The Week in Review for January 19th, 2012

MSU Football News

Recruiting Updates(Since Yesterday) - This is the time of year where you could write a recruiting update everyday and still not cross over into creeper territory of following people around. Earlier today, Matt Dorsey tweeted that Wisconsin Offensive Tackle Prospect Kyle Dodson will be on campus for an official visit. Dodson's offer sheet is bananas. If he actually shows this weekend(always a concern with a high profile potential decommitment) I'd put the odds at better than 50/50 he ends up in green and white. You don't take an official at the 11th hour without being very serious in doing so. Also, per Matt Dorsey's twitter, DT prospect Terrell Jackson has moved his visit to the weekend of the 27th. There is additional recruiting chatter, but the majority is speculative still. Perhaps more firms up over the weekend.

I always wanted to do that...

- Earlier this week, Hondo posted a story that Pat Narduzzi turned down a job offer to be the Defensive Coordinator at Tennessee. With all due respect to Hondo, I find this very difficult to believe because 1.) Hondo is the only one reporting it that isn't originating the story from spartannation.com. 2.) A million dollars is a lot of money, do you know what you can do with a million dollars? 3.) Most importantly, if someone offers you a million dollars, I think you go interview for the job, even if you have no intention of taking it.

In related and conspiratorial news, Narduzzi after deciding to stay did receive a raise, although to my knowledge that amount has not been made public. Another reason to stay may in fact be that the money might not be that big a jump. But honestly it's that UT is a trainwreck under Dooley and are hoping Narduzzi could save a sinking ship.

Senior/Shrine Bowl Practices

B.J. Cunningham - "Cunningham's route-running was also much better than anticipated. He lacks classic foot speed and does not display a deep burst, but showed enough skill to cause NFL decision-makers to believe he'll be a solid third receiver." He plays in the East-West Shrine Game on Saturday at 4p on NFL Network

Keith Nichol - "Nichol is pretty quick in and out of breaks, but he's had a lot of drops in the first two days of practice.He has soft hands when it comes to the deep ball and he judges it in the air pretty well, but on underneath passes with velocity he lets it go through his hands far too often." He's practicing for the NFLPA bowl, which apparently is not happening? There are no NFL scouts at his practice although CFL and UFL scouts are in attendance, so...? If he works on his catching no one might know he's been letting some passes go?

Or this?

Kirk Cousins, Brian Linthicum, Trenton Robinson - These three guys will play in the Senior Bowl on 1/28. "This is a great chance for me to compete against the best guys in the country," Cousins said. "I'm excited to get to prove myself all over again."Expect to hear more on this next week.

MSU Men's Hoops

A pox upon our house apparently? Honestly, 15-4 is pretty damn good considering how new this team is and as Chris Vannini writes "It's pretty hard to get a road win in the Big Ten." Also on his blog, you can vote for the most improved player on the 2011-2012 Men's team, it's currently a two-horse race between Nix and Thornton.

The next couple of games will be critical for defining the rest of the season, while Pete of the Only Colors explains that  "This isn't a real bad loss, except it was to our rival and hurt like hell." Michigan is a good team now and there's no shame in losing. Still, Mike of the Little Brother Blog writes "The Spartans Need Their Swagger, Toughness Back" With Purdue coming to town at 14-5, he's absolutely right. If the men drop three in a row this golden start to a season where not much was expected is going to start looking much less impressive.

MSU Women's Hoops

The Lady Spartans lost a tough one to Ohio State this past weekend 64-56. They fell to 12-6 and (4-1) in the Big Ten. They take on Minnesota(10-9)(2-3) tonight and Purdue(15-3)(5-0) on Monday. With an RPI of 78 they need to need to have a strong finish to make the tourney this spring.

MSU Hockey 

MSU Hockey had an Overtime win and a Win over Northern Michigan this past weekend. They improved to 12-9-3 on the season and their rating bounced up to 16th overall. They take on 19th ranked Lake Superior State on Friday and Saturday night at Munn. As I said last week Anastos' improvement of the Hockey team would be one of the biggest stories in college sports of College Hockey was a sport people got excited about.

Have a good weekend everyone!

