Post-Game Quotes: Wisconsin

Michigan State Head Coach Tom Izzo

Opening Statement…
Wow, kind of a strange game with Klesmit (Max Klesmit) out and then Richardson (Jase Richardson) hardly played for us the first half. We weren't very good offensively in the first half. I did think we were pretty good defensively. We had a game plan on what we wanted to do and I thought the coaching staff did an unbelievable job on that. We said we wanted to hold them to eight three's because of the way they shoot it and their bigs hit a couple, but give Jaden Akins credit not for finding his shot but he did a pretty good job on Tonje (John Tonje), who I think is a player of the year candidate in our league. The guy is really good. I thought Blackwell (John Blackwell) played really good for them too, he missed some threes but the kid has improved so much. He's done such a great job and Greg Gard is one of the better coaches in this league and they played well most of the way. I don't know if we wore them down a little bit at the end or not but they played a lot of people, but not as many as we did. But we found a way to get a big win down the stretch again, a 9 to 2 finish. There's enough things to still coach, we are all of a sudden dropping down at the free throw line. But Jaxon Kohler getting 16 rebounds and t10 points and us only turning the ball over nine times was positive. I thought Jeremy Fears having five assists to zero turnovers, Jase Richardson having six assists and one turnover and the other bigs did a pretty good job too rebounding the ball. I mean, Coop (Carson Cooper) played pretty well, Frankie (Frankie Fidler) and Coen (Coen Carr) and then we had some guys that didn't play so well. So, that's the way it is at this time of the year but it was a big win, the crowd was very helpful to us as they always are and taking the 20 assists on 28 baskets, that's more like us and we got 71 shots up. That's what happens when you don't turn the ball over a lot and we were able to beat a very, very good and well coached team. They'll be making a run in the tournament for sure.

On Impact of Jaden Akins finding his shot and Jaxon Kohler's rebounding efforts…
Well Jaden (Jaden Akins), I mean, you saw what that stretch was like. Coen (Coen Carr) got the big dunk and it kind of got the crowd into the game and then Jaden (Jaden Akins) hit those threes and it makes a difference. If we could have had Jase (Jase Richardson) hit a few on the other side or Tre (Tre Holloman), who had an off night shooting the ball, but he's been shooting pretty good and Jase (Jase Richardson) has been shooting pretty good too. But the one time when Jaden (Jaden Akins) was hitting while Jase (Jase Richardson) is out of the game and Tre (Tre Holloman) was struggling a little bit but we still need those guys. Well, then there is Jeremy's (Jeremy Fears Jr.) defensibility and I thought he pushed the ball really well but there was no question Jaden Akins not only did it offensively, but he did a hell of a job defensively and he got eight rebounds and that is something else we have been on him about. So, giving Jaden Akins a lot of credit, you continue to hang with guys that are good people and he's a good person and he continued to work even though he was slumping and he deserved what he got. It was a good game.

On players upholding accountability of each other…
Yeah, I think we have gotten them to do that. But I also think we have to practice well but, in that game, we didn't seem to be showing that. At this time of the year, everybody's telling you how good you are and sometimes I think we don't handle that well. But I don't know if any team handles that well and I don't even handle it well if you tell me we are good. I tend to say the opposite, but there's a reason. But I think we were a little shaky early and then once we got going I thought we did a pretty good job in the second half. The ball was moving, we were getting some lobs and we there was just some really strange plays out there in a lot of ways. How some of them were called and what was going on and what we were doing and what they were doing. I'm sure Greg (Greg Gard) and I'll talk this week and we'll probably both be ticked off at some things that happened. But you know what? We found a way to win and right now that's all that matters find a way to win.

On playing from behind in the last five games and how it reflects on the team…
Well, I don't think we were behind in all of them, you sound like Andy Katz there as I had to straighten his butt out on that. You know, when you are leading by nine that's not behind but we were behind in some of these games at halftime. You know why? They are all good teams and there's not one time I have said we were a great, great team yet. We're not. We're edging closer. The shooting would take us to another level I think just making some shots. But I think it says a lot about your team when you can bear down in those last five minutes and just take a strangle hold defensively. As I said to them before the game, as I said to them yesterday in meetings, your defense travels. It doesn't matter where you play, it doesn't matter where you are, it doesn't matter who you play, you could even play outside but defense travels. What I am disappointed about in is our free throw shooting and I thought we took some good shots that we missed by a mile and that was disappointing. Even inside the paint we missed some shots. But they are probably bigger than I think, I don't usually go up in the air where there's a seven-footer so maybe I never knew what it was like to shoot shots with guys swinging at you. But it was a monster win that's for sure.

