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Every college hoops coach loves the pressure and bright lights of bringing their teams into March Madness. But Tom Izzo is a different breed.

As the saying goes, there’s October, November, December, January, February, IZZO, and April.

There’s a reason the Michigan State Spartans have performed so well when it really matters. And that’s because since he took the job in East Lansing in 1995, Izzo has understood what it takes to win.

Oh, and contrary to popular belief; Izzo and Dan Dakich don’t hate each other.

Sure there was that one disagreement that made the Michigan State student section start a social media eruption with DD, but he’s good with his guy Tom.

Izzo was kind enough to spend a few minutes on The Dan Dakich Show Wednesday afternoon.

“It was one incident that probably got blown out of proportion,” Izzo jokingly told DD. “You are always one to stick up for coaches. And coaches don’t have many people as fans so hang in there.”

But oh boy. All joking aside, here come the Spartans.

They’ve had two wins over the Indiana Hoosiers in the last 10 days, four victories in their last five, and former Ben Davis stud Aaron Henry with double-digit point totals in each of his last 11 games.

Now it gets really tough for Izzo’s crew.

It will be a doubleheader with the Michigan Wolverines to close out the Big Ten regular season slate. And you can bet Michigan is not going to be happy after getting embarrassed at home last night by an Illinois team without Ayo Dosunmu.

“I’ve been in the league for a long time and have never played four top-five teams in a 12 day period,” Izzo mentioned. “We’ve never played a back-to-back against Michigan. It’s really different.”

In Joe Lunardi’s latest bracketology report this morning, Michigan State was among the “Last Four In.” If they come to the 317 and are looked at as an afterthought, look out.

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