2010/11 Michigan State Basketball Season was a Disappointment, but Proves Tom Izzo’s Dream is a Reality

 Tampa, Florida As I sit here in Tampa tonight the roar of the fans has dissipated. The work area is abuzz with the laptops of my colleagues and I am

 

Tampa, Florida

As I sit here in Tampa tonight the roar of the fans has dissipated. The work area is abuzz with the laptops of my colleagues and I am trying to put to paper my thoughts. A recap on what I should say and think of the season.

Left in the wake of this season are the statements of many of the players, who when it started declared this was “A national championship team or bust.” Based on what this team said, not the media, not the fans, this team: it was a “Bust!”

What once blossomed with a deep and talented team morphed into a failed dream and broken hearts. Can you wrap up this as one season? It feels more like two when you add to it the 2010 season.   

It would be unfair to gloss over the colossal disappointment and “Bust” that was the 2011 campaign and pretend that expectations were met or achieved. The players already did that. They set the standard early. Some felt like they made a mistake. I do not. I admire them for it. You beg for swagger and they showed it. Sometimes swagger goes unfulfilled, but a group of 18-22 year old young men set the bar early. That takes guts.

Tonight here in Tampa, the Spartans played hard. Even down big they didn’t quit, and fighting at the end for an amazing comeback they still played with heart. Did everyone play well? Not at all. This game was a perfect microcosm for the season. Each night it would seem a different cylinder. 

Never a night (other than against Purdue in the Big Ten tournament) when it all worked in unison and as a fine-tuned machine this season. Anyone who watched the 2011 season could point out numerous areas of frustrations, but other than one night in Iowa no one can point to anyone who quit. Some didn’t fulfill expectations. Some didn’t play as many hoped including themselves, but NO ONE quit.

It is my opinion that a new season starts the moment the final whistle of the last game is blown. 2012 is already underway.

This team has to find its identity. Draymond Green is without a doubt the leader. This is his team. I am IN NO WAY speaking disparaging of Lucas, Summers, or Kebler, but Green will find leading much easier. It is natural for older players to resist leadership from younger. That is human nature. He, too, must learn to lead, but one thing about Green I know is that no one cares as much as he does.

This team now becomes Draymond Green’s group. Izzo loves to have a point guard floor general that speaks for him and leads for him. Next year will be different as there will be no doubt Green is his go-to-guy. Others will and must grow into leaders, but not since Mateen Cleaves has the clear general among the players been so obvious.

Tom Izzo is still a Hall of Fame head coach. The 2011 season did NOTHING to hurt his legacy. He still has been to six Final Fours in thirteen seasons. The Breslin didn’t collapse, and the sky didn’t fall. It was the high promise of this season that makes it hurt so bad. It’s the hopes of what could have, would have, or should have been, squandered into the record books of history. 

There have been other years in Izzo’s tenure that ended without March glory. Frankly, there have been other years, under other coaches, that didn’t end in March glory. None hurt or feel like this. None quite had this promise. None held this much expectation. None have hurt this bad.

In 2007 Tom Izzo had his best coaching job. With a junior Drew Neitzel, his team was an injured shoulder to Idong Ibok away from a sweet sixteen and putting North Carolina out of the dance in their home state. That season felt glorious. This one was smothered in so much promise that it hurts perhaps worse than any he has coached.

This one season will sting. Rest assured, Spartan Nation, that as bad as you hurt, you are not alone in your misery. Tom Izzo said earlier this year after the Spartans lost to Texas, “I love turmoil.” He has even reiterated that he meant it. Well then, he has a lap full, or as they say down south “A whole heaping full.” If you hurt, this one crushed him.

He has things to address, the least of which is his scheduling. The sky hasn’t fallen. The program is far from ruined. The Spartan Nation simply has to deal with a “Bust.” Something we aren’t used to, something that isn’t fun, and something that most of the more than 300 NCAA division one-basketball teams have grown accustomed to every year.

MSU is not one of those schools. The silver lining in this “Bust” of a season is that Izzo has clamored since he took the helm from Jud that he wanted to build a program. He wanted to be elite. Spartan Nation, the reason this hurts so badly is because Izzo has done that. Spartan basketball is elite. That is why the 2011 season hurt.

In 2007 making the tournament was an accomplishment. Almost beating North Carolina in North Carolina to move to the sweet sixteen was a glorious accomplishment. This team in the ensuing next three years cemented itself firmly as elite, and now what once would have been a mild frustration is the fruit of being truly elite.

The program will be back. The feeling the Spartan Nation has for this past season is what it feels like to be elite. This is what North Carolina endured last year, and what the few handfuls of other elites have felt in the last 20 years. For many schools the Spartans 2011 season would be good. Even great. The reason this hurts so badly is because the Spartan program is elite.

The good news is that the hard work of building it was not in vain, and that it isn’t over yet. It doesn’t make it feel any better right now, but it doesn’t change the facts. MSU basketball is elite. Not this season, but the program. Sadly, it took a season like this to really know that.

Tom Izzo said that maybe he, the fans, and all around the program needed to be humbled. The point of the matter is that MSU Basketball is elite. With talent lined up out the door to come and be the next line of Spartan stars, the cupboard isn’t bare or even mildly empty. In fact, Izzo may have to build some new cupboards. Anyone claiming the Spartan program is losing its edge is a fool.

This season was tough. Frankly, last year was tough, but an improbable run to the Final Four was a soothing balm to many peoples’ memory. This season hurt. Honestly, I think MSU basketball is better for it.

This was a reminder to an elite program of what it takes to win. They didn’t have it this year. Tom Izzo loves turmoil. Tell Izzo he can’t do something and get out of his way. No one and I mean NO ONE feels worse about this season than Izzo. I also know the rear view mirror is torn off and he is looking ahead at 2012.

I once heard a Choctaw Indian Chief tell a story about dead men don’t feel pain. He talked about the pain of life reminds us we are alive. If this season didn’t hurt, didn’t disappoint, and didn’t frustrate people then it would prove that the program had failed. People were apathetic and didn’t care. 

If this season didn’t bother the Spartan Nation it would simply be because the dreams of being elite were dead. They aren’t. This pain that the entire Spartan Nation feels after the 2011 season tells us plainly that Tom Izzo has realized his dream of being that elite program.

I hope the other Big Ten schools and the rest of the nation enjoyed this. It was a down year, but for an Elite program. See you next year.

This article was reprinted from the March Spartan Nation Magazine