Couch: Ranking MSU's 7 Final Fours under Izzo when the Spartans didn't win the title – best chance missed to almost no chance at all
We’ll never know how far this season’s Michigan State basketball team might have gone if the Spartans had gotten past Kansas State in the Sweet 16, how much of a missed opportunity it truly was. Given the year the Spartans had, even with their improved play late, a Sweet 16 exit seems about right. Satisfactory, even.
Yet with the chaos of this particular NCAA tournament and how wide open it became, it’s reasonable to think MSU would have had a decent chance at reaching Monday night’s championship game if it had survived the Sweet 16. A matchup with UConn in the title game, had the Spartans made it that far, would have been dicey at best — and a wicked interior matchup at worst — but every MSU player, coach and fan would've loved to have that shot.
It’s been 14 years since MSU was in such a position and 23 since the Spartans finished on top. There have been plenty of postseason what-ifs along the way, including, to varying degrees, seven Final Fours under Tom Izzo that didn’t end in a championship. Just for kicks, as an exercise in exorcising regret — or perhaps exacerbating it (sorry) — let’s look back at each of those seven Final Four trips, ranked from greatest opportunity to win a national title to the slimmest of odds.
If that sounds awful, I’d stop reading here.
1. 2019: Lost to Texas Tech, 61-51, semifinals
MSU ran into a nasty matchup in Texas Tech in the 2019 Final Four in Minneapolis. The Red Raiders’ defense disconnected a Cassius Winston-led MSU offense that had hummed in February and March because of how connected it was. Texas Tech, however, wasn’t some unbeatable juggernaut or even necessarily any better than the Spartans at their best. The Red Raiders were old and tough and masters at making opponents uncomfortable. MSU looked it. Winston made just 4 of 16 shots and Aaron Henry found foul trouble, which hurt. MSU also missed three front-ends of one-and-one opportunities from the free-throw line and a few good looks from beyond the arc.
This was a coin-flip game, one I think MSU wins 50% of the time, given how it was playing — thumping LSU and beating Duke in the regional. Next up would have been Virginia in the national championship game. While arguably Tony Bennett’s best Virginia team, the Cavs were still a program that the Spartans had beaten twice in recent NCAA tournaments. In terms of the matchup of styles and the history, MSU had Virginia’s number. Just needed a better night against Texas Tech first.
2. 2010: Lost to Butler, 52-50, semifinals
If Kalin Lucas doesn’t tear his Achilles tendon in the second round against Maryland, MSU likely wins the national championship in 2010. But the Spartans could have won it anyway. This was probably the weakest of the eight Final Fours MSU has been in during the Izzo era. A beatable Duke team — by Duke’s standards — would have awaited in the championship game. MSU might have gotten to face the Blue Devils if Butler's Gordon Hayward had been called for what was a clear foul, his hand hitting Draymond Green’s arm with less than 10 seconds left and the Spartans trailing 50-49.
That said, Butler was a more worthy foe than the bogus Cinderella storyline. We just didn’t know what we were watching. The Bulldogs had two future NBA players on their roster and a former four-star recruit at center and finished 18-0 in the Horizon League, which is difficult to do in any league. We (pundits, fans and even the selection committee, which made Butler a 5 seed) just didn’t fully understand how good the Bulldogs were, because we struggled to see past what was still a mid-major brand at the time.
3. 1999: Lost to Duke, 68-62, semifinals
Izzo still sometimes says this was his best team, the year before the Spartans won the national championship. It was certainly his first great team. MSU had everything other than the pedigree in 1999, including senior Antonio Smith. The Spartans ran into one of Duke’s better teams in the Final Four. The Blue Devils had Elton Brand, Trajan Langdon, William Avery, Corey Maggette and Shane Battier. This Duke team, which finished 37-2, would have annihilated the 2010 Duke team. This 33-5 MSU team — with Mateen Cleaves and Morris Peterson as juniors — would have annihilated the entire 2010 Final Four, too. Sometimes there are just other great teams in your path.
MSU thought it could beat Duke and on its best day probably could have. The teams had met in Chicago in early December. Duke won that game by six points, as well. This wound up being such a physical and grueling clash that Mike Krzyzewski blamed it in part for his team being worn out in the title game against UConn, which the Huskies won.
