Izzo wants Michigan State focusing only on Nebraska, not NCAA bid
EAST LANSING – It’s a four-game season for Michigan State’s postseason future.
Yet for the Spartans, Tom Izzo and his 19-year NCAA Tournament streak, three of them don’t matter. Not yet, at least.
“Right now, we’re going to focus everything we got on Nebraska,” Izzo said Monday. “I know it’s such a cliche, coaches’ statement, ‘One game at a time.’ Trust me when I say this: we have no choice but to take it one game at a time – not worry about the bubble, not worry about the tournament, not worry about anything else. Just worry about what we got left, the 10 scholarship players in the room and see if we can make them into a team that can get better here at the end of the year.”
Thursday’s home game with the Cornhuskers (7 p.m./ESPNU) begins a series of what essentially become one-day, play-in games for the Spartans to make their case for an at-large invitation to the 68-team NCAA field.
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MSU (16-11, 8-6 Big Ten) enters Wednesday’s action sitting 45th in RPI and a half-game behind fourth-place Northwestern in the conference standings, tied for fifth with Minnesota.
“All these games are do-or-die for us,” freshman forward Miles Bridges said. “We gotta play every game and leave everything out there on the floor. And if we get these last few wins, then they would be really big for us.”
The Spartans led by 20 at one point and defeated Nebraska 72-61 on Feb. 2 in Lincoln. The Cornhuskers (12-14, 6-8) have since returned forward Ed Morrow from a foot injury that cost him seven games and is 2-1 since he came back Feb. 8. They were 1-6 in his absence, including the MSU game.
“We’re just gonna have to lock in and do what we did the first game,” senior guard Alvin Ellis said. “Learn from our mistakes from the first game and just tighten it up a little bit.”
Coach Tim Miles has won two straight at Breslin Center. His Cornhuskers have already won on the road this season at Indiana and Maryland to open Big Ten play and 58-57 at Ohio State on Saturday. They also have been in a number of close losses, with nine of their conference games decided by six points or fewer.
MSU will be without Eron Harris for the rest of the season after the senior guard suffered a “significant” right knee injury that will require surgery during an 80-63 loss Saturday at Purdue. The Spartans host No. 15 Wisconsin on Sunday for senior day, then wrap up on the road Wednesday at Illinois and Saturday at No. 24 Maryland.
Lose to Nebraska, however, and the already-slim margin for error and an NCAA at-large bid shrinks considerably heading toward the Big Ten Tournament.
“My guy (Mark Hollis) is on the selection committee and doesn’t have a clue” who will get into the tournament, Izzo said. “I think there’s gonna be a lot of things that happening in these last two weeks. We just gotta take care of as much of our business as we can and see where that takes us.”
Contact Chris Solari:csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter@chrissolari. Download our Spartans Xtra app for free onAppleandAndroiddevices!