Tom Izzo (head coach of MSU Spartans): Bio, Wiki, Age, Family, Career, Net Worth About The Young Entrepreneur Award Winner

Tom Izzo (head coach of MSU Spartans): Bio, Wiki, Age, Family, Career, Net Worth About The Young Entrepreneur Award Winner

Tom Izzo, the head coach of the MSU Spartans, has won the Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award.

Tom Izzo, the head coach, and his wife Lupe Marinez Izzo have been together for nearly 30 years. Lupe has been running the Lansing-based Rain Water Treatment Systems Dealership for more than 20 years.

The Izzo Legacy Family Fund, which will host the Spartan Spring Football Game in April 2023, also has her as its Event Committee Chair.

Lupe studied ballet and modern dance while growing up in East Lansing, where she also performed with a sizable group of Mexican folk dancers.

According to MLive, she still loves to dance and is a “Dancing With the Stars” supporter. She will be pulling for her friend and ESPN sportscaster Erin Andrews in 2010, who is one of the favorites to win.

Lupe had thought about going into acting and dancing (before her relationship with Tom). As any good daughter would, she talked to her father, and he persuaded her that starting a business was unquestionably the better choice.

Tom Izzo
Tom Izzo

Lupe Marinez, Wife of Tom Izzo Izzo

Lupe Marinez, Tom Izzo’s wife, is from East Lansing and both of them attended Michigan State University. She also established the Izzo Legacy Family Fund.

According to her biography on Izzo Legacy, Lupe Marinez won the 1990 Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award in Michigan for owning and operating the Rain Soft Water Treatment Systems Dealership in Lansing for more than 20 years.

Lupe presided over the Tri-County United Way Campaign from 2005 to 2006. She contributes her time and expertise to a number of community groups, including Holy Cross Services, the Greater Lansing Food Bank, the MSU Food Bank, the Lansing Promise, and the Cristo Ray Community Center.

Martinez Izzo is a native of Crystal City, Texas, and one of her most recent projects is Coaches Vs Cancer, a multi-year national campaign supported by the American Cancer Society.

Tom Izzo Bio

Tom Izzo, an American college basketball coach who was born on January 30, 1955, is currently the head coach of Michigan State University. His Italian name is.

Izzo was inducted into the Naismith Basketball Hall of Fame on April 4, 2016.

Izzo has guided the Spartans to eight NCAA Tournament Final Fours, including the 2000 NCAA National Championship and the 2009 Runner-Up result. In his 26 years at Michigan State, his teams have won six Big Ten tournament championships and ten regular season Big Ten championships. Izzo is the school’s all-time winningest coach, and his teams have qualified for 24 straight NCAA tournaments without ever having a losing season under his leadership. Between 1998 and 2002, MSU also established a Big Ten record for the longest winning run on its home court. Following a number of these successes, longtime ESPN analyst Andy Katz named Michigan State the best collegiate basketball program from 1998 to 2007.

Izzo has been the head coach of the Big Ten Conference’s teams for the longest time, and his teams are well known for their ability to rebound and play tough defense. He maintains a sizable coaching tree; numerous of his former assistants are currently head coaches at different Division I colleges. He has earned four national coach of the year accolades. Izzo ranks third among all conference regular-season champions with 10 victories. Six of his victories in the Big Ten Tournament are a record for the conference.

Izzo surpassed Bob Knight on March 6, 2022, with 663 victories as a men’s basketball coach at a Big Ten institution.

Tom Izzo’s Sports Career

Izzo, who was born and reared on Iron Mountain in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, close to the Wisconsin border, is of Italian and Finnish ancestry. He first met Steve Mariucci, a former NFL head coach, in his hometown. He and his pal were teammates on the football, basketball, and track teams at Iron Mountain High School where they both attended. They shared a room at Northern Michigan University in Marquette, and Izzo played guard for the team from 1973 to 1977. He established a school record for playing time during his senior year and was recognized as a Division II All-American.

Tom Izzo’s Beginning of Coaching Career

Izzo spent one season as the head coach at Ishpeming High School after graduating from Northern Michigan. From 1979 through 1983, he worked as an assistant coach at Northern Michigan University. In September 1983, Izzo was then hired by Michigan State as a part-time assistant. Izzo returned to Michigan State in 1986 after a brief two-month stint as an assistant coach at the University of Tulsa when assistant Mike Deane departed to take the head coaching position at Siena College. Izzo was promoted to associate head coach before the 1990–91 season by then–coach Jud Heathcote. Izzo was appointed the new head coach of the MSU men’s basketball team after Heathcote retired following the 1994–95 season, on the advice of both Heathcote and the MSU athletic director.

The Michigan State Head Coach

Izzo and John Calipari, the two highest-paid college coaches in 2012, are from Kentucky.

Izzo has been the head basketball coach at Michigan State since 1995, making him the Big Ten Conference’s coach with the longest tenure. On November 29, 2009, he defeated Heathcote to become the coach with the most victories in school history after winning his 341st game. Izzo finished 9-9 in his first two seasons as head coach, finishing sixth and seventh in the conference but missing the NCAA Tournament. MSU’s conference record improved to 13-3 in 1998, and Izzo earned the first of his eleven regular-season Big Ten titles.

