Thoughts on Minnesota Game: Meh and Woohoo!

Well, that wasn't the prettiest victory, but it was a victory and MSU is now 11-1 -- quite the achievement for this coaching staff. I knew Minnesota would be tough. Thank goodness they don't have much of a passing game.

Offense

Not a great day. They put together 2 great drives, but they could not do much else against that tough Minnesota defense. Connor Cook missed some huge opportunities and the receivers made some terrible drops. They will need to be much sharper next week. Langford did his thing, but he did struggle for 3 quarters. That Minnesota run defense was tough.

Defense

They held the Gophers to 3 points, but they definitely struggled to stop Minnesota's running game. If not for some miscues, Minnesota could have put up more than 10 points and made this a much closer game. There were also several times where the defense struggled to generate a pass rush. The defense will have to step it up, if they want to stop Carlos Hyde next week.

Special Teams

Not their best performance, but no turnovers and no big mistakes.

Coaches

No complaints about the play calling. The game plan was working, but there were several bad plays that killed most of the drives.

Upshot

It was not a pretty victory, but Michigan State just won its 11th game of the season. That's special. Next week, this team has a chance to take this program to the next level, to elite status -- perhaps even into national championship discussion, if a lot of other things break their way. I am actually expecting MSU to bring it next week, I'm confident they will "unleash hell."

Preview of Minnesota Game: Slugfest

Only time for a short take on this week's game. Bottom line on this one, A focused MSU team should be able to replicate what Wisconsin did to Minnesota last week. But a distracted MSU team, one that may be looking ahead to Ohio State, could struggle and get stunned.

Minnesota is dangerous. This ain't your ancestors' Minnesota team. Jerry Kill and his assistants are clearly turning Minnesota into a real B10 team, one that may be farther along than Michigan. They have a physical defense and a physical running game. Thankfully, they still have a relatively weak passing game -- and that was their undoing against Wisconsin.

MSU will have a tougher time running the ball than usual, and I wouldn't be surprised if Jeremy Langford's 100-yard-game streak comes to an end this week. If he still gets over 100 on the Minnesota defense, that's a good indicator of the strength of MSU's running game.

So the Spartans will likely have to rely more heavily on their passing game. That means Connor Cook and the receivers must play well. And considering that the passing game has been consistently improving over the last several weeks, I don't expect that to be a problem.

I was impressed by Minnesota's ability to run the ball against Wisconsin. Their o-line was getting good push against the Badgers' front 7, and their running backs are relatively bruising. I am eager to see if MSU's front 7 can have more success against the Gophers' running game, especially as preparation against OSU's Carlos Hyde.

Minnesota struggled to score points against Wisconsin mostly because their passing game had so many miscues. If they fix some of those miscues, they could score some points on the MSU defense. They have potential, I just hope that potential isn't realized this week.

Upshot: MSU needs to win this one to keep their BCS hopes alive. A loss in this game would be devastating for a team that seems destined for greatness -- I'm dreaming of 13 and 1, woohoohoo!

Final Score: MSU 27  Minnesota 10

Thoughts on Northwestern Game: A Formula Has Emerged

Alright, we're now starting to get a pretty good sense of MSU's formula for victory. It's basically something like this: slow start on offense, defense keeps it close, offense heats up in the second half, defense throttles opposing offense, oh, and Langford breaks a long one.

Offense

Cook showed significant improvement. I like when he lets it rip, makes him look like a Heisman Trophy candidate. The Spartans will need that kind of performance against Ohio State.

The receivers are now a strength of this team. The talent is outstanding and deep. MSU has to be at least top 2 in the B10, when it comes to receivers. Nice to see Price also making some catches.

Langford is outstanding, but I feel like he's faster in the second half than in the first. I'd like to see him run with more speed early on because that's part of why the offense starts slow.

The o-line was also outstanding. They opened some nice holes for the running backs and they gave Cook all kinds of time.

Defense

They were amazing overall, but it does make me a little anxious that Northwestern was able to move the ball so well in the first half, even without their top 2 offensive players.

The secondary was too much for Nothwestern. But the front seven failed to generate much pressure, even on blitzes. That's two weeks in a row.

