Post-Game Quotes: Northwestern

Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo

Opening statement...
Disappointed. And happy for Chris Collins. And I mean that. They did a hell of a job rearranging these guys. (Ryan) Young's never played this many minutes in his life, and he's probably one of the tougher kids on their team. (Matthew) Nicholson probably had career highs, and (Julian) Roper, and it was a perfect case of guys that probably wanted to be here, a couple of 'em, and they played harder. There's a couple of you guys who I talk to once in a while, so this is no surprise. We've been living on borrowed time, there's no surprise to this. We were playing very well until we started to think we're an offensive team. That first half we shot, at one time we were shooting 60%. At halftime, we were shooting 50% for the first half, and I had to remind (Max) Christie and Gabe Brown that defense still wins championships and still wins big games, and wins all games. I've been telling you guys we've been struggling defensively, and it's just because we're not playing as hard, and I've told a couple of you that the turnovers are gonna get us, and it's my job to fix, so blame nobody but me. That game was not lost at the end, it was not lost in the middle, it was sorta lost at the beginning with the start, with a couple of players just walking around. But in my mind it's been lost since Christmas. You know, we've got a good team, we got good guys, but I think they're reading their press clippings, and thinking they're better than they are, that they're gonna reinvent the way to win. My staff and I did not do a very good job of making sure that that didn't happen.

On Joey Hauser over Julius Marble down the stretch…
I don't know. Julius Marble played a lot, played the most down the stretch. He got tired, and I think DJ took him out. But you know, I thought Julius Marble played a lot, in fact, in the second half, we didn't give him much chance in the first half because we played Marcus [Bingham], but it's a good question, I'll have to look at that, I don't know. It was probably more to get some offensive punch, 'cause we couldn't score the ball. But give Julius credit, he did a hell of a job. I thought he played pretty well, I thought Malik [Hall] played pretty well, believe it or not I thought Tyson [Walker] played pretty well, he had a little more spunk to him and that was good. But we had a lot of guys who didn't play well and we had a lot of coaches that didn't coach well, so I don't know. Maybe I should have put myself in the portal at the end of that game, instead. I thought you were gonna ask me why I didn't play Marcus at the end of that game. I'll talk to DJ about that and we'll figure it out.

On saying Northwestern played harder and how he felt…
About as poor as I've felt as I've taken this job. That's one of the things we pride ourselves on, but I give Chris [Collins] a lot of credit. I think he had some guys, some of those guys never play, Nicholson never plays, you know I think his mother's from here. Give him credit. And Roper didn't play the last time, and sometimes I say a steady diet without Nance is not good, but that one time game, sometimes people rise up. But we did get beat in all the effort related things. Maybe it's good, some of our young guys, that's what Jaden Akins has been doing, Max Christie's been doing, tonight they found out what it's like when other guys are hungry too. Again I just keep reiterating, this is no surprise to me at all, none.

On Marcus Bingham's game lately…
You should ask him. I don't really have a good answer, you should ask DJ, that's his position coach. I've kind of left that alone a little bit, because it frustrates me when a guy walks up and down the floor. It frustrates me. And you know, I'm just gonna say that they made the choices, and I seconded it, at the end. We put him in because of the free throw situation, and even at the very end, I mean the play wasn't designed to be that, it was supposed to go over the top of it. I don't know, that's been an enigma for me, there are a couple of things that have been a little bit of an enigma, and I think that's why I don't feel like we're as good as we could be. I still think we have a very high ceiling, I do think we can get better. I thought Max [Christie] struggled today, he's been playing really, really, really, really well. If you look at since Christmas, High Point, we didn't guard anybody, over there [at Northwestern], we didn't guard very well, Minnesota we didn't guard very well, we didn't rebound very well. We have not done the things that stand for Michigan State Basketball. Effort-related things, 17 offensive boards, you know I don't know if that has ever happened in my career. But I have been softer on this team, so I take the blame for that, I really do.