The year 1998 also marked the start of Michigan State’s current second-longest streak among Division I teams—a run of 24 consecutive participation in the NCAA Tournament. 53-23 is Izzo’s record in the NCAA Tournament. Izzo joined Krzyzewski and Ben Howland as the only three coaches to make three consecutive Final Fours since the NCAA Tournament bracket was extended to 64 teams in 1985 when he won his first of six Big Ten tournament titles and reached his first of three straight Final Four visits in 1999. Izzo’s official record versus the Wolverines in the intrastate rivalry is 31-14, despite the fact that Michigan forfeited five of their victories in the series at the beginning of his head coaching career.

Izzo guided MSU to its second NCAA national championship in 2000 by defeating Florida 89–76. Of his athletes who completed their eligibility, 82% graduated from MSU with a degree. The Atlanta Hawks, Chicago Bulls, Cleveland Cavaliers, and New Jersey Nets have all expressed interest in hiring Izzo as their head coach over the years. After a brief flirtation with Cleveland, Izzo informed the Board of Trustees of Michigan State University on June 15, 2010, that he will stay as head coach of Michigan State and declared himself to be “a Spartan for life.”

Izzo’s team lost to North Carolina 89-72, preventing him from winning his second national championship in 2009. The squad’s six Final Four appearances from 1999 to 2010 were unmatched by any other college basketball team, and his streak of three consecutive Final Four appearances from 1999 to 2001 is the third-longest of all time.

Izzo values being named by USA Today Sports as the fifth-most irate coach in college basketball in 2013.

On November 26, 2015, Izzo defeated Boston College in the Wooden Legacy to win his 500th game in his career, all with Michigan State.

Izzo passed Gene Keady to take over second position all-time in the Big Ten for victories by a coach on January 28, 2016, after winning his 513th game of his career. He is only behind Bob Knight.

When No. 15 seeded Middle Tennessee defeated the No. 2 seeded Spartans 90-81 on March 18, 2016, it was at the time arguably the biggest upset in NCAA Tournament history for MSU.

MSU was thought to be the equivalent of a No. 1 seed, and Vegas odds listed them as the front-runners to win the championship. Middle Tennessee maintained the advantage the whole game and repelled numerous attempts to overtake them by Michigan State. Izzo claimed that despite this, the group “resurrected” him.

Izzo received the Dean Smith Award on October 13, 2016, which is given to “a collegiate basketball player who exemplifies the attitude and principles of the late North Carolina coaching great.”

Izzo oversaw the Spartans’ 32-7 overall record in 2018–19, his fifth 30-win campaign and 19th season with 20+ victories, nearly tripling the previous coach’s seven 20–win performances. This was the team’s ninth Final Four appearance under Izzo. For the first time in the history of the program, which dates back to the start of the AP poll in 1948, Michigan State was ranked as the preseason No. 1 team in The Associated Press Top 25 Men’s College Basketball preseason poll on October 21, 2019, the first game of Izzo’s 25th season as head coach of the Spartans.

With a victory over the No. 4-ranked Purdue Boilermakers on February 26, 2022, Izzo matched the record held by former Indiana coach Bob Knight for the most victories in Big Ten history.

Izzo and the Spartans agreed to a five-year contract extension on August 11, 2022, worth 6.2 million dollars per year. The agreement makes it clear that Izzo will be a “Spartan for life.”

Tom Izzo’s Honor

Izzo was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame on April 4, 2016.

Gary Williams, a former head coach at Maryland, was chosen by Izzo to introduce him during the Hall of Fame ceremony. On September 9, 2016, he was admitted to the Hall of Fame.

Izzo was inducted into the Basketball Coaches Association of Michigan (BCAM) Hall of Fame in the fall of 2016.

Anybody, anywhere, at any time, we’ll play. It doesn’t matter if it’s morning, noon, or night, or who it is.

Izzo’s teams are renowned for their toughness, rebounding, and outstanding guard play. Izzo is well-known for his “war” rebounding routine, in which the players don shoulder pads and helmets from football. “Players Play – Tough Players Win,” is his catchphrase. His other coaching theories include “A player-coached team is better than a coach-coached squad” and “He doesn’t select playing time, players do.” In order to prepare his teams for the NCAA tournament in March, Izzo is also renowned for setting incredibly difficult non-conference schedules.

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Tom Izzo Net Worth

American college basketball coach Tom Izzo has a $13 million dollar fortune. Tom Izzo, who was born in Iron Mountain, Michigan, in 1955, played basketball for Northern Michigan University from 1973 to 1977. During his senior year, he was recognized as a Division II All-American. Izzo first coached basketball at the high school level before becoming an assistant coach at his alma mater, where he remained until 1983. Later, he obtained a temporary assistant position at the nearby Michigan State University. Izzo returned to MSU as head coach in 1995 after a few brief spells elsewhere, giving him the Big Ten’s longest-tenured basketball coach.

He has made the Spartans into a dependable powerhouse that often leads the conference standings in his more than two decades in East Lansing. Izzo has participated in six Final Fours and won the NCAA National Championship in 2000. Seven Big Ten Championships and four Big Ten Tournament titles have been won by the Spartans. He has the most victories in MSU history and has participated in the NCAA tournament 17 times in a row. Izzo was named Big Ten Coach of the Year in 1998, 2009, and 2012 by the Big Ten. The Associated Press named him National Coach of the Year in 1998. Izzo participated in Operation Hardwood, a program that sends college coaches abroad to assist American troops in the field.

Tom Izzo
Tom Izzo

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Quick Facts

Net Worth: $13 Million
Salary: $3 Million
Date of Birth: Jan 30, 1955 (67 years old)
Place of Birth: Iron Mountain
Gender: Male
Height: 5 ft 8 in (1.75 m)
Profession: Coach, Basketball Coach
Nationality: United States of America

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