Tom Izzo best coach

[gotime909]

....in modern tournament history?

This study says yes....and it's not really close

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/...ach-in-modern-ncaa-tournament-history-by-far/

 

[LuciousGameWinner]

What holds Izzo back in some people's mind is that he only has 1 title. I'm thinking he gets 1 more before he retires and goes down as a top 5 coach of all time.

I'll admit I've questioned him a ton this year, but there is no one I'd rather have as a coach. Sometimes he's stubborn but it comes with the territory I suppose. Tom is a legend, replacing him will be tough.

 

[Spartan23MSU]

What holds Izzo back in some people's mind is that he only has 1 title. I'm thinking he gets 1 more before he retires and goes down as a top 5 coach of all time.

I'll admit I've questioned him a ton this year, but there is no one I'd rather have as a coach. Sometimes he's stubborn but it comes with the territory I suppose. Tom is a legend, replacing him will be tough.

You saved me a post, spot on.

 

[Spartanmack]

Interesting. His ranking based on this criteria is helped by him being under-seeded as has been argued on another thread and conversely krooziwooski, who has nearly 2x the number of tournament wins is hurt by the fact that dook is consistently getting 1, 2 or 3 seeds. Obviously that doesn't account for the entire difference but is Izzo really better or that much better than coach K? Is it better to get lower seeds and way outperform (being a 7, making the Elite 8 is WAY outperforming). Or, is it better to be a 1 seed, only kinda outperform but win a National title? The better your seed, the harder it is to outperform.

It's not a perfect analysis but it's interesting and whether you like the criteria or not, no one can say izzo's not in the conversation.

 

[Sbee]

....in modern tournament history?

This study says yes....and it's not really close

http://fivethirtyeight.com/datalab/...ach-in-modern-ncaa-tournament-history-by-far/

the question on here is being the best tournament coach which I'd agree with, this isn't about recruiting or building the best program, it's about living up to expectations in the tournament. of course this is a lot easier to do when you aren't seeded as high, as we often aren't. this is really a function of our scheduling since we quality opponents and rack up losses early. we are prepared for tough games at neutral sites and we tend to be seeded lower because of those losses. We could have not played Duke and Kansas and been seeded better but we wouldn't have found out where we needed to improve.

 

[TheVictors]

I'd agree with that. Come tourney time, State is the anti-Kansas where rather than assume they'll choke in early rounds, you put them thru to the Sweet-16.

Of course I'm not a Sparty nor an Izzo, so take my objectivity with a grain of salt.

 

[tomdalton22]

It has more to do with the seeding than anything else. MSU is typically under seeded and almost every year MSU fans complain about it (including this year). Now it helps the argument that Izzo is the best NCAA tournament coach. He is a great coach...but only one title in that same era...can't be called the best.

 

[Sbee]

It has more to do with the seeding than anything else. MSU is typically under seeded and almost every year MSU fans complain about it (including this year). Now it helps the argument that Izzo is the best NCAA tournament coach. He is a great coach...but only one title in that same era...can't be called the best.

It's all a result of playing a difficult schedule, the seeding and the performance. MSU is more of the anti Syracuse than anything, they play nobody, never leave NY and generally underachie

 

[tomdalton22]

It's all a result of playing a difficult schedule, the seeding and the performance. MSU is more of the anti Syracuse than anything, they play nobody, never leave NY and generally underachie

and they don't cheat! (as far as we know)

 

[Sbee]

and they don't cheat! (as far as we know)

Well izzo did get suspended for the dumbest violation in history.

 

[tomdalton22]

Well izzo did get suspended for the dumbest violation in history.

I don't remember him getting suspended so I googled it. Paying a camp counselor <$500 for a week...that will get some recruits to MSU!!!

 

[everyoneneedsasmil]

Why does everyone encourage the idea that State is consistently underseeded? I don't mean to destroy anyone's delusions, but the selection committee doesn't hate MSU. They aren't purposely seeding the team lower just to screw with us. They are seeding all teams based on the same criteria.

Even if you do believe that MSU is getting shafted by one seed each year (unless you're really crazy and think the team is being dropped multiple seeds), Izzo would STILL be one of the best coaches by this study. For fun I just ran the numbers. If you bump up MSU's seed by one in every single year Izzo has been the coach, it averages out to expecting 4.2 more wins than the study indicated. Taking those 4.2 wins directly from the wins above expectation (attributed to Izzo), that drops him all the way down to +10.4. That number, by the way, would still rank second in the study.

So 1) stop being homers and assuming everyone is out to get you, and 2) don't try to rationalize away something when even worst case scenario makes Izzo look like a superstar.

