Jeff Riger: Izzo Happy To Be Dancing Again!
A day after Selection Sunday, Tom Izzo stepped to the podium to do his weekly news conference as he does every Monday however this one was different. There was no more talk about being on the bubble, or being the last four in, or even possibly playing in an embarrassing play in game. No, all that chatter had disappeared and the only thing left on Izzo's mind was UCLA, the Spartans opponent come Thursday evening in Florida.
During the 50 plus minutes addressing the media, Izzo hit on several things including how legendary UCLA has been in the sport, how he wants his team to forget about a bad regular season and focus on the "big dance" and Izzo even ripped ESPN college basketball analyst Doug Gotlieb for referring to Michigan State as "Kalin Lucas and some dudes." However the Northern Michigan native spent the majority of time on Monday talking about the schedule and how it is quickly becoming the hardest part of his job. Izzo had the media participate by nodding their head yes or no on if MSU's 2010-11 schedule helped them get into the tournament. The response was spilt and for the people like myself that thought the schedule did help, Izzo was ready to debate and have us see it his way. The MSU head man thinks that the Spartans non conference slate was the toughest in the country and if they would have played lesser competition they no doubt would have won more games and been a higher seed, thus not having to wonder if they would be in or not.
Izzo went on to question if in the future it is worth scheduling so many tough opponents letting on that he won't bring in a bunch of "cup cakes" but maybe just less top teams in the country. I on the other hand do think the schedule helped the Spartans, because while playing less top teams would have maybe resulted in more wins they would have been less meaningful and not had the chance to have those other games count as those so called very important "marquee wins". I think every Spartan fan knew that in the end it would be reputation and that tough schedule, especially in the non conference portion of the season that would help get them in. Furthermore, Izzo knows that while it is basketball it is also entertainment and when he has a chance to schedule a Duke or a NC or a Kansas he will in the end choose those teams instead of some mid major snoozer because he as well as you wants basketball to be interesting in November and December. So I will play the role of Tom Izzo now and ask you...did the Spartans schedule help them get into the NCAA tournament? I say yes, what do you think?
Watch the video of Izzo at the podium below.