One thing I thought about when Kain Koulter went out is that this defense is bruising. It pounds other teams into submission. Now, the hit on Koulter should have been flagged, but I don't think Lewis intentionally targeted him. Nice to see Williamson step in and excel.

Special teams

Tough day for the punting because of the wind, but still effective, while Geiger continues to take the kicking game to new heights.

Coaches

MSU won, so they did well overall. But they need to fix things like clock management, and perhaps getting the offense off to a faster start -- that may be critical against OSU.

Upshot

The Spartans are 10-1 and Legends Division champions. I predicted 12-2 and I hope they make me eat crow by going 13-1. Now on to Minnesota and Ohio State.

Preview of Northwestern Game

This is a game that makes me a little nervous. MSU is riding high, we're all confident that MSU will be playing in the B10 championship game, and so it's easy to overlook a Northwestern team that has collapsed this season. But folks, Northwestern is a wounded snake that can still kill you if you're not careful and focused. A focused MSU team wins this one, while an overconfident MSU team could suffer a devastating defeat.

Northwestern has struggled in part because of key injuries. Well, they now have several key players back, including their most dangerous offensive weapons, Kain Colter. With Colter, NU's offense is much better than their total statistics suggest (which are about middle-of-the-road in the FBS). I actually expect them to be able to do many of the same things Nebraska did against MSU's defense, particularly with their running game. Their wide receivers, however, are not as good as Nebraska's, so they may not be able to exploit some of the weaknesses in the MSU secondary that Nebraska exposed. One important thing I would like to see in this game is the defense showing that it has addressed some of the weaknesses exposed by Nebraska. I would also like to see the d-line generating a lot more pressure than they did last week -- though the lack of pressure may have been in part due to MSU's respect for Nebraska's dangerous running attack.

NU's defense is not elite, but it can be pretty pesky. So MSU will have to come in with a solid offensive game plan, while Cook and the rest of the offense will have to make some key plays. If Cook struggles, or if the receivers drop balls, or if they turn the ball over multiple times, this is the kind of defense that could shut down MSU. If MSU's offense can at least play like it did last week, they should be fine. But of course I would really like to see the offense showing significant improvement every week, especially when we consider where they will need to be if and when they play in the B10 championship game. Specifically, I'd like to see Cook getting off to faster starts and the tight ends contributing again (they seemed to disappear last week).

So MSU should win this game if they come in focused and ready to go, and I think they will do so. This team seems to recognize the greatness of what they are accomplishing.

Final score: MSU 27  NU 14

Thoughts on Nebraska Game

OK, i'm ecstatic about the victory, but I'm a little unsatisfied with the coaches' performance. MSU was the more talented team overall, and Nebraska turned the ball over 5 times. Yet this game turned out to be close, late into the game.

Coaches

So I'll start with my thoughts on the coaches. I think they spent too much time the last 2 weeks working on trick plays. OK, the fake field goal worked, but most of the trick plays did not work, and they tended to kill a lot of drives. Nebraska's coaches actually seemed better prepared, and as a result, they were able to do more with less. They identified weaknesses in MSU's elite defense and effectively exploited them, especially the match-up against Drummond. They also overloaded zones with receivers in ways that confused the Spartan secondary.

The MSU coaches also went away from what I thought was working pretty well: running between the tackles. The o-line was getting pretty good push up the middle, and yet the coaches kept trying trick plays, too many runs to the outside, and too many passes.

Ultimately, MSU won the game, so the coaches deserve much credit. But I do think the Nebraska coaches were able to do more with much less.

Offense

I was most impressed with the receivers today. Lippett is the third down stud. That's multiple weeks in row he's made big catches on third down. Fowler looks like an NFL wide receiver, and is making some plays. Of course, Mumphery caught the big touchdown pass.

The running game was pretty good and I think they would have been better if the coaches ran more power plays. In any case, the o-line looked pretty good, especially in the first half. They did struggle to deal with Gregory, but that's to be expected. Langford had another great game, but I'm worried that he's getting overworked.

Cook started slowly, missing a wide open Lippett in the end zone in the first quarter. But he did get better throughout the game and he made a lot of nice throws.

Defense

They finally looked human. They struggled to contain that superhuman Ameer Abdullah, who I hope leaves early for the NFL. The Nebraska coaches also found a weakness: Drummond struggles against elite receivers. So basically, elite players give MSU's defense troubles. Thank goodness their QB was a freshman.

I was also discouraged that Nebraska's decimated o-line was able to do quite well against the MSU front seven. That could be a problem that resurfaces against top-tier teams like OSU, and maybe even Minnesota.

Special teams

Solid. No great kick returns, as usual. But no fumbles, and Geiger hit his field goal attempts, and Sadler showed off his running abilities.

Upshot

MSU is now a strong enough team that even a well-prepared Nebraska team was not able to overcome. The talent gap was clear. This suggests that MSU should be able to overpower their next two opponents. Still, I think this team should get into the habit of firing on all cylinders, including coaching preparation, because they're going to need to be doing so if and when they face OSU in the B10 championship game.

Preview of Nebraska Game

Folks, when I made my preseason prediction that the Spartans would go 12-2, this is one of the games I thought they'd lose. The Spartans just don't seem to know how to beat Nebraska, even when they clearly have the better team. As the season has unfolded, however, it has become clear that MSU is one of the top 3 teams in the B10 and really has no business losing this game to a weakened Nebraska team.

Sure, Nebraska is starting to salvage what at one point looked like a season that would get Bo Pellini canned. And they put together a nice road victory against Michigan, last week. Plus, they do have some dangerous players, like Ameer Abdullah. But the bottom line is that this is MSU's game to lose, so they have to come in focused and passionate. This is the type of game that could ruin what is becoming one of the greatest seasons in MSU football history.

MSU comes in looking dominant on D and improving on O. I expect the defense to do well against a Nebraska offense that is missing Taylor Martinez and half their starting o-line. Another dominant performance looks likely, if they can avoid the big plays.

The offense should also do well, even if Connor Cook struggles -- hopefully he won't. MSU is starting to develop a solid running game and Nebraska's run defense is allowing 160 yards per game. If the o-line is gelling the way it usually does later in the season, MSU should be able to run the ball quite effectively. It would be nice if they could run it as effectively as Wisconsin ran the ball on Nebraska in last year's B10 championship game, but I'll settle for a replication of Minnesota's rushing performance (271 yards) against Nebraska.

One thing I'll never forget is how Nebraska defeated a superior Spartan team 2 years ago by engaging in a lot of pass interference. The refs basically allowed Nebraska to get away with what was clearly an underhanded strategy. Come to think of it, the refs gave Nebraska the game last year, particularly when they called Johnny Adams for a block in the back on an interception returned for a touchdown (if I recall correctly). Son of a . . ., MSU is bascially going to have to take it out of the ref's hands by dominating the way they should.

Final Score: MSU 25  Nebraska 10

The Bye, So Let's Think About Where We're At

Folks, the bye week gives us an opportunity to reflect on some interesting things about this season, and perhaps the next. One way to gauge where we're at is to consider how this team is doing in terms of surprises. If you've been reading this blog for a while, you know that before the season starts I like to anticipate surprises that could significantly affect how the team will perform throughout the season. You can find my preseason discussion of surprises here and here. So what significant surprises have we observed, up to this point in the season?

As far as the bad surprises go, it looks like the only one that really came to fruition was the one about Maxwell. He did struggle, but at least I was right that he could be replaced by an adequate quarterback -- and that's what Cook has been, up to this point. In the first few games it also looked like the receivers were set to give us another bad surprise. That is, it looked like they had not improved much from last year. As I wrote, I think that would have been a season-killing surprise, but thankfully, the receivers came around by the Iowa game and have continued to improve throughout the season.

