ROSEMONT, Ill. – It was by design a trick question, not the sort of approach generally taken by those of us in the journalism business. No need to worry, though. The person conducting the interview and the most esteemed and cooperative subject were smiling as it happened.
This is what I said to Michigan State head coach Tom Izzo:
“Are you happier that you don’t have to answer the question any longer about when the Big Ten is going to win another championship – or more vexed it was Michigan that ended the drought?”
Izzo has been an integral part of Spartans basketball for 43 years and the man in charge for 31 of those. You don’t hang around East Lansing that long without developing an insatiable desire to best the university up the road in Ann Arbor. He owns a .610 winning percentage against the Wolverines in 59 career meetings, and if you think that’s sufficiently dominant, you might need to look up the definition of the word “rivalry.”
“I can’t say that you can ever pull for your rival. That’s just normal, especially when it’s the rival-rival,” Izzo told me at the Big Ten’s annual Media Days event. “You never want your rivals to do well; I’d be lying if I did, and they’d be lying if they said any different. And so would Purdue and Indiana … but I am a Big Ten guy. I do get sick of hearing those things.”
The Big Ten produced the first NCAA men’s basketball champion of the 2000s, when superstar Mateen Cleaves led Michigan State to the title at the RCA Dome in Indianapolis, and the most recent, when surprise star Elliott Cadeau drove Michigan to the title at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. And those were the only two championships won in this century by Big Ten members. My goodness, so much time passed Indy built a whole new stadium in between.
The drought that existed in that period was employed by many in the media, by online fan bases of other conferences and by rival coaches as a weapon to denigrate Big Ten basketball. It became an annual harangue, brushing aside so much that was being accomplished during a glorious period for the league. It was a time that saw such extraordinary players as Scoonie Penn, Robbie Hummel, Jordan Taylor and Rafael Davis excelling. Jason Richardson, D’Angelo Russell, Victor Oladipo and Johnny Davis became prominent draft picks. Izzo and Bo Ryan coached at a Hall of Fame level, and John Beilein, Matt Painter and Thad Matta were in that same weight class.
Purdue’s Braden Smith set an NCAA career record in one of the most prominent statistical categories: assists. Boilers center Zach Edey became the first player to become the consensus National Player of the Year in consecutive seasons in four decades.
Between 2001 and 2025, there were five Big Ten players chosen for the Naismith Award a total of six times: Evan Turner, Trey Burke, Frank Kaminsky, Luka Garza and Edey twice. There were 23 first-team All-America selections and 25 second-team selections, an average of essentially one per year in each category.
And in that time, the Big Ten sent eight teams to the NCAA championship game, though none was able to win it. This led to pervasive narratives that the Big Ten was overrated, or played too slow and too physically. To be fair, the fans of teams in other leagues and the coaches competing for recruits and NCAA bids are justified in their use of whatever pejoratives they can conjure against the B1G. The media business, though, used to be better than this.
Now, items of information reporters once would tack at the end of articles as “notes” are presented as headlines. Coaches have been fired or forced or encouraged to change jobs because of narratives: couldn’t win the big games, couldn’t win in the playoffs, couldn’t make the Final Four or the Super Bowl.
Now, after so long, the Big Ten will enter a basketball season behind the reigning champion and expect to deal with none of that. Illinois and Izzo’s Spartans are projected as top-five teams and obvious title contenders by a variety of prominent analysts.
“I guess if I was to be honest, it is nice not to hear all of that. You don’t get your just due unless you win one,” Izzo said. “I think people in general looked down on the Big Ten because we hadn’t won one. So I guess in that respect, it’s good.
“That’s the only respect, but in that one, it’s good.”
The 2026-27 Michigan State team is expected to have a shot at the title for many of the same reasons the 2000 team got it done: significant depth, a number of legit pro prospects, impressive size and a gifted point guard to execute what Izzo wants on the floor. Back then, it was Cleaves. Now, it’s Jeremy Fears, who led the NCAA in assists in 2025-26 — even over Smith — and started 71 games for teams that went 5-2 in March Madness the past two seasons.
The Spartans’ superpower in this year’s race might be continuity, which has become as rare within college basketball as a low-post basket. A year after Michigan won it all with four players in their first season as transfers, it might not matter. Or it could define MSU’s 2026-27 season.
“Do we spend enough time? Do we treat them right?” Izzo said. “It’s getting harder, though.”
Florida returns its entire frontcourt from a team that earned a No. 1 seed, and Rueben Chinyelu, Alex Condon and Thomas Haugh all have national championship rings from 2025. Illinois has back five of its top eight scorers. Five of the nine Michigan State players who averaged double-figure minutes will play for the Spartans this season.
More to the point, MSU’s roster includes only two players who spent time at other four-year colleges: center Anton Bonke, who played at Providence and Charlotte, and wing Kaleb Glenn, who played at Louisville and Florida Atlantic.
Spartans basketball has retained its identity in the transfer portal era, from the alumni returning each autumn during the “Grind Week” celebration inspired by 2012 All-American Draymond Green to star players Fears and Coen Carr citing the positive influence of custodian “Mr. Rudy” Limas and the team’s impressive staff of student managers.
“This is home,” Fears told me. “I don’t know what other people want or need, but I don’t really care. I am good at home. Everything I need is in green and white.”
Michigan State is ranked No. 7 in the preseason ratings at KenPom.com, which reflects a strong belief in the team’s defense but some skepticism about the offense. Fears will get the ball where it needs to go, obviously, but there need to be enough ideal options. The Spartans were very judicious about when to use their three-point attack a year ago, ranking 242nd in the percentage of their scoring that was generated from long distance. Only two of the past 10 NCAA champions were outside the top 160.
Sophomore Jordan Scott, who might be the team’s most talented player, shot 37 percent while playing 20 minutes a game. Guard Kur Teng shot 38 percent but on just 56 makes in 35 games.
“There’s so much to look at yet, but from what I see of our team, we have a team that has a chance,” Izzo said. “How many teams have a chance? Ten? I don’t know. We’re probably in that group. The problem I have this year is I really have no clue what everybody else has. I mean, we’ve still got teams picking up players two weeks ago!
“That’s what’s maybe harder, if that makes sense.”
The changes in college basketball this offseason did not impact only players. Michigan lost coach Dusty May to the NBA’s Dallas Mavericks, and the Wolverines found their replacement on their own bench with former Oklahoma State coach Mike Boynton. He’s got a transfer- and talent-laden frontcourt but might have the nation’s best set of guards in Cadeau and gifted sophomore Trey McKenney.
It’s not out of the question that the Big Ten could win a second consecutive NCAA title with guys wearing the big block “M” on their jerseys, just like last March. Izzo would find no positives in such an outcome. The Big Ten already has proven they can rule March Madness. Now he wants it to be his crew on top.
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