The Michigan State Spartans dropped their Maui Invitational matchup against the Virginia Tech Hokies by a 71-66 final score. Turnovers doomed the Spartans, who clearly were rusty after having a week off from play.
Afterwards, head coach Tom Izzo issued an apology to Spartans fans, especially those who made the trip.
“I publicly want to apologize to maybe the greatest fan group that was here,” Izzo said. “I feel like I let them down and it’s been an interesting couple of weeks and we just weren’t as sharp today.”
Despite being in tropical Hawaii, Izzo promised that his team wouldn’t be taking any leisure time to enjoy the beach after tonight’s loss.
“I thought the determining factor in the game started in the first couple minutes when plays we had gone over and our bigs just did not execute,” Izzo said. “And we gave up some threes and wide open shots right off the bat and it happens. And somehow, some way — we didn’t spend a lot of time on the beach.”
“I promise you, we will spend no time on the beach tonight, tomorrow or tomorrow night. So we’re going to spend some time in that walkthrough room and we won’t make those mistakes again.”
