East Lansing — When Kenny Willekes was getting ready to head to Michigan State in the summer of 2015 for his first season as a walk-on with the Spartans, his high-school coach had one piece of advice.
“I said, ‘The best way for you to get yourself noticed is be the first guy there and the last guy to leave,’” Tim Swore said. “And for him that’s not a problem.
“That’s just part of his personality.”
That personality, the one that made Willekes a handful in his early days at NorthPointe Christian in Grand Rapids, Swore said, proved to be exactly what he needed at Michigan State.