But some turnovers, the “bizarre” ones Izzo says the Spartans have been racking up lately, are what really get under his skin.

MSU appeared to right the turnover ship in its victory Tuesday night against Ohio State, turning the ball over 11 times after averaging 18 in its first three Big Ten contests.

After the game, Izzo said he felt better about the giveaways, but some still irked him.

“The ones that were made, again — a couple travels, slipping on the floor, ball through a guys hands — they’re just of a bizarre nature,” he said. “If they were throwing the balls away, you could coach that a little differently.”

After MSU’s loss to Iowa on Saturday, arguably the worst offensive performance in Izzo’s tenure as the Spartans’ head coach, the MSU coaching staff evaluated film of the team’s first three conference games. The findings, Izzo said, were “discouraging.”

“I think we looked at it and saw 16 of those 54 (total turnovers) have been forced,” Izzo said.

He said he would hope that the ratio of unforced to forced would be flip-flopped from what they actually show and have two-thirds of them be forced.

The unforced turnovers, as opposed to the forced ones, can add up and totally skew the outcome or feel of a game. If a team travels twice, accidentally steps on the baseline once and fails to get an inbound pass in time, those unforced errors can alter a statistics sheet from an average game to a poor game in terms of turnovers.

“We have to make a change,” senior guard Drew Neitzel said. “I don’t care who you’re playing, if you’re turning the ball over, you don’t give yourself a chance to win. We’ve got to get back on track and realize that every possession matters, especially in conference play.”

As Izzo said, turnovers that are so random and hard to account for in nature can be a bit harder to resolve.

“You could look at them and say it’s a lack of discipline or lack of skill,” he said.

“Well, I can’t fault our effort in the (Iowa) game. It’s going to take some better concentration because turnovers lead to more than you not getting a basket. There’s psychological things you deal with on that too when they’re more in abundance than normal. I’m more worried about the bunches they’re coming in rather than the number.”