Michigan State coach Tom Izzo is closing in on his first commitment of the 2025 class.

The Spartans haven’t had the best luck on the trail so far. Five-star Braylon Collier, one of the biggest risers and most elite prospects in the class, left the Spartans out of his list of top teams.

That one hurt, as Collier’s shooting prowess and ability to defend and manage the court were traits that matched the prototypical Izzo player. Another top Indiana prospect, four-star forward Trent Sisley, just committed to Indiana. The Spartans were recruiting Sisley heavily, too.

However, the good news is that the Spartans will be visited on Oct. 3 by forward Cam Ward, per 247Sports’ Justin Thind. Ward is the No. 54 overall prospect in the class, per 247Sports. He is the No. 11-ranked power forward and the second-rated player in his home state of Maryland.

In an interview with Jamie Shaw of On3, Ward touted Michigan State and Izzo.

“Tom Izzo. I mean, I think that speaks for itself,” Ward said. “He called me recently, and every time we talk, he tells me that I am his type of guy. And when you have a Hall of Fame-type coach tell you that you’re his type of guy, then you have to entertain that and see what is going on. Me, personally, I love that I’m his type of guy. So, I’m going to go up there and see what he is talking about and see what their plan is and how they plan to get me where I want to go.”

Ward also told Shaw what he was looking for in a program.

“One, having a family aspect is big for me,” Ward said. “Two, having a development plan for me that is going to be consistent. I don’t want to show up and then just be on my own. I want tough love and tough coaching. So those two things and then, of course, a degree. I want to get a degree that is going to help me outside of basketball. My mom is big on the academic side. She keeps telling me that she is not going to let me go somewhere that does not have academics.

“I’d like to do something in sports, Sports Management or Sports Business. I was actually looking at Sports Medicine recently, but some schools recruiting me told me how taking Biology and Sciences might not line up with playing athletics, but some of the schools say it will line up. But I want to do something with sports.”

The Spartans had a good showing with five-star Jalen Haralson on his visit. If they pull off the same with Ward, they could be set up for success.

Michael France is Sports Illustrated’s Michigan State recruiting beat writer, covering all things Big Ten recruiting for Spartan Nation. Be sure to follow him on Twitter/X@michaelfrancesi for exclusive Spartans recruiting coverage.

Don’t forget to follow the official Spartan Nation Page on Facebook Spartan Nation WHEN YOU CLICK RIGHT HERE, and be a part of our vibrant community group Go Green Go White as well WHEN YOU CLICK RIGHT HERE.

Well, this one probably wasn’t on your election bingo card.

Amer Ghalib—the Muslim mayor of Hamtramck, Michigan, which since 2021 has also been governed by a city council made up of exclusively Muslim officials—on Sunday announced his endorsement of Donald Trump.

“President Trump and I may not agree on everything, but I know he is a man of principles. Though it’s looking good, he may or may not win the election and be the 47th president of the United States, but I believe he is the right choice for this critical time,” Ghalib wrote in a Facebook post. “I’ll not regret my decision no matter what the outcome would be, and I’m ready to face the consequences.”

Trump has since reposted Ghalib’s endorsement on his Truth Social platform, incidentally just hours after another post in which he thanked the emir and prime minister of Qatar for attending a meeting at Mar-a-Lago.

Neither the Qatari officials nor the mayor of Hamtramck appear to have been deterred by the Republican candidate’s long history of Islamophobic remarks and actions.

By way of a quick recap, Trump’s anti-Muslim sentiment featured prominently in his promotion of the “Birther” conspiracy theory about the racial, national, and religious heritage of former President Barack Obama.

In the run-up to the 2016 presidential election, Trump variously floated the possibility of creating a national database of all Muslims in the U.S. and closing the nation’s mosques, as well as claiming to have seen thousands of Muslims cheering as the World Trade Center came down on Sept. 11, 2001.

As president, he also advocated for the indiscriminate execution of extremist Islamist terrorists’ relatives and issued a short-lived travel ban for citizens of six Muslim-majority countries.

Trump also hosted neo-Nazi Nick Fuentes for a private dinner at the White House in November 2022, defended violent 2017 “Unite the Right” protesters in Charlottesville as “very fine people,” and invited self-professed white supremacist Laura Loomer to travel on his private plane this month.

Amer Ghalib, who leads city in battleground state of Michigan, says the Republican is the ‘right choice’, despite disagreements.

The mayor of the only city in the United States with an all-Muslim government has endorsed former President Donald Trump for November’s presidential election.

Amer Ghalib, who leads the city of Hamtramck in the crucial battleground state of Michigan, said on Sunday that the Republican candidate is a “man of principles” and “the right choice”, despite their disagreements on some issues.

“President Trump and I may not agree on everything, but I know he is a man of principles,” Ghalib said in a post on Facebook.

“Though it’s looking good, he may or may not win the election and be the 47th president of the United States, but I believe he is the right choice for this critical time. I’ll not regret my decision no matter what the outcome would be, and I’m ready to face the consequences.”

“Now, let the Caravan begin its journey,” Ghalib added. “This is just the starting point.”

Trump reposted Ghalib’s endorsement on his Truth Social platform shortly after the announcement.

Hamtramck, which has a population of about 28,000 people, made headlines in 2021 when it became the first US city to elect an all-Muslim City Council and a Muslim mayor.

Ghalib, who immigrated to the US from Yemen when he was 17, offered his support to Trump a little less than a week after meeting the Republican candidate before a town hall in the Michigan city of Flint.

Ghalib told The Detroit News last week that the pair had discussed the concerns of Arab and Muslim Americans and that Trump had requested his endorsement.

Michigan is one of seven key swing states expected to decide the outcome of November’s contest between Trump and his Democratic Party rival, Vice President Kamala Harris.

Opinion polls suggest a tight race between Trump and Harris both nationally and in battlegrounds such as Michigan.

In the most recent average of polls compiled by The New York Times, Harris leads Trump in Michigan by 50 percent to 47 percent.

Trump won Michigan in the 2016 election against Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton, becoming the first Republican to prevail in the state since George HW Bush in 1988.

President Joe Biden flipped the state back to the Democrats in 2020, beating Trump by a margin of about 150,000 votes.

Muslim-American anger over the Biden administration’s support for Israel’s war on Gaza has become a concern for Democrats as they face razor-thin races in the battleground states.

In a poll released by the Council on American-Islamic Relations in August, just 12 percent of Muslim voters in Michigan expressed support for Harris, with 18 percent backing Trump and 40 percent supporting the Green Party’s Jill Stein.

On Thursday, the Uncommitted National Movement, a grassroots campaign aimed at pressuring Democrats to end their support for the war, announced that it would not endorse Harris after her team failed to meet a September 15 deadline to respond to a request for a meeting with families of Palestinians killed in Gaza.