Ty: My wife spent her entire life never having seen the Spartans lose in person—until Northwestern took us out 37-17 in 2000. They’ve seemed to have our number ever since. Now we go to Chicagoland with a 7-0 record, and everyone rejoicing that State has finally overcome its Same Old Spartans trap-game mentality. This foretells certain doom—right?
Jim: Since MSU has compiled a 4-3 record against the Wildcats, and a 2-1 record in the Dantonio vs Fitzgerald era. Pat Fitzgerald is 1-3 vs the Spartans, which is only noteworthy because it includes the largest comeback in NCAA history in 2006.
Pat Fitzgerald is a good coach and by all accounts a better person. He has been classically laying up the Holtz-Speak all week long. In terms of a true trap game, Northwestern fits the bill of the team I am worried about this year. PSU at home even if they have lost every game this year is not really a trap game as the Spartans haven’t won there since the 60’s.
Ty: Exactly. Last year, the Spartans’ defense metamorphosized Mike “The Cockroach” Kafka into Kurt Warner: he went 34-of-47 for 291 yards and 2 scores against, essentially, this same secondary—only this time, we’ll likely be without Chris L. Rucker. Once-in-a-lifetime comebacks aside, getting caught up in a shootout on the road sounds like a recipe for disaster.
Jim: Well I’d hardly call last year’s score 24-14 a shootout. Although they did carry a 7-0 lead into the locker rooms. Dan Persa is another product of the Northwestern Infuriating Quarterback Machine and should be expected to perform as such. As a true freshman he has a 173.27 QB rating which is good for fourth in the NCAA. He is going to gash us for lots of yards, he’s going to run for a few third downs that will have the casual MSU fan questioning the coach’s knowledge of the game.
Since last year, the MSU pass defense has improved substantially. They are currently tied for 3rd in the NCAA in total interceptions with 12. I believe that the majority of this improvement can be directly correlated to the improvement of the linebacking corps in pass coverage in not allowing anyone with two working feet and at least to be open on a 5-7 yard hitch.
It looks like MSU will be without Chris L Rucker for a second straight week as he serves more suspension for a drunk driving charge. Darqueze Dennard filled in admirably in his absence this past week, but Northwestern will test him more thoroughly. Dennard worked really hard to keep his man to the outside in the Illinois game, if he can do that successfully against the Wildcats, don’t worry about Rucker too much.
Ty: Okay, so let’s say the Spartans manage to slow down, if not actually stop, the Wildcats’ passing offense. What about their pass defense? The Wildcats are 23rd in the nation in scoring defense, ranked 5th in the Big Ten—and 24th/4th in pass efficiency defense. If Northwestern can bottle up Cousins and company, and the first half looks much like the first half against Illinois, can the Spartans pull out a similar second half—in their first game outside the state of Michigan?
Jim: Bah. If MSU can slow down and especially if they stop the Wildcats passing offense, the ground game will handle the rest. This is definitely a game where the winner will be whoever establishes their own tempo early. If MSU is up 14-0 at the end of the first quarter, look for them to keep running and keep the NW offense off the field. If NW is up 14-0 at the end of the first quarter, look for MSU to take away the deep pass and keep NW limited to 3-7 yards at a pop.
If MSU is down more than 7 at the half things could be a bit dicey. So far though MSU has been a complete second half team this year, keep them close through the first half and there will be nothing to worry about.
The master of the game tempo wins this one.
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