On encouraging the guys to play harder…
Well, first of all Northwestern, to be very blunt and honest with you, is big. They're very athletic on the lanes, and they are good. That's not a bad team. You can say "oh without their guy" but then all of a sudden they play Young who might be their toughest big guy, if you ask me. How can you get their guys to play harder? Well you practice harder, and that falls on me. So you're right, you haven't asked that many times in 27 years, but sometimes what a coach says, when everybody's reading what everybody else, or what their families say, it doesn't hit home. I told them two weeks ago, I'm okay to lose. When Roy Williams came here, I said, it's not a big deal guys. I can lose a game. See that guy? I ain't ever touching his record. I ain't catching him. The game, I don't care about, I care about getting better, and where are we at the end of the year. So if this is what it's gonna take to get better at the end of the year, then I'm glad we lost. Whoever thought I'd say that? But I'm not saying that out of frustration, I'm saying there's a five game stretch here where we haven't played Michigan State basketball. Mike Garland pulled me in his office, right around Christmas and said watch this tape. And he had made a little tape of our Connecticut game, and you would swear we were two different teams in how hard we played. They've got it in them, cause they've done it before, but we have to do a better job as a staff, my whole staff. Me and my staff have to do a better job on a day to day basis, holding people accountable to play at the level we need to play at. I thought Tyson Walker said it pretty well in the locker room, earlier in the year had it out about the levels of basketball, and you can do certain things at certain levels, and tonight he said to me, it was a different level. You don't get away with as much, you can't make the same mistakes, you can't do the same things. It was hard, but I said it was good to learn a lesson and still win. It was evident it wasn't good to learn a lesson and win because I don't think we learned a lesson. Whether we will now or not, we'll find out. We got five days of hell in front of us, so we'll find out. But disappointed? Very. Surprised? Not really.

On what is causing the turnovers…
Well, we haven't changed the system any. Those turnovers, we kept saying on the bench, are not because of the break. Guys trying to do too much and maybe not being held accountable enough so, maybe when some guys sit like they did, you lose, maybe guys will listen. I can take blame for a lot of things, and I will, but effort related stats, I don't get the play. That one, I think players need to take some responsibility for and that's what I plan on telling them or showing them. Other than that, it is my job to get them ready and it was evident, as Malik [Hall] said in the locker room, that we were not ready to play.

On how much the turnovers carry over to the defense…
There is no question that when you defend really well and then all of the sudden they get the rebound it's a downer. When you turn the ball over like we do, great plays, pressing teams, you can swallow that you are going to turn the ball over some. You tell me, you probably watch it closer than I did. I closed my eyes a few times. I give them a lot of credit, I think he [Chris Collins] did a hell of a job but they don't press, they don't jump in the lanes. They were some of the most bizarre turnovers and you've heard that. If I was an alum, if I was a media guy, I'd say 'you say the same thing every press conference' I have. So I will take the abuse for that but it is demoralizing and depressing and it doesn't lend to any momentum so I would say that is a fair statement.

On the loss sparking the team…
I don't know. I think I got a good team but they are a good team when they are playing hard as hell. We are not the most talented team in America. I think they just wanted to start looking at different things, maybe we will become an offensive team. Offensive teams don't win a lot of games, I can tell you a few that were ranked in the top 10 and tried that, whether its 3-point shooting, or there's this or there's that, those teams have taken some losses. The game hasn't changed. It hasn't changed in 100 years, more 3's, less post guys, those are all different aspects of the game, but the game hasn't changed. Football hasn't changed, you have to block and tackle, you have to defend and rebound and that hasn't changed and it won't change no matter what you do. The more 3's somebody takes, the more long rebounds, there's actually more rebounds because nobody shoots as good from the 3 as they do from the 2 so there's more rebounds and it's your opportunity to get them. I thought a couple of times we contested a shot, they missed a shot, it bounced right back, their guy went in and got it, our guy was leaving.

That's our fault. That has been a problem that we have had and we have showed them on film and we just have to do a better job of coaching. Not playing, coaching.

