5. Kevin Willis — 1984
Wait, Kevin Willis? Yeah, so, the list of Michigan State NBA greats is pretty short. Willis can hold down the fort at number five until Jackson, Bridges, or Harris wrests it away from him. Willis was the number 11 pick in the 1984 draft and went on to play a whopping 22 seasons in the league, finally retiring at age 44 after the 2007 season.
For some perspective, Willis’s final team was that same 67 win Mavericks squad Maurice Ager played on — and Ager was born in 1984, the year Willis was drafted with Hakeem, Jordan, and Barkley. Willis made one All Star team in a decade with the Hawks before bouncing around the league as a starting center, and he won an NBA championship with the San Antonio Spurs in 2003 at age 40. He was rarely great but pretty decent for a really long time.