the season.

“I’m really, really excited,” he said. “It’ll be nice to play MSU on a mutual court. This will be good for the city. I’m looking forward to a chance to knock out MSU before I graduate.”

Every time Oakland takes on MSU the games are hyperintense and crowd-pleasing. This keeps spectators on the edge of their seats until the final buzzer.

“It’s going to be an amazing game both to play and watch,” Kendrick Nunn, a senior on the team, said. “MSU has always been one of my rivals.”

With pre-season games and over a month of regular season before the faceoff, the Grizzlies have plenty of time to warm up before the team attempts to defeat the Spartans for the first time.