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Michigan State men’s basketball head coach Tom Izzo has stacked up a lot of accolades throughout his 27 seasons at the helm in East Lansing. But perhaps none of those feats are more impressive than what he accomplished on Sunday afternoon.
With the Spartans’ 77-67 victory over the Maryland Terrapins, Izzo is now the all-time winningest coach in Big Ten Conference history.
MOST OVERALL WINS AT A BIG TEN SCHOOL pic.twitter.com/dQUQRADL0a
— Michigan State Men's Basketball (@MSU_Basketball) March 6, 2022
With the win over the Terps on Sunday, Izzo surpassed former Indiana head coach Bob Knight for most total victories at one Big Ten school, with 663 wins. Knight is of course considered by many as an “icon” or “legend” in college basketball, and Izzo will undoubtedly live in college basketball coaching lore forever, just like Knight.
An important distinction here, though, is that Izzo now has the most total wins as a head coach in Big Ten Conference history — that is counting non-conference and postseason opponents. Knight still owns the record for wins against Big Ten Conference opponents only, and by a decent margin. Knight has 353 conference victories to Izzo’s 322.
Izzo’s first career victory came in his head coaching debut against Chaminade in the Maui Invitational on Nov. 20, 1995 at the Lahaina Civic Center. Now, with the 2021-2022 regular season over, Izzo’s career record stands at 663-265 (71.4 career winning percentage).
Of course, Izzo has had an extraordinary career at Michigan State. Izzo won a national championship in 2000. He has 10 Final Four appearances. He was elected to the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2016. He has 10 regular-season Big Ten championships, six Big Ten Tournament titles and a Big Ten-record 23-straight (soon to be 24-straight) NCAA Tournament appearances. Izzo has been named National Coach of the Year on eight different occasions.
Of course, Izzo has also sent multiple players to the NBA and helped many of his players earn their degrees as well.
Congratulations to Coach Izzo on this historic accomplishment.