Michigan State Basketball: 3 final takeaways from 2020-21 season

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Mar 18, 2021; West Lafayette, Indiana, USA; Michigan State Spartans head coach Tom Izzo reacts in the second half against the UCLA Bruins during the First Four of the 2021 NCAA Tournament at Mackey Arena. Mandatory Credit: Marc Lebryk-USA TODAY Sports /

1. Tom Izzo had an uncharacteristically bad coaching year

Tom Izzo is a Hall of Fame coach for a reason. He usually gets the most out of his players and is one of the best at developing in the country. He’s also elite when it comes to exceeding expectations. That just didn’t happen in 2020-21.

Not only did Izzo fail to meet expectations at the beginning of the year (which were probably too high to begin with), he struggled all season long with lineup management.

To top it all off, Izzo had arguably his worst coaching performance of the season in the First Four matchup against UCLA. His second-half coaching mistakes led to the Bruins coming back down 14 to win the game. This wasn’t the first time Michigan State choked away a big lead due to coaching gaffes as the UCLA game felt very similar to the Purdue game in East Lansing back in January.

Izzo was giving minutes to guys like Thomas Kithier and Julius Marble over Marcus Bingham Jr. all season long and that was head-scratching. We saw later in the year that Bingham was the best post defender on the team by a mile and he probably should have been averaging 20-25 minutes.

And why not try to grow and develop Mady Sissoko?

It just wasn’t a good coaching performance for Izzo in 2020-21 but no, he’s not losing his touch.

Next. Projected starting 5 for 2021-22 season. dark

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