"Typical Spartans" - adjective
1. relates to the performance of the Michigan State football team.
2. a pattern of losing easy games in the final minutes due to lack of effort, focus, and/or execution.
"That loss to Central Michigan was 'typical Spartans'".
3. the act of winning early in the season and having a letdown in October.
I am not trying to exaggerate the importance of the next 3 games, but this really is a pivotal point in their season. From one perspective, their 1-2 record isn't as bad as it sounds. They have lost their games on a last second field goal and 2 minute offense that was very close to producing a go-ahead TD or a game-tying field goal. They have lost by a combined 5 points. Their starting QB is the best in the Big 10 in QB Rating (14th overall), which happen to also stand as our rankings in passing YPG in the conference and nation. Between Nichol and Cousins, they've thrown 1 INT all season. Greg Jones is #3 in the country in tackles.
From another perspective, they are in worse shape than they have been in years. They lost to a MAC team at home, which brought up memories of similar early-season losses in years past to Cal in 2002, Louisiana Tech in 2003, and Rutgers in 2004. The next game was headed to be much more of a blowout until Michael Floyd broke his collarbone and Jimmy Clausen injured his foot. (Side note: I propose we call the broken collarbone the "Charles Rogers" much like an injured ulnar collateral ligament is the "Tommy John"). MSU ranks 81st in Rushing YPG. They have only recorded 5 sacks and 2 INTs. Our secondary can't stop anyone. We STILL have not settled on a QB and the WRs don't look in synch with the QBs as a result.
This season has defied the third part of my definition because their schedule is uncharacteristically difficult early in the season. We have not met my expectations, but they really do start their new season this Saturday. Over the next 3 weekends, Michigan State plays at Wisconsin (a game we won on a last second FG last year), has a tougher-than-expected game against U-M, and plays at Illinois. If they were to somehow win all three of these games, they make a very strong argument for winning the Big 10. I assume they would at worst finish 3rd barring a huge letdown later in the season. If the opposite were to occur, which I think is entirely possible, they will stand at an abismal 1-5 on October 10th. To put this into perspective, here are the dates over the past 7 seasons when they lost their 5th game.
2002 Oct. 26
2003 Dec. 29th (Bowl Game)
2004 Nov. 6th
2005 Nov. 12th
2006 Oct. 28th
2007 Nov. 3rd
2008 We lost our 4th game against Georgia in the Citrus Bowl on 1/1/09
Playing difficult Big-10 teams this early in the season is rare, but disasterous when it occurs. Looking over this history, our schedule is most akin to that in 2005. After defeating Kent St and Hawaii at home they played at Notre Dame and won. They blew out an easy Illinois team on the road to make it 4-0. However, they lost a close game at home against Michigan and again against OSU after the bye week. Things took the "typical Spartan" downward spiral and they lost 4 of the last 5 to bring the season record to 5-6. 2006 was very similar as well with their Big 10 schedule opening home against Illinois, at Michigan, and home against OSU. That season, John L Smith's last, they finished 4-8 overall, 1-7 in the Big 10.
To prevent things from spiraling downhill, I think that Kirk Cousins must immediately be named the starting (and ending and everything in between) QB so he can get all of the reps with the first team. They must also begin game planning to defend against the spread offense immediately after the Wisconsin game. U-M, Illinois, and Northwestern, our next 3 opponents after this weekend, will rely on mobile QBs (to varying degrees) and spreading out the field. It could be a blessing to face them back-to-back-to-back since the defensive strategy can be improved each week. Finally, they have to find someone who can defend passes. I think the player we have missed most from last year, other than Javon Ringer, is Otis Wiley.
Compared to my preseason predictions, I think U-M is looking more like a Loss, but Minnesota and Wisconsin appear to have strong potential for MSU to be victorious. I don't believe they will start 1-5, but I think we should be looking forward to a low level bowl game and their potential for next season.
2 comments:
While these last two losses have been two swift kicks to the balls, I'm not sure if they are necessarily "Typical Spartans". Let me play devil's advocate here.
Going back to the CMU game, I think it really only compares to the Louisiana Tech game, where LA Tech had a pro-prospect quarterback (McCown) that engineered a late comeback. To me, the loss wasn't typical because we usually do beat the smaller schools we are better then. I know we were suppposed to beat Rutgers awhile back, but I think looking back on that game it's clear that we were overrated and overconfident (which IS typical for an MSU football team at the beginning of the year), and flat-out not the better team. The same can be said for both Cal games. 'Typical Spartans' to me is losing to teams we think we are just as good (or better) then, when in actuality we are not. So while I think the CMU loss fits your definition, I'm not sure if it's a yearly norm. Maybe you can give me some more examples of the easy games we've lost in recent years?
And to the ND loss...definitely not 'Typical Spartans' because we always win against Notre Dame in South Bend! That loss hurt, no doubt about it, but I was still proud of the effort. We were playing against a pissed off ND team that lost at Michigan, in South Bend, against a damn good offense. We had no running game and we still had a chance to win (and should have). There were a lot of positivies to take away, more so than a lot of other losses we've had in the past against decent/good teams.
I think all along my expectations for this season have been low-level bowl game and a middling record. What I want to see is the emergence of a running game, the QB "controversy" sorted out, and improvements on defense. Most of all I want to see consistency and stability (In my opinion, inconsistency and instability has been the staple of 'Typical Spartan' football) heading into next season where I think we have a major shot at contending for an upper-level bowl game.
Nice post!
Point taken on Cal - I didn't realize they went 7-5 that year.
I can acknowledge that "typically" we beat ND on the road. The "typical" part I was mentioning was blowing it at the end on a careless mistake, like we have seen so frequently against U-M and occasionally against ND in the past. They shouldn't have won that game according to how things were going early on, as I said. But once ND lost Floyd and Clausen was hobbled, I think they looked poised to at least tie it up for OT.
The one takeaway is that they look really bad this season despite maintaining our great WRs and what many thought was at least a lateral move in QB, if not an upgrade from Hoyer. I wanted to highlight that they could end up being worse than any team we've seen in several years. I agree that this is building to potentially great things next season.
Post a Comment