On level of team's defensive prowess…
At the beginning of the year, I wouldn't have said that but I am starting to think it. Jeremy (Jeremy Fears Jr.) can guard, Tre (Tre Holloman) can guard, Jaden (Jaden Akins) who I have said all year long despite his struggles with shooting can guard. Jase (Jase Richardson) is a funny defender and he's gotten so much better. Cooper (Carson Cooper) is an elite defender and Coen (Coen Carr) when he comes in can guard. So, we have some guys that I think have made a difference, but I think some of that's been that they have followed the scouting report other than the first five minutes of the game really well today. I think that is part of it too is can you plan something and then execute it. There was some things that Wisconsin does that we thought we had to take away and I think for the most part we did. But, like I said, I really like that team and I don't make any bones about it. Klesmit (Max Klesmit) is a hell of a player and not having him out there probably affected them some but I will say not have Jase (Jase Richardson) affected us in the first half, I think you could see that. You know, we have had to play without Jeremy (Jeremy Fears Jr.) and that is part of the game and I'm sure when I talk to Gard (Greg Gard) after he is not complaining about that. But I know that Klesmit (Max Klesmit) is a good player and those three guards have been dynamite for them. Not that McGee (Kamari Mcgee) isn't, but is just a different rotation.

On rebounding advantage and beating a highly rated team by most major metrics…
This is the great part about coaching, there's always something to be ticked off about and we have actually not shot well from the free throw line in the last five games. We've been inconsistent and I don't know why. I don't know if that says you should get comfortable, if that's the case, then they are going to get uncomfortable this week. We have some time with Spring Break and that means that the NCAA doesn't come with handcuffs and tell you how long you can practice so we aren't going to beat the hell out of anybody but we're going to get some extra free throw shooting in because we are a good free throw shooting team. Even the guys that miss them, most of them are shooting really well, but that is a problem especially down the stretch because that is what won us a lot of games early in the season. We are also not getting to the line as much and as many points from the line and that is disappointing. For rebounding, I mean Kohler (Jaxson Kohler) almost did it by himself. I mean he had sixteen rebounds but when you have some other guys like Jaden (Jaden Akins) who gets eight, here's Jase Richardson who gets five, here's Coop (Carson Cooper) who gets four and here is Frankie Fidler who gets six. I mean we gang rebounded it and we told them we would have to do that. They're really good at tipping balls back and I thought we did a great job of that. There are weird things when you play Wisconsin, you work on some different things. I mean we spent ten minutes of practice just letting our guys tip the balls back so our guards could get rebounds so like I said my staff did a good job and my players for the most part handled it well.

On closing out games defensively…
Jeremy (Fears Jr.) did a great job of that in the huddles. You had to lock up. If you get leads and you don't let them score, you can't lose. No matter how you play, I think there's a little bit of that. Those are battle cries that are good battle cries. It was just so strange. We're missing free throws, and we get the ball on a rebound, and they knock it out of our hands. There were a couple of calls I did not appreciate, but maybe I was wrong, maybe I was right. But it was a little bit of a helter-skelter ending, but it was a good helter-skelter.

On junior forward Jaxon Kohler's rebounding progression…
How bad is an intelligent question that I would agree with? I thought he'd be more of a scorer. I still think he can be a scorer. He's been shooting the three-ball really well, and he missed two or three wide-open ones today. Monster heart, just like (Xavier) Tillman. He is just an animal to go there. He does it in our practices. Doug Wojcik and Saddi Washington say it best because they got him every night. There's never a day when he doesn't come to practice. There's never a day when he doesn't come to go hard. He's not gifted with long arms or two more inches or phenomenal jumping ability. I once told Zach Randolph that Zach was there when I recruited him. It was 10 minutes from Zach's house. I said, 'Zeebo, he's a lot like you, you know?' I'm not sure he ever gets a dunk in college, but he can rebound, and he's got some Zeebo qualities. He's got good hands. He just has a nose for the ball. He's like a great linebacker. He has a nose for the ball, and some of those ones he got were in traffic, and I was going on the bench, 'How the hell did he get that?' Because their guys are good, too, and John Tonje is a good rebounder. He's got strength. Jaxon plays possessed. That's how he gets it done. He is like a heat-seeking missile. If we get everybody to play like that, we'll improve even more.

