March Madness: Michigan State-Kansas has Final Four pedigree, hometown feel

Some very familiar faces are about to square off for a trip to the Sweet 16

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TULSA, Oklahoma – This is where Tom Izzo enters the scene. Where Michigan State enters the tournament.

It really doesn’t matter if the Spartans are sporting their most losses and lowest seed in six years. Or let’s just say that it matters less than it would for most teams with 14 losses.

That’s because Izzo practically owns the scene playing itself out here in the Midwest Region. Top seed Kansas is next in Sunday’s second round (upset alert!) and the ninth-seeded Spartans are all but saying, “Yeah, so?”

Michigan State has played tougher teams – in November alone. That was the month Izzo scheduled Arizona, Kentucky, Baylor and Duke in an 18-day period.

Only Arizona wasn’t ranked No. 1 at some point this season.

And Michigan State lost them all. Izzo apologized for it then -- but not now, after a 78-58 first-round evisceration of Miami on Friday.

“We’ve been on big stages all year long,” Michigan State’s coach said.

Any discussion over Michigan State’s “down” season has a chance to end fairly quickly. The Spartans finished tied for fifth in a down Big Ten. They came into Friday having lost three of their last four.

That’s sort of how the season began in November, 4-4.

“For us that had been here, we knew what coach was doing,” junior guard Tum Tum Nairn said. “For the younger guys, coach had to explain it to them. That’s what we do at Michigan State.”

That is, peak in March. Friday marked Izzo’s 102nd career win in this month. He is now 47-18 in the tournament.

This is a program so used to March it keeps track of its mark on St. Pat’s Day. For the record, the Spartans broke a seven-game losing streak March 17.

We now know Michigan State’s upset loss to Middle Tennessee in the first-round last year was an anomaly. Friday’s trouncing of Miami was evidence. 

After falling behind 10-0 to start, and then 15-5, the Spartans went on a 30-10 run to basically decide it before halftime.

“We probably wouldn’t have gotten out of that hole if it wasn’t for those [early] games,” Miles Bridges said.  “Freshmen aren’t freshmen anymore. We’re sophomores.”

 There is that juicy subtext for Sunday that has nothing to do with the schedule. It has to do with the Spartan Who Never Was.

Without Detroit native Josh Jackson, Izzo still locked down his best recruiting class ever in 2016. On Friday, he started three of those freshmen and had four on the floor at times.

Just think what that roster would be like with Jackson, KU’s stud freshman.

“It would be crazy, you know?” Ward said. “But you can’t live off of ‘what ifs’ anymore.”

Jackson returned from a one-game suspension Friday – and 13-day layoff to score 17 against outmanned UC Davis.

“I was a bit nervous,” Jackson said. “Nervous how I was going to perform. Nervous how we were going to perform.”

KU won by 38. 

A year ago Izzo was assembling that monster recruiting class that included his team’s top two scorers -- forward Ward (19 points) and swingman Miles Bridges (18).

True freshmen accounted for 57 of the 78 Spartan points Friday. They’ve scored 60 percent of the points during the season.

Jackson would have been in the same recruiting class with Ward, Bridges and guard Cassius Winston. All of them would have been in East Lansing until Jackson picked Kansas coming out of Prolific Prep in Napa, California.

“It would be a pretty good matchup,” Jackson said before Michigan State had tipped with Miami. “We’ve played each other multiple times. We both know what we like to do.”

After the Spartans sealed the deal Friday, Bridges countered: “It would have been crazy [to have him] but I like what we have now. It’s all business coming here. I didn’t come here to see any friends. I came here to win games.”

This game will be fraught with emotion for more reasons than the obvious. Kansas has that great/nasty streak of 13 straight conference titles that includes only two Final Fours and a lone national championship.

Sure, everyone would want that sort of run -- except in the same 13-year space Izzo has 28 tournament wins and four Final Fours. Self has 27 tournament wins and two Final Fours since 2005. 

Michigan State has the third-longest tournament appearance streak, 20 games. Kansas is No. 1 at 28. The teams have met five times since 2009.

Welcome, then, to a meeting Sunday of the sixth (Kansas) and seventh-winningest (Michigan State) tournament teams in history.

This has the pedigree of a Final Four game in the second round.

This is also where it automatically was going to get tough for Kansas. The No. 1 seed is almost guaranteed to be pushed in any year by a Power Five opponent emerging from the 8-9 game.

“If you’re the 1 seed you’re expected to still be able to handle business no matter who it is,” Kansas’ Landen Lucas said.

Yes, so no excuses for one team that took its lumps early and for the favorite who has been laying the wood all season.

“I appreciate their program and what they’ve done,” Izzo said of Kansas. “Tonight I appreciate my guys.”