On the team lacking a true leader and how that affected the loss…
Well, when I said we don't have a true leader that is what we are used to hearing. Some leaders like Mateen Cleaves or Michigan State is used to Magic Johnson, Mateen Cleaves, Draymond Green, Travis Walton, Denzel Valentine. We showed our team a tape of the Alabama thing when the defensive back that was player of the year kind of went at that guy and almost ripped his facemask off and the next play he made the play. I think we have mentality, like street mentality. It's one thing to be a leader and it's another thing to hold people accountable by saying 'this is the way we are going to do it' and I don't think we have that. I will give Malik [Hall] credit, he spoke up after the game and I think Malik [Hall] realizes and I thought Malik [Hall] spoke up and I thought Julius [Marble], I told you I am a great body language reader, I'm reading his body language sitting there and I thought he said 'I get it, you were right, I see it'.

Those of you that I talk to in the media, I told you that I was worried that we weren't playing as good and for some reason we aren't defending and rebounding. We have done that, actually against better teams. We played better against Baylor than we did in some of these games. I don't think it's that they don't have it or they don't know, I just think it's that they are not as focused in because maybe they think they can win another way and you can't. Lesson learned, all lessons can't be learned by winning. I have heard that my whole life, it's good that if you lose a game and you still have coaching points, you can lose a game and mommy and daddy are still hugging you, your girlfriend still wants to go to the movies, your buddies want to sit and watch TV with you, as long as you win the game, that's okay to everybody and maybe now we will see. We have a rugged schedule coming up we'll learn something about my team. I think the way it sounds, I'm putting down Northwestern, I'm actually building them up and I think they are a good team. I really like [Ryan] Young, I think he did a great job. I think the difference in this team is [Chase] Audige and Boo Buie are taking better shots. They take a couple but it wasn't at critical times like it was over there where I think sometimes people shoot you in and they shoot you out. I think those guys played very, very, very well and I think their role players played their roles to the T. that was impressive, but I am not down on my team thinking we are not any good, I just don't think we played very good and I don't think we practiced as good and I think even my staff, we are just letting too much go in practice. You just don't get as much practice time when you get to this time of the year, it has been strange. We have a lot of work to do but 14-3 and I have been beaten in the National Championship by Wright State, I have been here done this before. I bet if each one of you called me, you'd say the same thing that I said, in the High Point game and the Northwestern game and the Nebraska game you didn't, you can see it coming. In the stats, we were leading the league, or one of the top two teams in the field goal shooting, I think we are the top team in 3-point shooting. Now we are one of the top teams in 3-point defending. I heard Matt Painter say something he said with his team, they gave up 90 points to Nicholls, we are all running in to the same thing and he took care of that last night. If there is a guy that deserved to have a big win more than Chris Collins, I don't know. They have had some bad luck, some tough overtime games, they have played really well, this team did play hard.

They got all the loose balls, they have experienced players, they did things that they hadn't done in the past. If I had to lose to somebody, I feel like even though it was in people's minds a lower rung team, I'd rather lose to him.

Northwestern Head Coach Chris Collins

Opening statement:
Thanks for being here guys. Needless to say, this was a really important win for us. After what we've been through here the last four games. Feeling like we were on the doorstep in probably three of those four games. Three of them at home, and not able to find a way to get over the hump. Just really proud of my team. I thought we played incredibly hard. We knew what we were up against, not having (Pete) Nance and our back up bigs, didn't have Elijah Williams today. We knew that we were going to have to play really hard, tough and really together, in a really tough atmosphere. I think if you look at the rebounding, I thought overall we did a pretty good job against there fast break, which is so lethal. And just give a lot of credit to some of the guys. Ryan Young was fantastic in the second half offensively. I thought Boo Buie lead the way for us all day. But I thought some of our young guys who hadn't played like Matthew Nicholson, local Michigan kid. Really hasn't had a chance to play. To put him in this game and this environment and for him to come out and give us the minutes he did, so proud of him. Julian Roper (II) as well, local Michigan product. To be able to come first time playing in this building, I thought his defense on Max Christie was really integral to the game tonight. Its one game, just like you get really upset when you lose and you have a tough night, you've got to move on to the next one. Same thing here. We're going to enjoy it, obviously big win for us. It was one we needed to kind of get back and hopefully regain some momentum. We've gotta focus on the next one. You always have another team coming in a couple days ready to play.