The Week in Review for Jan 12, 2012

So last week after the Outback/Arnett/Worthy/Narduzzi/Baker drama, I had wished for some quiet time in MSU sports. That is exactly what happened, and now begins the long hard winter of recruiting and that's pretty much it until Spring Ball. Basketball coverage to be spotty, as I've said many times before, The Only Colors does a much better job. The Week in Review will be a staple during the football lean times until we begin quenching our thirst for football roundabout August.

Johnny Adams

Johnny Adams tweeted to some very happy Spartan fans, "Back in East Lansing for my senior year!!!!!". You can tell he's excited about this because there are five exclamation points at the end. He also wears the number 5. He only had 3 picks this year, maybe next year he gets...5?

Johnny Adams might have saved himself from another five by staying. This five is the fifth round, which is about as high as I could see him being taken at this point. Best of luck to him in the upcoming year, I forsee him bolstering his draft position with a healthy 2012.

Fran Is Real Mad About Something, Maybe Being Named Fran?

Image courtesy of Sports From a Spartan

Fran McCaffery got SUHper pissed and threw a chair in Iowa's loss at Michigan State on Tuesday night. Iowa's 95-61 demolition felt like a throwback to the early 2000's. Indeed, the last time MSU recorded fifteen straight wins was the 2000-2001 season. This was I'm sure in part aided, by Tom's mild rebuke of the Izzone after the old folks showed them how it's done over the holidays.

This rebuke came after a bit of a row about how the Izzone is too involved with their phone during the games and not involved enough with the game. So Hollis celebrated this rebuke, by texting during the game on Tuesday night. Also, why rebuke them prior to the Iowa game. Shouldn't that have been saved for a good opponent?

Speaking of Hollis, You Should Know

Are you a wealthy alumni who has money to spend on going to interestingly located sporting events? No? Are you wealthy? No? Hm. Do you love Michigan State and know someone who is wealthy? Maybe? Ok, then we're finally getting somewhere. There have been more solid rumors recently of a MSU vs. (THAT) USC Basketball game in Greece and a hockey game on an aircraft carrier.

I love what Mark Hollis is doing right now. Make no mistake about it, the recent increased success of MSU Women's Hoops and Football is due in part to Hollis' incredible effort to market and be a champion of Michigan State sports. All while being the lowest paid athletic director of public record in the Big Ten.The man has done and will continue to do great things for Michigan State Athletics. Do you sense a but coming? You should.

I can't say I agree with all of these gimmick games though. Don't get me wrong, they're amazing, increase visibility for the school, attract potential recruits, etc. The athletic department turns a profit, so I shouldn't complain. However, for my own part, don't oversqueeze your fans, students and alumni to support these once-in-a-lifetime events that could start to happen every year. Have these events often enough that they are a part of the MSU brand, but not so often they aren't a once-in-a-lifetime event anymore.

MSU Hockey

At Munn Arena an amazing thing has happened. Michigan State's very own version of Rich Rodriguez has been exorcised in Rick Comley and replaced by Tom Anastos. For a brief backstory, when Anastos was hired the non-MSU blogger consensus was that Hollis had given up on hockey and that if you wanted to talk hockey, you best go find Ron Mason at the Blue Gill Grill on a Saturday night.

All he's done since coming to MSU is knock off three teams in the top 20 and field an 11-9-2 squad. MSU is coming off a three game skid and looks to get their swerve back against #20 Northern this weekend. I've not yet made it out to a hockey game yet this year, but I think it's going to be a must before the season is out. He has the Spartans ranked 18th and is positioning hockey to improve itself the same way Football has under Dantonio.

Other MSU Bullets

• Nick Hill wants you to know he's a Spartan for life. Photo courtesy of Chris Vannini's Green Thoughts. I'm pretty sure that sets the record for most manly tattoo on the Spartan football team ever.
• MSU Wrestling takes on West Virginia and Indiana this weekend in the hopes of getting back above .500
• Women's hoops plays on Sunday afternoon and looks to continue their undefeated big ten season. After their 67-47 win tonight, they are 4-0 in the early Big Ten Season and could improve to 5-0 with a win against Ohio State on Sunday.

