Michigan State coach Tom Izzo previews charity exhibition game against Tennessee

Tom Izzo on Thursday previewed the charity exhibition game between No. 4 Michigan State and No. 9 Tennessee scheduled for Sunday afternoon (3:30 p.m. Eastern Time, Big Ten Network) at the Breslin Center in East Lansing:

The exhibition against Tennessee

“Well, not to be one of those coaches that just is trying to motivate his team, but if we play like we did last night, we’ll get our butts kicked. I mean this team is the deepest, best team I’ve seen in a while. Deepest. I mean ,like 12 deep. And we played them last year, so we know about them. Very well-coached, but they’ve got a lot back and they’re a physical team. so we have to rebound better … this team we’re playing is definitely a top-five team.”

If he plans to use the Tennessee exhibition to tinker with and work on the Michigan State rotation

“It’s funny because Rick and I are gonna talk tonight, tinkering. I mean, it’s not about just trying to win. I mean, if it was closed, I think definitely I would do some other things. Maybe both of us. But being open, as the game goes on both teams would want to win and to do other things, but I gotta get some things done, too . 

“… I don’t think I’m going to tinker a lot. But I think try to get the rotation down. I haven’t won enough games, the way this program is, the last couple years. So I’m not worried about anyone’s feelings. I’m worried about connection. But our team is something we control and that’s the way I’m look at it.”

How Michigan State matches up with Tennessee 

“They’ve added a lot of people. And now I say that, they have a couple guys that were sitting out, you know. One of the transfers (Jordan Gainey) is the assistant coach’s son, who came, it was all in a good way. But they are worthy of everything, their rank. And the backcourts courts will be good. The front courts are gonna be good and the wings are gonna be good. 

“So our biggest problem now is they have so many different pieces, it’s figuring out who’s gonna start. I’m not even sure they know. And then who’s gonna play the most and at what position are they gonna play? And that’s the part of this that’s a little harder than normal. It’s harder to get a scouting report on them. And we do a lot according to our scouting reports, so as they probably do too. But it’ll be some of it we’ll have to play as we go. And that’s good too.”

Why he wants his Michigan State teams to scrimmage high-level competition like Tennessee

“Well, I think that was another one of the good moves. I don’t know why they don’t, I say open it up and maybe let us do that and give to a charity. It’d be good to, it could be any charity. It could be the Boys and Girls Club in your community. It could be something like that. And maybe teach players how to give back in different ways, I think would be a hell of an idea for one. I also think though it has benefited us a lot. You know, some people are playing two games, but when they’re behind closed doors, I always like to get our freshmen out in front of a crowd in one of them.

“So we’ve gone one-and-one. But I think it’s been tremendously valuable. As you say, we’ve played Gonzaga twice, we’ve played now Tennessee twice. And I mean, I was trying to pick some teams that I think are gonna be really good and create some issues that we don’t, from different conferences so that we can grow in that area.”

If he remembers who had the idea for the Tennessee-Michigan State exhibition to benefit the Maui wildfire relief efforts 

“Well, I know I talked about it right off the bat. I heard Kansas was gonna do it first, to be honest with you, in Illinois. And I called KP and I said, let’s petition. I said, what a great idea, what a great cause. And I thought it’d be great for our fans since we’re both ranked at the top five or six. You know, how many games do you get at anybody’s arena where got two top-five, six teams. So it was one of those win-win wins, but the biggest win was to Maui because I can’t even imagine the devastation those people have been through. 

“And I think I’m going on my fifth time next year, and I don’t know if Rick’s on his fourth this year, but we both, two coaches have spent eight, nine different trips to Maui, we probably owed them something too. So I’m glad Rick felt the same way I did.”

How different the exhibition might be if it were played behind closed doors

“We might come up with a couple of things like, have a little session that’s just on out-of-bounds plays or a little session where we go play zone. Or we might also just, I think you’d sub more freely. I mean, the competitive juices are gonna go and maybe some of the subs that would play 15, 18 minutes, they’ll play 12 minutes now, you know, maybe, maybe not. But yeah, I think all that, especially with those young guys, I mean, they’re trying to figure out how to put their shoes on in the locker room. So it will take a little time to get them back to normal life.”

How he became friends with Rick Barnes

“You know, I first met him when I was in, I think when he was at Ohio State working for Gary Williams. And you know, we always been friends. I always appreciated (him). He went at, when he was at Clemson, he went North Carolina. He had that Dean Smith incident. And he was just a guy that always took these smaller programs. because Clemson wasn’t any good then. And then when he went to Texas, we played each other a lot, including Kevin Durant. In fact, I was out in DC and I was recruiting a kid.

“And Kevin Durant’s dad had kind of coached him. He was at the practice and he brought up, yeah, remember when that little white guard (Drew) Neitzel, he says. he scored the winning bucket at Madison Square Garden? We were laughing about it, you know, and it kind of shows you how far back it goes.

“But then it really came to fruition When we went to Kuwait together. We spent eight days together over there. And he was just a riot, enjoyed him. And so we have mutual respect because I think we try to do it the right way. And he’s done it the right way and he coaches them hard and he’s demanding and he’s had a lot of good teams. And his incident, that Texas incident, meaning I don’t think there’s any way he should’ve been let go, but he was …  And I don’t know, we’re not best friends talk all the time. We’re just very respectful friends that appreciates things.”

If there’s an appreciation between Izzo and Barnes because they have similar coaching styles, if they’ll share notes after the exhibition for some self-scouting

“Oh yeah. We shared some things after the last game, things we thought. And during the year, once in a while, we’ll contact each other. I saw you play, what about this, this, and this. I saw you play. And we commiserate together as coaches do. But since I have great respect for him, I respect what his answers are. We respect what his thoughts are, and that’s fun. And we don’t have, we’re not trying to steal each other’s players or anything like it’s going on now in college basketball, so it makes it even easier.”