As for good surprises, I think we've had many more of these, and that's why MSU is having such a great season. Starting with the defense, I expected it to be good, but did any of us expect it to be this good? Part of that dominance is thanks to the emergence of Shilique Calhoun, who I think has turned out to be more disruptive than Will Gholston. I said it would be a nice surprise to get 10 sacks out of him, and he currently has 6.5, along with 11 tackles for loss. So he may actually exceed what I thought were high expectations. In general, the d-line has turned out to be more disruptive than anticipated, and that has helped make this one of the best defenses in school history. I didn't say anything about Denicos Allen in my surprise discussions, but he may be the biggest surprise on defense. He leads the team with 57 tackles, 5 sacks, and 11 tackles for loss. That's just astonishing.

On offense, I can't really say there have been any big surprises. I guess we could call Cook a good surprise in that he stepped in when Maxwell struggled, but quarterback play is actually worse than I expected. As for other parts of the offense, the receivers, the o-line, the running backs are now performing about how I expected. Jeremy Langford is the big surprise among the running backs, but the running game overall is about what I expected. Perhaps the biggest positive surprise on offense has been the emergence of the tight ends in the last few games. I honestly did not expect much from that group, but they have started to make some key contributions. Hopefully they'll continue to progress as the season draws to a close.

The special teams have performed about as expected, except that Michael Geiger has exceeded expectations. I was hoping that he would at least match what Conroy did last year (hit approximately 75% of field goal attempts), and he has actually hit 9 of 10 field goal attempts.

So hopefully the good surprises stay in place and hopefully we see the emergence of a few more good surprises. I would most like to see Cook take a big step forward over the next few games, but I'm not really counting on it. If he can at least play the way he played against UM, The Spartans will still have a great year. Throughout the Dantonio era we have also seen the o-line gel by about this point in the season, so I'm kind of expecting/hoping that they really start to dominate. It would be a nice surprise if this "best o-line in the Dantonio era" ends up dominating in a way similar to Wisconsin o-lines, especially by the B10 championship game.

The season, thus, has been quite the success. Have you ever felt this kind of euphoria? Perhaps it's just best to say as "Da Bears" guys say: "why are we so blessed?"

Recruiting 2014: Madre London

There is some buzz about Madre London committing to MSU. I don't have time to write thorough reviews of recruits these days, but I did want to pass along a few thoughts.

London is a relatively different from most recent running back recruits. He's big, but not LeVeon Bell big. He's fast but he's not RJ Shelton or Jeremy Langford fast. Basically, he is kind of "tweener" on size, power, and speed. His best traits appear to be quickness, vision, decisiveness, and toughness. He kind of reminds me most of former Stanford running back Stepfan Taylor, though obviously, London has some work to do before we could really start comparing to Taylor. I'll say this, his contribution will probably fall somewhere between Larry Caper and Stepfan Taylor. He does look like he could contribute as a freshman, but that all depends on who's ahead of him.

London is a sound pick up, who seemed to be a top priority for the coaches -- maybe they saw the next Taylor in him, as well. It's always good to see the coaches getting who they want. London's commitment probably means the Spartans are finished recruiting running backs, and they probably only have about 3 or 4 spots left. My guess is they'll take 1 or 2 more d-linemen, 1 more o-lineman, 2 receivers, and perhaps a defensive back.

Thoughts on Michigan Game

A little late with my review of the game because I'm traveling, but man, what a game! This victory ranks right up there with the Outback Bowl victory over Georgia. It makes it 5 out of the last 6 over Michigan (and yesterday's victory was the most resounding), which shows that MSU is here to stay at least as an equal to UM and may be on the verge of establishing "a new world order" (in fact, if Brady Hoke loses again next year, UM could be looking for a new head coach).

Here are some other random thoughts.

Defense

This is a historic defense. They have now completely shut down several of the B10's best offenses, outright suffocating them in the second half. Just astonishing.

Offense

Considering the great field position they had to work with, it's safe to say that the offense under-performed. Connor Cook has a lot of work to do. Right now he is adequate for the talent around him, but this offense could be unstoppable if he could just play a little better. There were several huge plays that he missed, though he did also create a few big plays. He'll have to step it up, if MSU has to play Ohio State in the B10 championship game.

I was a little disappointed in the rest of the offense, as well. The o-line didn't dominate like I hoped (though they were pretty good), the receivers dropped several balls, and the Langford was just a few shoe-string tackles from having a bigger game (though he still ended up with a solid performance). 

