Miami flaunts 'underdog' tag against MSU despite higher seed
EAST LANSING – Jim Larranaga knows Tom Izzo well.
So well that he has beaten the Hall of Fame coach twice.
The first came during the 2006 first round of the NCAA Tournament, the start of a dramatic run to the Final Four by Larranaga’s George Mason team.
The second came five years ago in the ACC/Big Ten Challenge, in Larranaga’s second year at Miami (Fla.).
This time, Larranaga arrives as the favorite with the eighth-seeded Hurricanes as they face No. 9 seed Michigan State on Friday in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Tipoff is about 9:15 p.m. ET, and the game will be broadcast on TNT.
“So maybe this is good luck, because we were the higher seed then. Now, we’re the lower seed,” Izzo said Sunday night with a grin. “Jim’s a good coach, he’s a guy I’ve known for a long time, a good guy. He’s done a good job there.
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“But it’s OK not to like him for a weekend.”
Izzo said he’d might use that George Mason game as a slight motivation for his players to show what can happen in the NCAA Tournament, but not much else. Larranaga, on the other hand, got some early bulletin board talk from an unexpected source – which, in turn, might give Izzo something a little more recent for his own locker room.
When the NCAA Basketball Selection show on CBS revealed the pairing, analyst Seth Davis tipped his hand that he liked the Spartans to beat the Hurricanes and advance to most likely face No. 1 Kansas in the second round Sunday.
According to the Palm Beach Post, that comment irked Jim Larranaga, who was at a watch party on campus at Miami’s Rathskeller bar. The newspaper said Larranaga stood up during the commercial break and addressed the crowd, asking if those gathered heard what was said.
He then reportedly said to the crowd, “I guess he's never seen us play,” and followed it up by asking the party to join the Hurricanes in Tulsa because “it'll be us vs. Kansas in the second round.”
The Hurricanes played a tough schedule in the Atlantic Coast Conference, with all but two loss coming in their seventh-place conference finish. However, Miami also defeated North Carolina, Duke and Virginia. Seven of the Hurricanes’ losses came against teams ranked at the time and nine of them came against teams in the 68-team NCAA field.
Senior guard Davon Reed, a third-team All-ACC selection who is 6-foot-6, leads a guard-heavy Miami squad at 15 points a game, along with 4.8 rebounds. Two others, 6-2 Ja’Quan Newton (13.4 ppg) and 6-5 Brian Brown (11.9), also score in double figures. The Hurricanes have five players 6-8 or taller, with 6-8 Kamari Murphy getting 7.3 points and 7.5 rebounds a game.
“I think we had a little better season than Michigan State, but they have the name Michigan State,” Murphy told the Miami Herald. “Miami’s always the underdog whether we’re winning a lot or losing. It keeps the chips on our shoulders, keeps you motivated.”
Brandon Folsom contributed to this report. Contact Chris Solari:csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari.