Chris Jans on Michigan State: 'We're not going to overlook anything'
Michigan State may not have ended up being the team that some thought they’d be coming into the season. They still made the NCAA Tournament, though, and, as Mississippi State’s opening-round opponent today, Chris Jans isn’t counting out the Spartans.
Jans spoke about Michigan State before their upcoming game with them in Charlotte in the Round of 64. He said that the Bulldogs aren’t looking past their No. 9 seed, especially since this is now an all new season and with who is leading them into March.
“We’re not going to overlook anything they do,” said Jans.
“They were ranked high in the preseason for a reason. At the end of the day, it’s how they’re playing now,” Jans said. “Tom Izzo is as respected of a basketball coach that there is in college basketball.”
Jans’ praise and respect of Izzo didn’t stop there though. He continued on by saying that Izzo is almost a form of idol for him that he has tried to emulate to some degree in his coaching career.
“When I was growing up in the business, when I was young, younger, people would ask me, ‘Who’s your idol? Who’s your mentor?’ I said, you know, I really don’t have one,” said Jans. “I didn’t grow up in an athletic family. None of my parents played high school or college sports. So I was oblivious really to the profession and even college basketball for that matter. I just wanted to be a high school basketball coach and a PE teacher. I thought they had the best life you could ever imagine. Eventually, I strived for a little bit more.”
“People would ask me that all the time. To be honest with you, my answer was, if I had to emulate someone or some program? And I’m talking about my early 20s. I go, ‘It would be Tom Izzo at Michigan State,'” Jans said. “I always respected the way he went about his business. The way his teams played. I wanted my teams to be looked at that way and I know they’re not. From an early age in my formative years as a college coach, that was probably the person and the program that I looked up to the most. Then I chuckled when we got paired up with him. I’m sure he had to look down at his staff and say, ‘Hey, who is Chris Jans and who are we playing against?’. I’m sure he had to ask a couple people to get some information about me.”
Michigan State opened the season in the top-five of the AP Poll after bringing back and then adding pieces to a team that went to last year’s Sweet 16. However, that didn’t last long with a 4-5 start as they’d never get back into the rankings. They still got to 19-14 with a two-month, 13-4 stretch but it was well off from what their expectation was.
However, that’s not enough for Jans to fail to notice Izzo and his team, especially in this event. He’s going to take the game for what it is and enjoy that part of the opportunity to coach versus him in the postseason.
“It’s a privilege to be able to get a chance to share the floor with him and to compete against him,” Jans said.