How does it feel, to come out with a win and to play harder and out-rebound MSU…
Anytime you plays these guys, you guys know me I'm the son of a coach. I'm a basketball historian. I can't tell you how much respect I have for Coach Izzo and what he's built here. I've said this, even though there's some amazing programs in this conference and no disrespect, I've always felt that how his team plays is the standard, for this conference. You know when you play this team and this program, every single time you play them you write toughness on the board. You write rebounding on the board. And you write transition defense on the board. Doesn't matter how the names change but those are three areas, when you play this team that, if you don't do a good job, then you don't have a chance at winning. And I thought we really handled ourselves on the glass, which was huge. I thought for the most part; I didn't see the fast break points. I guess only 13 which was big. They got 20 in our first game. I thought from a toughness perspective; we matched them. Whether we played harder or not, I thought both teams played hard. But I thought we matched their physicality and toughness today, which was a big key in winning.

On anything different with Young defending the post, how effective he was…
We knew that coach likes to play that small lineup with Joey (Hauser) and Malik (Hall). And that presents some problems on the offensive end because they spread the floor. Both of those guys can shoot and can put it on the floor. Veteran players who are good players. We felt like our advantage had to be running (Ryan) Young. If we were going to keep him on the floor and they were going to guard him with Hauser. If they were going to try to spread him out on one end, we've got to try and punish him on the other end. I thought we did a really good job on that stretch of making sure that he touched it. Whether it created some help, or you got some cuts or kick outs. Or he scored or drew some fouls. It was definitely a point of emphasis for us when we had. And give Marble credit. I thought he made some big plays. He made a huge jump hook with a couple minutes to go. He walked up and made two big free-throws late to cut it to two. I thought he played really well today.

On defense making MSU uncomfortable – how much that effected the 17 MSU turnovers…
Well we talked about that a little bit. That's been a little boo-boo for them this year. At times they've had a hard time taking care of it. They run such, if you allow them swing the ball and move the ball and run their actions and all of their sets, their going to be very difficult to defend. We tried to do our best, did we do a great job, did we not in the least did we have some mistakes? Absolutely we did. I thought we just tried to make a considered effort, to make the passes a little bit difficult to try to get them on their heals the best we could. Fortunately, we were able to force 17 turnovers.

Thoughts on 3 calls toward the end – two walks and foul, as a resiliency standpoint for players…
Yeah, no comment on that. That's for the other side of the floor. I don't want to get myself in trouble. You guys saw it, it is what is. But fortunately we were able to get out a win.

Significance of beating a top 10 team on the road, hasn't happened in a while for Northwestern…
I am just proud of these guys. This group, we've really invested in this group. We really came into this year with high aspirations. I think rightfully so, we've got a good team. I think everybody knows, every single game we've played, we've been right there. Four times we haven't been able to close in the last minutes for different reasons. A lot of it had to do with the other teams, not just us not doing things. For this group that's played a lot of games now together. Boo Buie, Chase Audige, Ryan Young, Pete Nance, Ryan Greer, Robbie Beran. This group of guys a couple years ago we kind of had to hit the reset on our program after we had the run to the tournament. We had to kind of start fresh and bring in a whole new group, we wanted to invest in these guys. We played them as young kids. The took a lot of lumps. Won three games as freshmen. Four games as freshmen, three as sophomores, then six. Then those guys are seniors now. We stayed together. They didn't stray. That shows a lot in today's day in age with the transfer portal and voices. Everybody stayed. Everybody stayed together in the fight and we believed that we could be good this year. And we still do. The last couple weeks were disappointing because of those games but todays can hopefully be a positive momentum builder. There's fourteen games left in league. We've only played six. You've got to take them one by one and you're judged by what you do at the end. Not by what you do in six games. We'll have another great opportunity. Obviously, I have so much respect for Michigan State. I spent a lot of years down south. I had some epic games as an assistant coach playing against these guys. I've seen. I've studied Coach Izzo. Anytime you can come to this building with this crowd and get a win, of course you're going to feel good about that. There's a reason they're so good. We feel real good about today.

