Tom Izzo rants about transfer portal frenzy amid March Madness

03/26/2025 12:19 PM

The Michigan State basketball team has had a special season, and it isn’t over yet. The Spartans earned a two-seed in the NCAA Tournament after winning the Big Ten regular-season title, and they advanced to the second weekend of March Madness with wins over 15-seed Bryant and 10-seed New Mexico. The Spartans are in the middle of an impressive run, but with the transfer portal already open, there is something else to focus on. Head coach Tom Izzo isn’t giving it any attention, however.

Michigan State is one of the few teams still alive that was built from the ground up. The Spartans are led by players that have spent their entire careers at Michigan State. Tom Izzo isn’t thinking about bringing guys in from other schools right now.

“I’ve got 15, 16 guys that have just accomplished something that hasn’t been done much in my career,” Izzo said on Tuesday, according to a video from Spartans Illustrated. “First of all, we’ve never won 17 Big Ten games. Second of all, to be 17-3 in a league that is this good and only have three losses is phenomenal. Third of all, they’ve given me everything they can, academically, athletically and socially. And I’m gonna think about replacing them. I’ve recruited the guys. They helped me recruit the guys who recruit nobody knows. And by the way, there’s not a lot of recruiting done in the transfer portal. It’s offering.”

If Michigan State’s season was over, it would be a different story. However, the Spartans are still competing for a national championship. Izzo is focused on only one thing, and it’s Ole Miss.

“There’s not recruiting. It’s pain, and we don’t even know all these people are doing it. We don’t even know what we can do yet. This is an amazing deal. And again, I’m gonna apologize to you, but I am ticked off that you ask me that right now, because I think you just cheated me,” he continued. “So if I keep talking, I cheat my players, and I’ll cheat myself before I’ll cheat my players. So another question about the transfer portal, I can lift you a lot of schools. You can call and ask them, they might have the better opinion than me, but me, I’m honed in on Ole Miss.”

These players have been loyal to Izzo and Michigan State throughout their careers, and now, Izzo is returning the favor.

“I might even call Mr. Manning [Peyton Manning]. Figure out something that I don’t know about that place, and that’s all I want,” Izzo added. “Chris Beard, what he’s done has been incredible, but what my team’s done has been incredible, and I’m not ready to move on. … I’m going to worry today about the guys I got in this program that have done an incredible job this year, and that’s it. And if that cost me later, so be it. But Tom Izzo isn’t cheating the people that he has that have been loyal to him for this chaos that is going on out there.”

The only thing that Tom Izzo is focused on right now is finding a way to get his Michigan State basketball team to the next round. He is taking everything one step at a time.

“When I came back Sunday night, that was it. There was nothing on my mind but giving these guys a chance to win one more game, get to the Elite Eight and one more game, and have a memory that’ll last their entire life, their kid’s life, and their grandkid’s life, because that’s what it is,” Izzo said. “And so excuse me for being passionate about it, or pissed off about it, whichever words you want to use, but I’m not going to talk about it, because it’s not fair.”

A lot of coaches with teams still dancing are taking a look at transfer portal players already. It’s hard not to in this era of college basketball. Izzo has built an incredibly impressive program, however, and he isn’t going to change how he runs it.

“It’s not fair to the people. You could say it’s fair to your program. I’ll run my program like I want to run my program, and if people have a disagreement with that, God bless them, but these guys that gave me everything they could give me are going to have a chance, and I’m not going to screw it up by spending any time on other stuff,” he said. “I don’t eat, I don’t sleep right now. So why the hell would I do something else that might benefit me a year from now, and really, it’s not going to benefit me now, because I don’t know what I have. I don’t know how much money I have, I don’t know which players are leaving or staying. I don’t have any idea. So why would I do that?”

There is no time for Izzo to be focused on anything else. He will spend the entire week preparing for three teams.

“Today doesn’t matter any more than Friday to me, this is a full week of work,” he continued. “I got three teams to prepare for. Okay? Because that’s what we do. We try to win the weekend. Winning one game and losing the other doesn’t turn me on. Doesn’t excite me. But the weekend; that excites me.”

At the end of the day, Tom Izzo just wants to do right by the players.

“We always talk about what’s fair to the kids. …I’m gonna do what’s fair to the kids,” Izzo concluded. “I’m gonna give them every ounce of energy I have until we lose, then I’ll worry about the next stage.”

Michigan State will take on six-seed Ole Miss for a spot in the Elite Eight on Friday night. If the Spartans win, they will take on either rival Michigan or the top seed in the tournament: Auburn.

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