Spartans Quit in 72-52 Beat Down By the Hawkeyes

 

The Spartan's season is in a downward spiral and last night at Carver didn't help.

 

Iowa City, Iowa

Carver Hawkeye Arena

 

You can call tonight’s blowout of Tom Izzo and the MSU basketball program whatever you want. I am sure many of those things couldn’t be printed, but did you ever think you could say that one of his teams quit and didn’t care? No, you can.

 

Anyone who was forced to watch this game saw it. It wasn’t hard to find. There was one team full of emotion. Allegedly, the worst team in the Big Ten that saw what Izzo earlier in the week called, “Blood in the water.” The other team was lackadaisical and nonchalant. One was ready for the kill and one seemed resigned to being killed.

 

Tonight in Iowa, what little life was left in the Spartans once National Championship dreaming season died. The Spartans lost by 20, but worse than that the entire team and coaches seemed accepting of it.

 

They were out rebounded by Iowa. They had more turnovers than Iowa, and while the Hawks shot an impressive 58%, MSU shot 34%. It was a disaster. Sadly, the stats don’t tell the story.

 

You can point fingers at players (Izzo blamed senior leadership) and you should, but substitution patterns by Izzo were just as bad, and frankly, this team doesn’t respond to him. That is on him.

 

The blame has to start at the top and filter to the entire program…and it does. This isn’t about spoiled fans that are cranky with the coach and program. This is about a once proud program that has collapsed. Losing happens to teams, not collapses.

 

Izzo said it himself, “"I think this is the worst performance of a team that I've coached.” He further lamented his team’s collapse (there’s that word again) when he added, “We are reeling.”

 

The players seemed resigned to it. There is a rift on this team that I will leave for Hondo to discuss, but Kalin Lucas said, “"We just played with no emotion, no fight." Draymond Green was speechless. That, in and of itself, says it all.