Tom Izzo’s diatribe on the ill-timed opening of the transfer portal during the NCAA tournament made for splashy headlines and provided a ton of positive reinforcement from around college basketball for the Hall-of-Fame coach’s beliefs.
His focus was on the now, his team chasing another Final Four.
When Michigan State basketball returned from Atlanta, falling a game short of that goal, Izzo’s attention shifted. Immediately. And necessarily.
The Spartans’ roster underwent swift changes less than 36 hours after losing to Auburn in the Elite Eight. Tre Holloman and Gehrig Normand entered the portal, both seeking new opportunities. Xavier Booker followed them later Tuesday, landing within the Big Ten as he committed to UCLA on Friday night.
Izzo? He’s been busy. That phone he wielded behind home plate during the Tigers’ home opener was glued to the same ear Thursday as he walked from the Breslin Center to talk with Jonathan Smith’s football team.
I am dying to know what Tom Izzo was speaking about on the phone as he got shown on camera at Tigers Opening Day. pic.twitter.com/043dlT6vFr
— Kyle Feldscher (@Kyle_Feldscher) April 4, 2025
It’s a reminder that, no matter how successful a coach or his season, the work now extends far beyond the first tipoff and final whistle. The requirement is to constantly recruit both inside your own program and to prepare for potential (seemingly inevitable) losses through a transfer system that is both broken and as robust as ever before.
“When you're involved in all these changes – and you're really involved, because you're on committees – it was nice to see a bunch of guys that played for each other and played for the university and played for the name on the front along with the name on the back. That's my new motto,” Izzo said in the locker room last Sunday after MSU’s 30-7 season came to a close. “I heard coaches say, ‘You should always play for the name on the front, not the name on the back.’ I say to hell with that, you should play for the name on the front and the name on the back. Because you're playing for your family, you're playing for yourself. And I'm coaching for my family, so I'll put Michigan State on the front and I'll put my dad on the back. That's cool with me. …
“I don't know if as many guys will play for the name. I ...
