EAST LANSING, Mich. — On Saturday afternoon following Michigan State’s blowout loss at Rutgers, it was suggested to Tom Izzo the Scarlet Knights exhibited a lot of the traits normally seen by a Spartans team. Tough. Relentless. Efficient. Rutgers was all of them and Izzo scoffed at the notion Michigan State was not, quickly pointing out that his team had won 17 games at that point and was still in the thick of the Big Ten race. It was a fair rebuttal. After all, the Spartans started slowly that day, but were essentially overwhelmed by a hot-shooting team, desperate for a big win to bolster its…