MSU: The Week In Review

So um, kind of a lot happened this week in MSU football. In case you have forgotten, MSU won it's first bowl game under Mark Dantonio. It helps when MSU isn't playing the top QB in the NFL draft, with a lost WR corps or four first round defensive draft picks from Alabama. Still, the Spartans needed a monster defensive game, some excellent special teams play and even a bit of luck to cut the cake against Georgia. Georgia is a very good and very young team, and I'd like to avoid playing the 2012 and maybe even the 2013 version of this team.

I said in the postgame write-up and will reiterate here, this game was MSU's season in a nutshell. You had the "road game blues" where the offense couldn't do anything, you had the "Spartan Domination" on offense in the 3rd and 4th quarter, where MSU scored 27 points in the second half to turn the corner. Special teams played well when it counted and the defense, oh, the defense. Thank you. This season wouldn't have been possible without our amazing defense.

I'll be rewatching this game over the weekend and with the help of Ty doing a bit of film review. That should be fun for next week.

Badgerfreude and a tiny bit about Basketball

MSU notched it's first victory at the Kohl's Center since 2001 on Tuesday night. The Badgers had their clocks out of sync and the scoreboard clock expired before the stadium clock. The refs reviewed and decided the Wisconsin player had not gotten the shot off in time. Bo Ryan summoned his rage. He called the refs falcons. He ranted "Falcon, you falconing Mister Falcons!"

Bielema can't tell time. I've decided this is the only way the clock management of a Big Ten Head Coach could be so poor. He called a timeout on 1st and 10 in the third quarter. A timeout that would have been useful with :02 seconds to go in the Rose Bowl when you'll have a shot at the end zone from the 28. Honest to goodness, he really needs to work on this in the offseason.

Perhaps, and this is just me spitballing, they wrote a clause into his Rose Bowl bonus where the bonus is only activated if he runs the shot clock at the following night's men's hoops game. You know, for funsies. All of this clock mismanagement couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys.

DeAnthony Arnett

DeAnthony Arnett received his release from Tennessee and will transfer to Michigan State University. Between Arnett and 2012 WR commit Aaron Burbridge, this marks the second year in a row MSU will have the top WR commit in the midwest committed to play for the green and white. I'm currently projecting Arnett as a slot receiver and the heir apparent to Keshawn Martin at the position. Whether he will run all of the fancified trick plays is a different discussion altogether. This is a huge pickup for the Spartans and can only help Maxwell's transition into Cousins job next year.

Jerel Worthy

Worthy announced his plans to forgo his senior season and declare for the NFL draft. Worthy is a projected first rounder and it would be a gamble for him to pass up that kind of money. There are a host of potential DTs ready to step into his place, but his impact will be sorely missed next year. Players leaving early for the NFL is a great thing for Michigan State. Be happy for him. His mom Stephanie made it quite clear Jerel will finish his degree or else... A great situation all around.

Pat Narduzzi

Pat Narduzzi has interviewed for the DC position at Texas A&M and will be offered the job at a rate of pay between 600 - 750k. As I said yesterday, this is not a positive thing for MSU. Coaches leaving for Head Coaching jobs is a great thing, coaches leaving for lateral promotions is not. The fan reactions have ranged from fury to apathy to congratulations. No decision has yet been reached on the part of Narduzzi nor has an apparent public counter-offer been made by Michigan State.

I suspect this will be over by the end of the weekend, maybe even Friday. If MSU loses Narduzzi, expect some upset fans. I just hope these same fans don't complain when ticket prices go up to support the coaching staff in the future. If MSU keeps Narduzzi, it'll probably only be for a couple years until he finds a quality head coaching gig.

Bonus Conspiracy Theory

Narduzzi was "scheduled" to receive a raise to 305k per Hondo in February. Narduzzi withdrew his name from consideration for the Akron gig. Treadwell is making 450 or so at Miami-OH, so one would expect that Akron would be shopping in that price range too. To me this all adds up to the reported 305k actually being higher than that. 2/3rds of a potential salary doesn't seem low enough to cause Narduzzi to say no.

In Review

That Outback Bowl feels like it was a LONG time ago now. MSU had some of it's biggest successes of the Dantonio era and was immediately forced to begin defending it's newfound success. The choices made regarding Narduzzi will help demonstrate how committed MSU is to paying the money necessary to retain an excellent coaching staff. It's a game of inches as Dantonio always says, and MSU needs to win the next couple days to help secure more of these first world problems for 2012.