College GameDay: They've already come to our City

This morning College GameDay is in town for the fifth time. We already know you're going and we already know it will be amazing. Kirk Herbstreit agrees, "Anytime we can come back to the Big Ten region and get into this cool air, I'm a huge fan... we hope people will come out and join the hyped up scene we have around GameDay." Not enough? Today marks Lee Corso's 200th headgear selection. He picked MSU in 1999 when MSU beat Michigan.

You can get involved by getting up early tomorrow and heading down to campus. Parking will open in the Comm Arts ramp at 6:30 a.m. If you intend on being in the first few rows, you'll want to be there a couple hours before GameDay airs from 9 to noon. Parking for students can be done, but it will involve a trip using the old Airwalks.

As fans, we don't often get to directly influence the course of anything for team we bleed green and white for. In home games, we might draw a false start or cause the opposing team to take a timeout. In away games depending on the place, we might get pelted by batteries or into a fight in the stands or even in the case of Northwestern set up a home like atmosphere. Largely, the game happens outside of us, we just get to show up and watch.

However, this is different. Desmond Howard unintentionally threw down the gauntlet. When asked "What do you expect tomorrow?" he answered, "We've had some fantastic crowds, Ann Arbor, Tallahassee, Morgantown and since we're back on campus we'd like to keep that trend of fantastic crowds." This is something we can show up and represent MSU with lots of Spartan Pride and give them a crowd to remember.

Friday Morning Youtubin'!: Wisconsin

ESPN College GameDay: Built by Home Depot, Conquered by Michigan State Spartans

You are going to be on ESPN.

You’re reading this; you know where you’re going. Early Saturday morning, you’ll swathe yourself in Green and White and drive to campus. You’ll wait until 6:00 am, when they’ll let you park in the Trowbridge ramp for $15. You’ll proceed to Munn Field, which will be opened for you (and thousands of your closest friends) at 7:00. Two hours later, the football-watching world will see you piped into their home—and the strength of our numbers.

Last time ESPN College Gameday came to Michigan State, it was 2005. The Spartans were a miserable 5-5. GameDay was not there to witness a clash of titans; they were there to crown Penn State.

This season, ESPN is putting Michigan State on the biggest possible stage. We’re playing for extraordinarily high stakes. We’ll host the Wisconsin Badgers, the usurpers of our rightful 2010 Rose Bowl berth. As you know, MSU is 5-1 and the Badgers are 6-0; both teams are undefeated in-conference. A win would put either school in the driver’s seat to win their B1G division.

Last week, Jim wrote eloquently about the Little Brother mentality. It’s clear that the team has overcome this complex, but have the fans? Saturday will be the true test.

Everyone even casually associated with Michigan State understands the importance of the Michigan rivalry; campus was saturated with fans last week. But do we really play a one-game season, in fans’ minds? Has the team already accomplished everything fans hungered for?

Us Michigan State fans have always held the great teams of Biggie Munn and Duffy Daugherty dear. We’ve been raised to believe our rightful place in the NCAA hierarchy is at or near the top; we should perennially compete for Rose Bowl berths and occasionally be amongst the best in the land.

The reality’s been different.

The other day, my family went to our dentist. In his hallway, he’s hung a matted and framed aerial photo of the 1988 Rose Bowl. My son eagerly asked questions about it; while answering I heard myself say I was his big sister’s age—seven years old—the last time MSU played in Pasadena.

Last season was very nearly Michigan State’s triumphant return to the top of the Big Ten food chain; this game and the next could right 2010’s wrong. It’s no secret the Marks Dantonio and Hollis aim to elevate Michigan State football back to its lofty historical perch. Part of that means not being satisfied with a winning record, a bowl berth, and beating Michigan. Part of being a perennial conference contender and occasional national contender is understanding the stakes for which our Spartans play.

This game, against this opponent, with each team’s respective records, and a national prime time audience, should be importance enough. Spending all day and all night tailgating before showing up in droves would normally be fine. But Spartan fans have an incredible opportunity to show that not only our team is ready for the national stage, but our school, program, and fans are too.

Really, this is all wasted effort on my part. I don’t know why I’m writing to you. I don’t know why I’m preaching to the choir. You’ll be there. You’ll be wearing your colors and screaming in and out of commercial breaks and you’ll cheer your brains out when the 200th piece of mascot headgear Lee Corso ever dons is a Sparty head.

Don’t worry, I didn’t mean to harangue you, proud and loyal Spartan.

I’m talking to everyone else.

The Expectations Heaped Upon Izzo By Rankings

Basketball isn't totally my thing. I love watching our team and I've always said that if Izzo shot someone at midcourt during a basketball game he wouldn't get in trouble until he did it the second time. Some of my fondest MSU memories are of attending MSU hoops games. I knew I was on the right track with my wife when she started talking about playing inside/outside ball and preaching why Izzo should play zone instead of man.

However, as I started out saying, I'm happy to watch basketball passively instead of critically and it's for that reason I'm starting out with the disclaimer right now. If you want cogent or frequent basketball analysis this isn't going to be the place for it. If that's what you want and you're not already reading The Only Colors you should be. They do work. That said, on with the show.

Here comes the rain, the cold, the yuck. Where football season and tailgating starts to get a bit raw, where you come home from every game and changing back into just a shirt after wearing seven clothes makes you feel like you lost 20 lbs in seconds. As I sit and write, it's pouring cats and dogs outside and there's 25 mph winds. This is normally the time of year I pick up a Sports Illustrated and see MSU B-ball is ranked in the top 5.

This year though, Izzo enters the season ranked 28th in the Coaches Poll which isn't even really ranked. He suffered the loss of Delvon Roe several weeks ago, Korie Lucious & Garrick Sherman last season, Chris Allen the offseason before that. We graduated Kalin Lucas, Durrell Summers and Mike Kebler. We've lost six players since last year that contributed significant minutes to our 2010 MSU basketball team.

