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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: DETROIT

March 18, 2018

Detroit, Michigan

Syracuse - 55, Michigan State - 53

THE MODERATOR: Coach, an opening statement.

COACH IZZO: I'd first like to thank our fans. It was an incredible showing on their support. Little Caesar's is a great place to be. And I want to thank my team for -- we said we didn't want to make effort-related things and mistakes. And when you outrebound a team by 21 that's average height is 6'9", and you got just about every loose ball we could get.

And we got beat because we couldn't make a shot. And I thought we had some good shots. It was really disappointing. We didn't shoot very well from the free-throw line and some of those early were one-and-ones, which means it's worse than the stat shows.

But you gotta give Syracuse a lot of credit: They played hard also, and I thought it was just a war of a game and they made a few more shots than we did, although neither team shot well from either the 2 or the 3. But they made shots at the free-throw line and we didn't. And that's the difference in the game.

So sad, when you're in the locker room with some of those guys that don't get another chance. But there's nothing that I can say that they didn't do. They played every bit as hard.

Jim did a hell of a job coaching his team. And I know he was upset with some things, and so was I. But both teams played their hearts out, and they just made one more basket than we did.

THE MODERATOR: Questions for the players.

Q. Miles, can you share your emotions, what's kind of going through your mind right now?
MILES BRIDGES: Probably the saddest I've ever been in my life. I wanted to send my best friend, Tum Tum, out the right way, and our seniors, Ben Carter and Gavin Schilling. And unfortunately I couldn't do that. That was my only goal for this year, and I'm sad I couldn't do it, but life goes on. And -- I don't know, just life goes on.

Q. Cassius, what are you going to take away from this season?
CASSIUS WINSTON: Almost anything could be solved or fixed through hard work. If you dedicate your time, put the hours in, results will show. This team, you know, we got better throughout the year. We just got better and better. It was no secret formula. Players got better.

Xavier Tillman got better throughout the year and there was no secret to it. He worked hard. So this summer, it's another step for me to take. It's a whole nuther level I can reach. And the recipe is just going to be me putting that time in and working on it.

Q. Can you talk about the unique challenge their zone presents despite your preparation?
CASSIUS WINSTON: It kind of forces you to take some two-pointers. You can't really punch it inside, like we couldn't really get Nick Ward involved just because how they played the zone. That would be the only challenge.

Other than that, I think we got some great looks, some shots that we usually knock down. And the ball definitely wasn't falling tonight.

MILES BRIDGES: I feel like we missed shots. We got the shots that we wanted. We just couldn't get inside as much as we wanted to because the zone is so long, but we just missed shots.

Q. Miles, it might be a little bit more difficult to say about it now, but when you do look back on what you have accomplished at Michigan State with this team this year as conference champions, what are going to be the bullet-point takeaways, the things that you'll remember most about this season?
MILES BRIDGES: Just how much fun we had. Everything that was thrown at us, we still had fun. And I love every guy that's on my team. That's why I'm so hurt right now. I couldn't ask for a better team. And I'll have memories that will last a lifetime.

THE MODERATOR: Thank you. Questions for Coach.

Q. You went big with your big lineup when Jared got in foul trouble and you outrebounded them. Was it as effective as you wanted it to be or were there issues?
COACH IZZO: (Indiscernible) was better than I wanted it to be. I thought our guards rebounds well, our forwards rebounded well. Xavier Tillman was a man in there. But Josh Langford got a bunch, Jaren got a bunch in his time in there. And Miles got a few.

The problem is we had a lot of rebounds to get. But so did they. You don't want to have regrets in games like this and the effort we gave, I have no regrets. I wish we would have shot it a little better.

Q. For Jaren, was there any particular reason he didn't play more?
COACH IZZO: He was in foul trouble the first half. And it's different in the tournament. And the second half we just, Ben seemed to have a feel in there, which we knew he did. But it really was in the defensive end.

Cassius did a hell of a job. I mean, there's nobody badgered him harder for two years than me. But defensively he grew so much this year. And he did an unbelievable job on Howard, I thought. Howard is a hell of a player, so is Battle.

But we did it because we got some help from our bigs. And Xavier was really good at it. And then we were moving Nick and, in all honesty, we put Ben in there because he had such a feel. I mean, he got some kickouts, we had some wide-open looks. I mean, really good looks. And it just didn't happen.

Q. Following up on that point, Coach, Ben's such a good high-post passer and it seemed like that point of attack against the zone was the most important thing, getting it to the high post. Looking back on what you had to face against the Syracuse zone, is there something that stands out that you didn't see coming in?
COACH IZZO: No, really didn't. I thought we'd have an easier time getting it in the middle, but at the same time we showed patience. We turned it over a little bit at the end, but 14 turnovers against them is not ridiculous. I didn't think that they did anything different than we thought. I just felt like maybe we didn't appreciate -- we took some shots inside.

