WATCH: Michigan State's Jaxon Kohler Speaks After Loss to Wisconsin
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INDIANAPOLIS, Ind. -- It wasn't the outcome Michigan State wanted, but it may be better off for it.
The Spartans were knocked out of the Big Ten Tournament on Saturday as Wisconsin downed the Spartans, 77-74, in the semifinal round.
Michigan State will get the extra time to rest and prepare for the NCAA Tournament, where it will likely be a 2 seed.
For now, though, the loss stings for the Spartans.
Junior forward Jaxon Kohler, who turned in 7 points and seven rebounds on Saturday, addressed the media afterward. You can watch part of his availability below:
Below is a transcript from Michigan State coach Tom Izzo's opening statement of his postgame press conference:
Izzo: "Well, I'm disappointed, and I think it shows you how little things can make a difference. We preach that all the time, but sometimes it doesn't go through. But I'm proud of these guys, especially these two [Jase Richardson and Jeremy Fears Jr.]. Coop [Carson Cooper] played awfully well, did a lot of things that we asked him to do. I think Jeremy is playing his best basketball in the last three, four games. Jase has had an eight-, 10-game run where he's playing phenomenal basketball. You've got to give some credit to Wisconsin. [John] Tonje was -- he definitely, along with [Braden] Smith, were the best players in the league at that time. He played like one of them today. I thought we did a pretty good job on him most of the way, and he cut loose a little bit, and that's what great players do. And yet I thought our game plan, I thought we -- you know, they didn't get 19 3s. How many did they get, eight, nine? And they got a couple of those late. We just made some mistakes in some key runs, and that was the difference in the game. Both teams had seven turnovers. That's a hell of a basketball game. We outrebounded them, shot pretty much similar, shot pretty well from the line, so did they. So, probably a hell of a basketball game except for the couple things that happened that probably cost us."
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