Michigan State Spartans head coach Tom Izzo let his opinion be known on the potential expansion of the NCAA Tournament.
Legendary Coach Tom Izzo Gives His Take on Potential NCAA Tournament Expansion
Hall-of-Fame head coach Izzo has been around college basketball a long time, now in his 30th season as the Spartans head coach.
During that time, he’s won the 2000 NCAA National Championship, 10 regular-season Big Ten titles, six Big Ten Tournament titles, appeared in eight Final Fours and brought Michigan State to a Big Ten-record 26 straight NCAA Tournaments. Oh, and he’s been honored with eight National Coach of the Year awards.
To say that Izzo’s opinion should be heard by college basketball decision-makers should be a given, considering how long he’s been in the sport and how much success he’s enjoyed.
In terms of the potential expansion of the 68-team NCAA Tournament—ideas have been floated of including 72 or 76 teams—Izzo expressed his position during an appearance on “Pardon My Take.”
“I was involved in a lot of things. I was on a lot of committees, but these last couple of things that have happened, I’ve kind of just decided I care about the game a lot,” Izzo said. “I’m not really putting enough time in to figure out what’s right. I hope they do what’s right for basketball, what’s right for the players in the game, and not just for money or something else. I hope it’s, you know, the best interest of basketball. And I don’t know what that would be until I really sat down and observed it.”
The Spartans head coach continued, confirming his worry of future expansion.
“There’s some younger coaches out there that I really respect that are on some of these committees that I think will fight those fights, and in the meantime, I’m gonna just, they want my opinion. I give my opinion, and you’re gonna say, ‘Well, what’s your opinion?’ I worry if they expand it too much.”
Izzo later commented on the Cinderella aspect of March Madness and related it to football, where a proverbial 16-seed would never get a chance to play a top seed—the beauty of college basketball and what makes the sport so popular in March.
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It’s safe to say that if any further expansion is to be done, NCAA decision-makers and committees should do their due diligence on how it will ultimately affect the product on the court—because, according to Izzo, that’s what matters the most.
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