Tom Izzo and Jaden Akins got into it in Saturday after the junior got a technical foul and the Hall of Famer spoke on the incident.
Towards the end of the first half in Michigan State’s 88-80 win over Illinois, Jaden Akins hit a 3-pointer right in front of the Illinois bench. After making it, he turned to face their bench for a brief second while celebrating the made shot. However, Akins was called for a technical foul for taunting. Maybe this was a questionable call, but an Illini player got called for the exact same thing earlier. So Akins needs to be smarter and should have known not to do this. As you can imagine, Tom Izzo was not happy with Akins.
Izzo stormed onto the court yelling at Jaden and had to be held back by AJ Hoggard. Here’s a quick clip both of the made shot by Akins and Izzo getting angry with him right after.
Tom Izzo comments on incident with Jaden Akins
Izzo had every right to be mad in the moment, and he has no regrets in doing so. But he also showed a lot of trust in Akins directly after the play as well. Here is Izzo’s full comment on the incident:
“You’re right I did get after you (Akins), but I left you in the game. That’s my way of telling you, I love ya, I appreciate ya, I know how you’ve been most of your time here and I’m going to take that as a mistake.”
This is the perfect mindset for Izzo to have in my opinion. He’s telling Jaden that this play from him was unacceptable and can’t happen again, but he’s also showing that he has a lot of trust in him.
Most coaches would take Akins out after a moment like this, but not Izzo. He has enough trust in Jaden to know he won’t do this again. He also knows that this is an abnormal behavior from Jaden as well, so there really isn’t any fear of him doing anything else like this, especially in this game.
This is one of just many examples of why people love playing for Tom Izzo. He holds them accountable but also still trusts and loves his guys at the end of the day. I have no doubts that Jaden won’t do something like this again this year, and I’m sure this moment will just bring him and Izzo closer together in the long run.
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