Tom Izzo Adds To Hall Of Fame Career With Big Ten Victories Record

When Michigan State promoted Tom Izzo to head men’s basketball coach in 1995, the move came with some risk. Yes, Izzo had been an assistant for several years under the legendary Jud Heathcote, who recommended Izzo for the job. But Izzo had no college head coaching experience, and he was entering an unforgiving and competitive Big Ten Conference that had at least five programs in the NCAA tournament each year for more than a decade.

Thirty years later, Izzo is still in the same role, although he’s now the veteran with a litany of accomplishments that make him among the best coaches the sport has ever seen. When Michigan State defeated Illinois Saturday, Izzo added to his lengthy resume, winning his record 354th Big Ten game. He surpassed former Indiana coach Bob Knight, whom Izzo had defeated on Jan. 4, 1996, to win his first Big Ten game.

“There’s some of me that says Bobby Knight deserves to have it,” Izzo told reporters after Saturday’s game. “I coached another year than him. I probably played more conference games than him. But if I could be in the same breath with him on that, that’s great for me. I have great respect for him as a coach. He helped me a lot in my younger days as a head coach.”

Like Knight, Izzo is a member of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame. Izzo received that honor in September 2016, and he hasn’t slowed down since. Izzo remains a passionate, driven man who commands the respect and loyalty of his players even as the college athletics landscape changes with transfers, Name, Image and Likeness and roster turnover the norm.

Entering Tuesday night’s home game against Purdue, Michigan State is 20-5 overall and 11-3 in the Big Ten, one game behind Michigan (20-5 overall and 12-2 in the league). Purdue is third at 11-4 in the Big Ten, while Wisconsin (10-4), Maryland (10-5) and UCLA (10-5) remain in the mix.

After losing its top three scorers from last season’s team that lost in the second round of the NCAA tournament, Michigan State was unranked in the preseason AP poll. But the Spartans have been ranked for the past 11 weeks and rose to as high as No. 7 in the poll late last month thanks to a 13-game winning streak.

Although the Spartans have lost three of their past five games, they are No. 14 in the Associated Press poll, No. 21 in the NCAA net rankings and a near-lock to make the NCAA tournament. ESPN’s Joe Lunardi has Michigan State as the No. 4 seed in the East Region, while CBS Sports’s Jerry Palm has the Spartans as the No. 4 seed in the Midwest Region.

While most other coaches are aggressive in the transfer portal, Izzo has primarily focused on high school recruiting. Of the top 10 players on its roster, Michigan State has only two transfers in senior forward Frankie Fidler, who played three years at the University of Nebraska-Omaha, and senior center Szymon Zapala, who played three years at Utah State and one year at Longwood University. Zapala has started all 25 games, but he averages just 5 points and 4.3 rebounds in 15 minutes per game, while Fidler started the first seven games but has since been a reserve and averages 7.7 points in 17.4 minutes per game.

Michigan State has 10 players averaging 15 or more minutes per game, with senior Jaden Akins leading the way with 26.4 minutes per game. Akins averages a team-high 13.2 points per game, while freshman guard Jase Richardson is next with 10.3 points per game. Richardson was a reserve for most of the season, but he has started the past three games, during which he averaged 17.6 points and shot 54.2% from the floor.

Richardson, the only Michigan State player projected as a first round pick in June’s NBA draft, is a second-generation player. His father, 13-year NBA veteran Jason Richardson, was a freshman on Michigan State’s 2000 team that won a national title and holds a special place in Michigan State lore. The 1979 team led by star Magic Johnson and coached by Heathcote is the only other Spartans’ team to win the national championship. No Big Ten program has won the NCAA tournament in the past 25 years, either.

Still, with Izzo at the helm, Michigan State has remained a top-tier program. The Spartans have made the NCAAs every year since 1998, the longest active streak in Division 1 and two shy of the all-time record. The only programs with longer streaks (Kansas and North Carolina) had multiple coaches during that time, whereas Izzo has been the constant for Michigan State.

In all, Izzo has led the Spartans to eight Final Four appearances, 10 Big Ten regular season titles and six league tournament championships. He has 727 victories and won nearly 71% of his games. And he’s still going strong, still driven and still attempting to win championships.

After Saturday’s game, Izzo recalled how he envisioned Knight, Heathcote, former Michigan State coach Gus Ganakas and Izzo’s father, Carl, drinking beers in heaven and discussing the latest victory. Each of those men have died, but Izzo took it upon himself to honor people who had made a difference in his life. Izzo remembered others, too, knowing he didn’t do it all by himself and needed help along the way.

“My Dad, I’m sure he’s proud, but it’s the players, guys,” Izzo said. “It’s the fans. It’s the Presidents. It’s the AD’s. It’s the people that all made this possible for me to have a chance to accomplish something like that. I didn’t shoot. I didn’t dribble. They did it for me, and I’m so appreciative of that.”