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How Tom Izzo always gets his teams to peak in March
INDIANAPOLIS — Two months into a season that had not started like he had hoped, Michigan State coach Tom Izzo grew fed up with the way his team ended huddles after every practice.
He prohibited the Spartans from chanting "Indy" for the rest of the season in order to reinforce that they weren't playing with the effort or attention to detail needed to contend for a Final Four.
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"That motivated us a lot," Michigan State guard Bryn Forbes said. "Knowing he thought we weren't playing as well as we needed to be to get to Indianapolis, that just pushed us to work harder. I think that changed all of us for the better."
Stories like that demonstrate how Izzo has forged a reputation for having a magic touch in March. He has a remarkable knack for finding innovative ways to get his teams to peak in time for college basketball's most important month.
When Michigan State meets Duke on Saturday night, it will be Izzo's seventh Final Four appearance in the past 17 seasons. The Spartans have met or exceeded expectations based on their NCAA tournament seeding all but three times during that stretch, a track record that has inspired Michigan State to start selling T-shirts that read "January, February, Izzo, April, May."
Of Izzo's seven Final Four runs, this is easily his most improbable. Michigan State lost stars Gary Harris, Adreian Payne and Keith Appling off last year's Elite Eight team, swung and missed on a handful of high-profile recruits and lost to lowly Texas Southern in December, yet the Spartans improved enough over the course of the season that they're one of the last four teams still playing.
"We've been fortunate enough to be really successful in March, and Coach Izzo is the driving force behind it," longtime Michigan State associate head coach Dwayne Stephens said. "He's never satisfied with being average. He wants us to be great in anything he does, and it shows."
One of the secrets to Michigan State's March success is Izzo's scheduling philosophy.
Izzo assembles one of the nation's most challenging non-conference schedules every season and takes great care to select opponents who play a wide variety of styles and systems. His theory is piling up a few early season losses is a small price to pay if the tough schedule boosts Michigan State's NCAA tournament seeding and prepares the Spartans for challenges that await in the postseason.
"If you look at how we schedule, we think it's better for us to play Duke and lose than it is to play someone we're going to blow out," Michigan State assistant Dane Fife said. "We always schedule with March in mind. We want a little bit of a gauge of where we are as a team, and we want to make sure our team knows this isn't going to be easy."
Izzo's approach to identifying a starting lineup and a rotation mirrors his scheduling philosophy. He's not afraid to take risks and experiment with different looks from November to February in hopes that the tinkering will lead to him identifying the ideal combination for March.
Ten different Spartans have started games this season and Izzo even used five different lineups in five games during one stretch. Izzo's key change was inserting freshman point guard Lourawls "TumTum" Nairns into the starting five and sliding Travis Trice to his more natural shooting guard spot, a mid-February switch that paved the way for Trice's brilliant finish to his senior season.
What Izzo's players appreciate most is that he drives them to get better and never allows them to become complacent. Spurred by Izzo's fiery outbursts, Marvin Clark, Matt Costello and Gavin Schilling have developed into a steady frontcourt, Trice has emerged as a go-to scorer and Michigan State has collectively improved on defense to compensate for no longer having Payne to erase mistakes at the rim.
One of the seminal moments in Michigan State's season came after a humbling home loss to Illinois. Izzo had his video team splice together a film clip of every sequence in which the Spartans were beaten to a loose ball, missed a blockout or committed a costly turnover.
"We saw we weren't playing like a typical Michigan State team," Nairns said. "Coach Izzo doesn't take that and that's unacceptable. The next game at Northwestern … we led [38-14] at halftime. I know Northwestern was at the bottom of the Big Ten, but they were competitive with all the top teams. The fact that we just stifled them and physically took it to them, it showed us what we could do."
Izzo can shout at his players without them tuning him out because they know how much he cares about them. He is an excellent communicator who goes out of his way to help all his players — even those no longer with the program.
Earlier this year, Izzo scheduled an exhibition game against the Master's College of Santa Clarita, Calif., so former Michigan State guard Russell Byrd could receive one last ovation at the Breslin Center. Then in March, Izzo invited Alex Guana to rejoin the team for the opening weekend of the NCAA tournament a few months after he retired from basketball to focus on fatherhood and the working world.
"He's intense but he just cares so much about this program and what the players are going through," Nairns said. "He holds us accountable because he wants us to achieve our dreams."
If Michigan State players ever do grow sick of Izzo's messages, they still hear his advice from other sources. Magic Johnson, Draymond Green and Mateen Cleaves are among the legion of former Spartans who come back to speak to the current players or offer invaluable advice via calls or texts.
While every Final Four run has been special for Izzo, he admits he has enjoyed this one most of all because even he didn't see it coming.
The day he banned the "Indy" chant, he wasn't certain this Spartans team had the focus and discipline to overcome its lack of future NBA talent. A couple months later, he's thrilled he was wrong.
"I said to Travis yesterday, 'Now you see why I was pushing so hard all year,'" Izzo said. "He said, 'Yeah, but this is way better than what you said.' That's kind of cool."
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Jeff Eisenberg is the editor of The Dagger on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at daggerblog@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter!