We got rebounds and that length of 6'7", too, and 6'11" and 6'10", those should have been kick-outs. But it's probably hard for Nick. Nick played pretty well, too, but he's not the kind of guy that kicks it out. And he's trying to put it up. And their lengths when you're underneath the basket bothered us. So maybe that would be one thing.

Q. Tum Tum's meant so much to this program. Can you talk about what you're going to miss most about him and the other seniors as well?
COACH IZZO: I felt sad that I didn't get the -- I didn't get Schilling in. And Ben been played a little more. Hasn't been playing much. But I didn't get Tum any minutes. It was just the game. I talked to him about it before. It was just the situation.

I think Miles said it best in the locker room. So did Dane Fife. That kid has meant the world to our program, our community, our team, and me. And I don't know if -- I don't know if there's another Tum out there. I just hope I can keep him around for a while. I'll figure that out in the future. He's meant the world to our entire community.

He's been rock solid through a lot of things this year. And I love him for that. As I do -- it's hard not to feel bad. I know why Miles came back. But he has no regrets why he came back, because in his mind he got to do the things he wanted to do and he came back, except maybe get to a Final Four.

And you don't get all your dreams sometimes. But Cassius has gotten a lot better because of Tum. Miles is better because of Tum. Josh is better because of Tum. Nick Ward has really made some strides in the last three weeks, four weeks, a lot because of Tum. Tum's not God, but he's right there.

Q. Clearly disappointed with the loss, but this is one of the best group of young men you've ever coached in your entire career. Can you put in perspective what this team will always be in your memory?
COACH IZZO: As everybody knows, it's been a different year. I don't think me, personally, I could have gone through the year without a group like I had. In fact, I know there would be no way.

And I've had a couple disappointments with some pretty good teams. And that's the way basketball goes. And I think Tum said it best to our team, you know, that: Hold your head up high; don't let one game -- we're 30-5 -- define who we are. Let the times when we went through some tough times define who we are, the way we stuck together and hung together and battled together.

And there's no reason to hang your head, as he said. Nobody's got cancer. There's a lot worse things in the world. Just never seems like that when you coach or when you play, especially when you're a senior.

The rest of us all get different chances, but they don't. And I love the kid, but I could look everybody in the eye and say I love every one of these kids and that's coach-speak. I don't give coach-speak very often. I give heart-speak. And from the bottom of my heart that's the way I feel.

Q. When you see Ben Carter and Xavier Tillman out there in a million years, did you think those two would be in a clutch NCAA Tournament game?
COACH IZZO: Not clutch; they played pretty well. It wasn't that Jaren didn't. It's just that sometimes the youth -- we did some different things defensively than we've been doing that worked.

We didn't jump those ball screens and stay up high on them. We kind of feathered them and made sure that, for the most part, Battle didn't get to the rim. I thought we did a very good job on Battle, didn't give up the 3s. We ran them off the 3s because we were helping with our bigs, and it was a bit of an adjustment for a couple of the bigs. And so we found some guys.

And then the middle of the zone, Jaren is going to be really good in there, and right now Josh -- Ben just had the experience to know what to do. And, man, we got some good looks. I don't know how many assists he had, probably not many because nobody made any shots. Two. But we had good enough shots.

Listen, it never ends happy for all but one team. I've been in the finals. I got beat and felt bad. I've been in the first round of the Final Four and got beat and felt bad, and in the Elite Eight and got beat and felt bad. And the Sweet 16. And a couple of years ago I was in the first round and felt bad. That's never going to change. But that's not going to define who we are. What's going to define who we are is what these kids went through this year and how they handled it. And that's what's going to define us.

And to me that's the only thing that matters in the end because I saw the facts of what they gave me, and I had great appreciation for the facts of what they went through and how they handled it.

And every Michigan State person can be a little upset with me; don't be upset with them, because they did their job in a very difficult time and did it with class and humility.

And you will never, whether you're a reporter following them or a fan cheering for them, you will never have better kids to appreciate than this group.

So I appreciate all of you. I'm sorry to our fans who did such an incredible job here this weekend. We were all set to maybe get another shot at Duke, and yet Jim Boeheim and his team deserves all the credit in the world. They did their job. They did it in a hostile environment. They played very solid. They played their style. They did not change. They just made a couple more free throws than we did. And that was the difference in the game. So thank you.

THE MODERATOR: Thanks, Coach.

FastScripts Transcript by ASAP Sports

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NCAA MEN'S 1ST AND 2ND ROUNDS: DETROIT

March 18, 2018

Tom Izzo

Miles Bridges

Cassius Winston