If MSU had reached the 2010 or 2019 Final Four with this squad, Izzo almost certainly has a second title. Perhaps 2001, too. But given the competition in the 1999 Final Four, it’s hard to call it a missed opportunity.
4. 2001: Lost to Arizona, 80-61, semifinals
MSU played so poorly in its Final Four loss to Arizona that it’s never really thought of as a title that got away. But MSU in 2001 — with sophomore Jason Richardson, seniors Charlie Bell and Andre Hutson and freshman Zach Randolph — was as good as any of the other teams in the Final Four. It just had a miserable night and ran into an Arizona team that looked way more locked in. The Wildcats tallied nine-second half steals and began the half on a 14-0 run. Arizona lost to a good Duke team in the title game, but those Blue Devils weren’t beyond MSU’s reach, either.
“The only thing I'd like to figure out is how this happened,” Izzo said that night. ”I wonder why we were so lax. We were playing a team that was a buzzsaw, that was on a mission.”
On one hand, this was a winnable Final Four for an MSU team of that caliber. On the other hand, the Spartans weren’t winning anything with how they played.
5. 2005: Lost to North Carolina, 87-71, semifinals
If Alan Anderson hadn’t been playing through a knee injury, maybe this game goes differently. Maybe MSU would have challenged Illinois in the national championship game. Maybe. Probably not. The Spartans, a 5 seed, put together a terrific NCAA tournament run after a 13-3 Big Ten season, beating Duke and Kentucky in the regional to reach the Final Four. And they were in the game against North Carolina for a long while, leading by as much as eight late in the first half, as they stifled Tar Heels star Sean May. MSU unraveled a bit in the second half and North Carolina showed its teeth.
Even if the Spartans had pulled off the upset, the notion they’d beat Illinois in the title game seemed unlikely, given 37-1 Illinois had beating MSU soundly at Breslin Center in their only meeting. This wasn’t a Final Four MSU should regret.
6. 2009: Loss to North Carolina, 89-72, national championship
I don’t think MSU has faced a more dominant team in all of its Final Fours than North Carolina in the 2009 title game. Duke in 1999 was in that tier from an NBA talent perspective. But the Tar Heels a decade later were as ferocious as any college team we’ve seen in the last 25 years. MSU — with Kalin Lucas, Raymar Morgan, Goran Suton, etc. — had won under great pressure to reach the Final Four in Detroit, including contentious battles with USC, Kansas and Louisville before handling UConn in the semis. But North Carolina — with Tyler Hansbrough, Ty Lawson, Wayne Ellington and Danny Green — was a beast of another kind.
The only reason this Final Four trip isn’t ranked the least likely of MSU’s Final Fours to result in a second title is because the 2015 MSU team had almost no shot and this team did reach the final — meaning it would only have taken one perfect night. If the 2009 Spartans and North Carolina had met 10 times on that stage at Ford Field, maybe MSU wins once or twice.
7. 2015: Loss to Duke, 81-61, semifinals
MSU’s improbable 2015 NCAA tournament run ended with a very probable result against eventual national champion Duke. The 7-seeded Spartans — led by Travis Trice, Denzel Valentine and Brandon Dawson — beat some really strong teams in the East Regional to reach the Final Four — No. 2 seed Virginia, No. 3 Oklahoma, No. 4 Louisville. But they were outclassed by a Duke squad with Quinn Cook, Tyus Jones, Jahlil Okafor and Co.
MSU would have faced a Wisconsin team in the final that the Spartans nearly upset in the Big Ten tournament championship game. That would have been a tall task, too. Beating Duke first wasn’t all that realistic anyway.
*****
In all, in only four of the seven Final Fours MSU reached and didn’t win did the Spartans, perhaps, have a shot. The lasting lump in the throat might be more from the years MSU never made it to this weekend but had the squad to do so and probably win it all — like 2014, 2016 and 2020. Izzo would argue 2018, too.
While there was an opening this season, it won’t linger the same way.
MORE GRAHAM COUCH: Inside Michigan State's hiring of Robyn Fralick as its women's basketball coach: 'It still feels surreal'
Contact Graham Couch at gcouch@lsj.com. Follow him on Twitter @Graham_Couch.
This article originally appeared on Lansing State Journal: MSU basketball: Ranking the 7 Final Fours under Izzo that didn't end in a title – best chanced missed to almost none at all