On the past couple games, losing streak. Take us in your head…
Yeah, how much can I take. Guys, when you go through life. You chose to keep fighting or you chose to tap out. You always have that decision. As much as losses hurt at times, as much as losses stain and the way they go sometimes. I've always chose in my life to keep fighting until there's no breath left. You just wake up. You keep fighting and you keep swinging. I'm proud that those guys in my locker room have done that. Because it's not about me, it's about them. They're the ones that have gone through it. It's about the players. It's their time. They're the one executing it, they're the ones in the fight. I'm just really proud that they've carried that attitude.

Junior Forward Malik Hall

On what you said to the team after the game…
I mostly just said that we didn't play with heart. They played harder than us. They wanted it more. That was it really.

On working to get more defensive rebounds and less turnovers…
Box out and not turn the ball over. I mean just to be more physical. They beat us to the glass, just got to be smarter with the ball.

On getting ready for Wisconsin…
Watch film and practice. Everybody has to watch what they did and see how they played. Just film, really, that is what's going to be best for you. Change of the mindset too, I say.

On Julius performance…
We have known that for a while. I think he is kind of grown into his confidence a lot more. Whereas he'll let it go now and I think that's good for us because like I've said since the beginning of summer, we have a lot of guys that can put the ball in the hoop and on any given night. It can be anybody's night. I think tonight it was his night, and I'm happy it was his night for him.

Senior Forward Gabe Brown

On not respecting them enough since Nance was out…
No, we did not come out ready to play. From the start of the tip, from the first play and then on. We did not come ready to play and they did a good job of just playing hard.

On what did you learn from today…
Can't take no team for granted. I've been in a lot of these games through my four years, and you can't take no team for granted, and they came out and they played hard. They crashed the offensive glass, they had a lot more attempts than us, so we just got to move onto the next one.

On seeing teams trying to slow you down…
Teams are doing a good job of trying to deny me, trying to not let me get the ball and what happens is we got other guys, other players than can step up like Julius did today and he did a good job of sitting in the high post and just scoring the rock and it turns out we just didn't come out with a win today.

On what you see being the problem with all the turnovers…
Just foolish turnovers. I mean it was bound for us to lose a game. I mean you can't beat teams, especially in this league, you can't beat teams with 20 turnovers. I mean we've been doing that lately, so it was bound for it to catch up with us, but foolish turnovers, not holding on to the ball, air balling shots, things like that, stuff that we don't do at practice, but it turns out we do it in the game and we got to be better than that.

On holding your teammates accountable with their effort…
I'm doing my best job of getting on guys as much as possible. Guys need to step up, especially effort related things. Coach harps on it every single day and that's Michigan State basketball, that's effort related things and when we don't do it I'm on guys 24/7 about it so I probably got to do a better job of just getting on guys more and more because we can't go out there and play like we did today.

Junior Forward, Julius Marble

On Northwestern playing harder, Izzo disappointed, you being on the court…
No, I kind of agree with him. That was probably really embarrassing. We let up 17 offensive rebounds and for it to be against Northwestern, kind of shows where we are at right now as far as our toughness. We've just got to get better at that. Boxing out, making sure that our guys know to just go into to the paint and touch.

Feeling on more minutes, overall…
I feel pretty good. Just be ready. I came out because I got a little tired, so I came out for a little bit. But I was just making sure that I was ready whenever I was going in.

On this game being a lesson with the loss versus a lesson with a win. Serving as a wakeup…
Oh definitely. The last couple weeks he's been talking about how we look complacent. We look comfortable. I think we needed this right now. Rather have it earlier than later so we can figure out and make adjustments. So I'm glad we kind of got this out of the way right now. We've got a little bit of a break where we can work on us and figure out what we need to do for Wisconsin.

A lot of production in 18 minutes, on the bench for a while in second half…
I'm always thinking I'm going to get a call back in, I'm always going to be ready. Whether it was for 18 minutes or for two. I don't care, I'll be ready whenever.

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Players Mentioned

Jaden Akins

Gabe Brown

Max Christie

Malik Hall

Joey Hauser

Tyson Walker

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