On potentially tying Bob Knight with 11 regular-season Big Ten title…
Those will be things that will mean a lot to me when I'm done. They just don't seem to mean as much to me now. I mean, they're important. They're things that get to be talked about with people that have done it over time and been so good. I would trade the 354. I would trade the 11 Big Ten championships. Well, I wouldn't trade the 11 Big Ten because we'd get another for a championship or for a deep run in the tournament. I'd trade that any day of the week. And maybe if I was done, I'd say, 'Damn, I wish I had that record.' But it's not the driving factor for me now. The driving factor for me now is I got a group of guys, and for the most part, they have bought in. They get along. They push each other. We got a little off balance today, a little bit by our bigs who weren't doing some things we needed to do and our guards. But for the most part, it's amazing what these guys have done. I thought Jeremy, who struggled a little bit in the last game, did a really good job this game pushing the ball. He acted like the kind of leader I wanted in the huddles, and that was good, and he realized we had to get the ball to Jase (Richardson) some. We got to get the ball to Jaden (Akins). Those things are what mean a lot to me. Those records, first of all, they're made to be broken, and second of all, don't let me kid you, they're important, but I know the 11 one. I never really thought about the other one everybody's been talking about. That would be a treat because I always say that you want to be knocking on a door for championships. And if you keep knocking, sometimes they're going to open. I say that we've knocked on seven other Final Fours, and the damn door doesn't open. We've been in the hunt for them, but we've lost a couple of Big Ten championships at home. So getting 11 of them in 30 years would be something special, I guess. But I just want to keep getting better. We got to get better. We didn't get better today. I don't know what (Greg) Gard thought of his team. I thought we just did some things that were unlike us, and then we did some really good things too, like rebounding and running and making some shots. If you make nine threes for us, that's encouraging. If we can make nine threes or eight threes in a game, I think we'd be a much better team.

On sophomore forward Xavier Booker…
It's probably every year there's something or somebody that we tried to go right to him and get him some shots. The hardest part about the game is there are two ends of the court, and he struggled on some things. But you know what? I still love Book. I still think that he's got a chance to be a great player. The best thing I can say is there's got to be a sense of urgency in practice and in games. I mean, he comes every day ready to go, but it's just been difficult. So what can he do for us? Well, he can make threes, and he can rebound, and he can block shots, and he does have length and size, and he can run. There's a lot he can do for us. Like Jaden, I haven't given up on Book. It's just certain times. I mean, we struggled. We had to play some guys today. Szymon (Zapala) struggled today. He struggled on a lot of the coverages and yet did some decent things. He got a few rebounds and got a big bucket at the end. But guys are struggling sometimes, and we just gotta keep working to get them through. This will be a good week. We got a break, but you worry too because the one time we get four days to prep for a team, we are on break. So we could go two days, we could go three days, we could go four days. We can do whatever we want this week. And, of course, you can't do that. We won't do that. But hopefully, we can get more shooting in, and hopefully, we can get more free-throw shooting and things that don't wear you down. And hopefully, we can get some film sessions with the Books of the world individually and try to show people what we need. We're going to make this a good week, a good three days here before we leave for Iowa, a team that I think can score with anybody in the country. So we still got a lot of work to do.

Freshman Guard Jase Richardson
On his role…
I feel like I've kind of found my role on this team. The guys have put a lot of trust in me, and the coaches have been putting a lot of trust in me so I definitely feel more comfortable on the court.

On having to sit for a bit after being in early foul trouble then getting right back into the game…
It was tough. I think I sat for 10, 15 minutes, so it was kind of tough to find my rhythm.

On what he thinks about when he is sitting…
Trying to stay involved in the game. Talking to the coaches, talking to my teammates, telling them what I see from the bench. You can't just be out for that long of a time and not still contribute to your team and not be happy for your guys that are on the court. So, once I came in in the second half, I was just feeding off the energy that Jase and Jeremy were trying to give to me. I was telling them to just pick me up, pick me up because I had not been on the court with them. Just coming in and trying to play with as much energy as I could.

On how scouting reports have changed on him since his start a few games ago…
It's been good. It just helps me find more ways of scoring. Just getting in and watching film, seeing where I can probably do something different than I could previously in the year.

Senior Guard Jaden Akins
On how much the run he went on was because of Jase being out…
Jase has been our top scorer really these past couple games, so I gotta get hot and score some points for us to stay afloat.

On how Jase has helped him with confidence despite him being a freshman…
I just know he is always going to come to play. Take some of the load off of me and be able to score. I don't always have to be perfect; I just got to be solid.

Junior Forward Jaxon Kohler
On what it means to have Coach Izzo call him an animal after his performance tonight...
It's a part of who I am, it's something that I've had since I picked up a basketball. It's in my DNA to give 100%, to be physical, and to do whatever to get the rebound. I mentioned that I find just as much joy and energy in getting rebounds as in scoring points. That's my role as a four or five-man. After I get one or two, it just keeps going, and that's my job. I take pride in my job and love my job.

On how it felt winning today and getting 16 rebounds...
16 rebounds is great and for me as a player, I always want to keep pushing because I still want to see how much I could do on the glass. Also, I know that today offensively was a little bit rough, that's something that I can take care of and continue to work on. Going into tomorrow, I know what I need to work on and improve.