 

[Spartanmack]

Nobody is saying it's a conspiracy or that there is some anti-MSU bias. We play a tougher schedule than most, lose games to good teams plus a game or two to bad teams from time-to-time. As a result, we get seeded similarly to other teams with the same record, who probably didn't play as tough of a schedule and likely aren't as good. So they're frequently a better team than their record indicates. That's where the under-seeding comes from. State probably deserved as high as a 5 seed, at least a 6 this year (most had us projected as a 7 going into the B1G tournament but losing to a 1 seed in OT in the finals didn't bump us up a single spot). Look at Oklahoma - they have basically the same record as MSU, split w/ KU was their best win and they have 4 losses to teams that didn't make the tourney. They're a 3 seed and we're favored against them as a 7. We're under-seeded (they're probably over-seeded too) this year. Seeding isn't a perfect science, the committee makes mistakes. It doesn't happen every year but it happens more frequently to MSU than it does to dook, KU, UNC, etc.

Also, while this study is interesting and not without merit, any study that has krooziwoosky as the 20th best tournament coach has to be taken w/ a hefty grain of salt. Like I said above, is Izzo really that much better because he can take a 5-7 team to the sweet 16 or final 8 (massive outperformance) than coach K who only slightly outperforms by winning multiple championships w/ top 3 seeds?

 

[Sbee]

I don't remember him getting suspended so I googled it. Paying a camp counselor <$500 for a week...that will get some recruits to MSU!!!

the counselor was Carlton Valentine, former player and head coach at Lansing Sexton. he's worked the camp for years and is the perfect kind of person to have at theses, former spartan and local basketball coach. this became a problem after MSU recruited Denzel. I understand the intention of the rule is to prevent the AAU coaches and parents to get money they don't deserve in order to sway their kids, that wasn't the case here. really just a dumb violation, I guess he shouldn't have done it but they did it for years and if Denzel was a football player Carlton still would have worked the camp

 

[Spartanmack]

This tournament illustrates the point I was making earlier. Is Izzo really a better tournament coach than krooziewooksi? Izzo was supposed to win .9 games this year but he outperformed by winning 4, that's a +3.1. Krooziwookski outperformed by less but he won a national championship. Under the criteria for this analysis, or any for that matter, coach K couldn't have possibly done any better than he did this year and he beat Izzo by 20 points yet according to this study, Izzo was better in this tournament. It very well could be that Izzo is a better or even the best tournament coach. At a minimum, he absolutely has to be in the conversation and the two previous years definitely hurt coach K's standing but you have to see that this study that ranks him 20th best (although this year he should make a big jump in the standings) when he has 2x the tournament wins than everyone except a couple guys AND he has 4 (now 5) championships, is flawed.

 

[tomdalton22]

This tournament illustrates the point I was making earlier. Is Izzo really a better tournament coach than krooziewooksi? Izzo was supposed to win .9 games this year but he outperformed by winning 4, that's a +3.1. Krooziwookski outperformed by less but he won a national championship. Under the criteria for this analysis, or any for that matter, coach K couldn't have possibly done any better than he did this year and he beat Izzo by 20 points yet according to this study, Izzo was better in this tournament. It very well could be that Izzo is a better or even the best tournament coach. At a minimum, he absolutely has to be in the conversation and the two previous years definitely hurt coach K's standing but you have to see that this study that ranks him 20th best (although this year he should make a big jump in the standings) when he has 2x the tournament wins than everyone except a couple guys AND he has 4 (now 5) championships, is flawed.

I certainly think that most people consider both Izzo and Coach K great coaches...but there is no doubt that Coach K is better. The 5 championships confirm this.

 

[gotime909]

I think if Coach K got as much out of his players as Izzo, he'd have 10 championships and if Izzo recruited as well as Coach K I'm sure he'd have a few more as well.

 

[MSUMatt28]

I think it's unfair to say Coach K doesn't get the most out of his players. When's the last time they were anything lower than a 3 seed in the NCAAs? They are consistently excellent every regular season. They've had some earlier than expected exits in the NCAAs here and there, but that is often a crapshoot.

 

[gotime909]

I think it's unfair to say Coach K doesn't get the most out of his players. When's the last time they were anything lower than a 3 seed in the NCAAs? They are consistently excellent every regular season. They've had some earlier than expected exits in the NCAAs here and there, but that is often a crapshoot.

1 ACC title and bounced from the tourney in the first round 3 times in the last 9 years.

2 titles in those 9 years. The other 7 were sub par by their standards.

 

[Mitchrapp]

This tournament illustrates the point I was making earlier. Is Izzo really a better tournament coach than krooziewooksi? Izzo was supposed to win .9 games this year but he outperformed by winning 4, that's a +3.1. Krooziwookski outperformed by less but he won a national championship. Under the criteria for this analysis, or any for that matter, coach K couldn't have possibly done any better than he did this year and he beat Izzo by 20 points yet according to this study, Izzo was better in this tournament. It very well could be that Izzo is a better or even the best tournament coach. At a minimum, he absolutely has to be in the conversation and the two previous years definitely hurt coach K's standing but you have to see that this study that ranks him 20th best (although this year he should make a big jump in the standings) when he has 2x the tournament wins than everyone except a couple guys AND he has 4 (now 5) championships, is flawed.

This might be the dumbest thing I ever heard.