Special teams

The kickers did their job, and the returners didn't fumble and they actually made some decent returns.

Coaches

The game plan looked solid, but more importantly, this coaching staff has built a defense that has not allowed UM to score a touchdown in 2 games. They still have some work to do with the offense, but the coaches are on a roll.

Upshot

As I said, this is one of the biggest victories in MSU history, especially because it revealed a clear trend: MSU has established itself at least as UM's equal and may be on the verge of asserting it's dominance. A victory next year will establish a Jim Tressel-like dominance over UM. This game should also help MSU with some recruits.

As for this season, this victory keeps MSU on the road to the Rose Bowl and on the road to fulfilling or surpassing my preseason prediction of 12-2. 

Why are we so blessed?

Preview of Michigan Game

Ahahalrighty then, we've come to it at last. Folks, I'll just come out and say it. MSU is the more complete team and can only lose due to a freak occurrence (like Devin Gardner having the game of his life) or a poor game plan.

Defense

Michigan has an explosive, but inconsistent offense. They're putting up 44 points a game, including over 700 yards of offense against Indiana's poor defense. The good thing is that MSU's defense matches up quite well against UM's offense.

To start with, UM has a weaker running game that the Spartans should be able to stop, even without stacking the box. UM's strength is it's passing game, but it is excessively dependent on 2 good receivers: Gallon and Funchess. Obviously, one of the keys to this game is how well the MSU secondary shuts down those two. Gallon's strength is his ability to keep moving. He takes advantage of Devin Gardner's ability to extend plays. The Spartan secondary is going to have keep on him for longer than they may be used to covering other receivers. Funchess' strength is obviously his height. He is not particularly explosive, but he can win a lot of jump balls.

The other danger is Devin Gardner's mobility. MSU has experience containing running quarterbacks, but Gardner is particularly dangerous because he combines excellent mobility with some decent throwing ability. Gardner has struggled with turnovers this year, but he has put it all together in a couple of games this year. He looked nearly unstoppable against Notre Dame. Obviously, MSU has to hope that Gardner doesn't put it all together for this Saturday. Even if he does, MSU should be able to slow him down quite a bit, but UM would probably get around 25 points. Then it would be up to the offense to keep up.

As we've seen, the MSU defense usually figures out opposing offenses by the second half of the game and then completely shuts them down. I'm hoping to see the same this week, but I suspect UM will have a little more success in the second half than previous teams.

Offense

The MSU offense has also been inconsistent but has more to work with than UM's offense. In particular, MSU has the best o-line I can recall and some above average running backs that are on the brink of stardom. MSU also has more depth at receiver, and emerging tight ends.

But like UM, the Spartan offense is heavily influenced by their quarterback. Connor Cook, has looked both excellent and downright shabby. If he plays like he did against Illinois, MSU will win this game regardless of what Gardner does. If Cook plays like he did against Purdue, MSU will lose regardless of how well their defense plays.

UM's defense is not statistically great this year, but they will still be one of the better defenses MSU has faced this year. Cook and the offense have done well against better defenses, like Iowa's, but they could also struggle if Cook's accuracy issues return, or if the receivers start dropping balls again.

Special teams

Last year, the special teams favored UM. They hit all their field goals, and MSU missed key opportunities. This year, I hope to at least see MSU's special teams neutralize UM's special teams. Ideally, MSU's STs will outplay the UM STs.

Coaches

MSU is the more talented team, so it's mostly up to the coaches to win this game. I will only excuse the coaches if Cook struggles mightily, or if Gardner has a freak performance. Otherwise, MSU really should win this game. I don't want to see MSU losing this game because of an inferior game plan or poor coaching decisions.

Upshot

As I said, the Spartans should win this game, barring a freak occurrence (like Cook absolutely flopping, Gardner going nuts, or multiple fumbles at inopportune times). MSU is more talented all around, has fewer holes in terms of talent, and is playing at home.

I'll say that Gardner will play well, but the defense will slow him down. Cook and the MSU offense will also play pretty well and score just enough points to win this one by a touchdown.

Final score: MSU 28  UM 21