Sophomore Forward Coen Carr
On if it's just part of who he is to take off and fly on his dunks...
I just tried not to fall out of bounds and he (Jaxon Kohler) tried to pass the ball in and I didn't hear the ref call the whistle so I just thought I'd take off running. It's an instinct when I'm running the floor every time, whether I'm behind the play or in front.

On what it means to have the crowd behind him with energy when he dunks...
Just being able to provide that for this team is great. The gym lights up when I do something and its amazing; I feel like my dunks are worth more than 2 points, I feel like when I dunked in the first half, we scored four or five more after that, so I definitely think that it brings energy to the team. They get real excited, and you can see that with the score.

Wisconsin Head Coach Greg Gard
Opening Statement…
Obviously the last six, seven minutes I thought we really inflicted some damage to ourselves with some turnovers, and that's obviously credit to Michigan State. Tom's got a really good team, as I thought, the five six-minute mark where we had back-to-back turnovers with possessions to take the lead, and they capitalized on it and were able to get separation. I felt that was a big part of the game. Obviously, the offensive rebounding, in particular the 'timely' ones where we got them (MSU) to miss late in clocks, and they've been doing that to a lot of teams all year. A lot for us to learn from, we go 5-for-32 from 3-point range. I thought we had some really good looks and some open looks from the right guys. Some of that is Michigan State's defense, they've defended well for the vast majority of the year, but even with 5-for-32, I thought we were in position, and then the turnovers and a couple of untimely offensive rebounds on their end. But like I said, he's got a really good team, and it was a good college basketball game. I wish we played better the last six, seven minutes."

On preparing the Badgers for this game, and the effect of having a player from this state (John Blackwell)…
I don't make a big deal about who we are going to play or where. Whether we go to Minnesota, and we go there next, we have several guys from Minnesota, or if we go to Illinois or Northwestern, they understand how we go about it every day and prepare. In terms of Michigan State, I've not been standing here as long as Tom has, but I go back quite a ways - 25 years. I know he's been here 42 now; there's great respect for him. I think you build your program as we did when we got to Wisconsin in 2001, we built to go try to beat the best, and at that time they were the king of the mountain in the Big Ten and set the bar really high. So, it was always for us and building our program how we wanted to be defensively, and how we needed to be on the glass. It was a battle, and some battles for championships, and it's been that way for the last 25 years. The thing I appreciate so much about coach is that he's withstood the test of time; 42 years, 30 years as the head coach now, and obviously he's got the most wins in Big Ten history. But that isn't going to happen, you know? In today's era, coaches aren't going to be there. Maybe (Matt) Painter stays that long, but man, it's just a tribute to Tom and it's a tribute to Michigan State. I know he hasn't had many down years, but if there ever was, he's as good as it gets, and he's great for college basketball and has been great for me as a young head coach coming into this. He just gets it, and I appreciate it. It sucks losing, but we always say we don't like each other for 40 minutes, then we go back to being friends. So, we can go back to being friends now.

On Wisconsin's offensive struggles…
It was number one offense vs. number one defense coming in, right? I thought again, I'll go through the film, but I thought we had some pretty good looks. Heck even the last one that McGee had from the corner in a transition three like that, and its Michigan State that does that to you too. I thought they did some good things, they protected the paint and closed on shooters. We've played without Max (Kelsmit) before. He sat out of a game two weeks ago against Minnesota, and we dealt with that, so it's not about the lineup. It's about our execution, credit to Michigan State's defense, and they were hot on shooters, but even when we did get loose, I thought we got some pretty good looks, and we need to be able to knock those shots down.

On how much MSU's transition offense wore down Wisconsin's defense…
I think on one of those (dunks in transition) maybe came from one of those turnovers where we were coming with about the five, six minute mark, two possessions in a row where it was a one-point game with a chance to take the lead, and we turn it over. I don't know if they both went pick sixs, but I know one of them did, and obviously you can't put yourself in that position, no matter who you're playing against, right? Even then we bounced back, we had it at a five-point game and had the chances, we could just never consistently clean up the glass or we would miss shots right around the rim. Missing pretty decent looks from three, but you don't want those momentum plays because the margin of error for both teams. I mean, it's such a highly-contested game that two or three possessions either way are going to tip the scale. So, you want to make sure you try to tip that in your favor and if we could have taken the lead there, I felt better about coming down the stretch than them getting a three-, five-, or seven-point lead that was going to be difficult to overcome.

Players Mentioned

Jaden Akins

Xavier Booker

Coen Carr

Carson Cooper

Jeremy Fears Jr.

Frankie Fidler

Tre Holloman

Jaxon Kohler

Jase Richardson

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