This might be the best thing to revitalize MSU basketball in a long time. What's Izzo ranked today? He isn't. He opens against #1 UNC and follows that up that by playing #6 Duke. So even if he opens 0-2 then he's still not ranked, he mulligans and he starts over. Can't lose there, you're playing with house money. He's going to be rotating in freshmen this year and lots of them. He has young players in Payne, Appling and Nix who have experience playing, but are far from savvy veterans.

He basically gets to blow up the team and start over with young, inexperienced and most importantly talented players that are malleable. A coaches dream for winning championships in the future. Who's gonna help old Tom whip this whippersnappers into shape? Draymond Green.

I've called Draymond Green in the past the Drew Stanton of Michigan State Basketball. He can do it all and sometimes does things a person would never think to do usually good, occasionally bad. He is tough, he works hard, he's a good kid and he can flat out ball. He manages to be a shining star of the team while still putting the team first. He's exactly what you want to teach all of the young pups to be and this is his team.

This is the first year in quite sometime Izzo has been freed of top 10 expectations by writers who forget that Izzo is brilliant in March and is still learning his guys in November. Izzo is free to experiment, to build, to have more teaching moments than usual. This is a year where if MSU basketball finishes in the top 3 of the Big 10 it's a joy, not an expectation. With reasonable expectations, this could be a great year for MSU basketball.

Game Preview: Wisconsin

It's fourth and goal from the one. The Badgers have stopped us on three consecutive attempts into the end zone. We line up in the Power I and Cousins hands off to Caper, except he doesn't. B.J. Cunningham jogs past the defense and into the back of the end zone where Cousins lofts the ball gently into his hands. The Spartans take the lead 34-24 with 2:45 seconds left to go.

Here's another one

Michigan State marches down the field but they're out of timeouts. They march all the way down to the 23 and get a first down with 11 seconds to go. THe hurricane kick unit comes out and it's gonna be close and HOLY CRAP AND A!!!!!!!!

Timeout

Timeout? To ice the kicker? It's totally icing the kicker to call timeout instead of making him rush through a field goal. Except that it's not, it's giving him a chance to relax and go through his normal routine.

Noticing a trend yet, if not, allow me to convince you

Bielema is 14-10 on the road and 10-10 in the Big Ten in road games. His record against top 25 road teams is 2-3(to be fair, I'd bet most coaches aren't better on the road). The Big Ten road teams he beats Iowa, Purdue, Minny and one at Michigan. The ones he loses to OSU, PSU, MSU, Michigan, Illinois and Northwestern. So loses to quality opponents, beats easy ones. Check.

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Wisconsin's Passing Attack vs MSU Pass Defense

Well, Wisconsin's passing attack is led by Russell Wilson. In case you've been living under a Big Ten rock for the past three or four months, he transferred from NC State after deciding he wanted to play for an actual football team. This season he's been 95 of 128 for 14 TD's and a pick. On top of being the Playstation champion of the Big Ten so far, his pocket presence is amazing. During the Nebraska game, I watched him look in the pass rush, both Defensive Ends got good penetration, he simply stepped about eight inches to the right to avoid the defenders looking downfield and fired a pass 20 yards downfield for a first down. So 74 percent completion rating, 14 to 1 TD-INT ratio and amazing pocket presence. We're probably screwed, I'd guess.

Except.

You know, our pass rush isn't too damn bad. You might even say after turning in 16 sacks the last two games, they're pretty damn good. You might even go on to say that there were probably another 5-10 times only the speed of Denard Robinson or Braxton Miller got them away from said sack. Further, Michigan State has eight interceptions on the season, three of which have been returned for touchdowns.

Of course, there is the matter of Will Gholston. He's been beastly in the past two games, maybe even a little too beastly. Simply put, you can't punch a dude, no matter what. I don't expect him to play in this game, nor do I think he should and that sucks.

Advantage: Push(slight lean Wisconsin)

Wisconsin Rushing Attack vs. MSU Run Defense

Wisconsin brings in the seventh ranked rushing offense in the country. The running backs James White and Montee Ball have combined for 25 TDs this season. That's a lot of damn TDs. The rushing game is averaging 29.2 points per game. MSU's total offense is averaging 28 points per game. Their rushing attack is fierce and real.

By contrast MSU's Rushing Defense is averaging giving up 67 yards a carry and has surrendered three touchdowns on the year so far. They have yet to play a rushing offense as strong as Wisconsin's and won't play one again this year. Again, this is a match-up of strength on strength.

Last year MSU held Wisconsin 80 yards below their average on the year for rushing. This year they held Michigan 150 yards below season average, OSU 140 yards below average and even in their loss held ND 80 yards below season average.

Advantage: Push

MSU Passing Attack vs Wisconsin Pass Defense

Wisconsin brings in the fourth ranked pass defense allowing only 146 yards per game with seven interceptions on the year. They have 14 sacks on the year and are absolutely for real. That's stingy.

Cousins has his work cut out for him this week. Last year he played one of the best games of the season going 20 of 29 for 269, 3 TD's and 2 picks. He will need to play that sort of game this week and probably even better for MSU to have a chance at winning. Keshawn Martin will need to build on the success he had during the Michigan game(maybe even avoid fumbling in the open field). It might even be nice to start working our TE's back into the passing game. Cousins will need lots of receiving options on easy routes to take advantage of this Wisconsin pass defense.

Advantage: Wisconsin

MSU Rushing Attack vs Wisconsin Rush Defense

Wisconsin brings in the 42nd ranked rushing defense which is decent, but not impressive. If you consider their best rushing opponent Nebraska tossed up 159 yards on them that looks impressive, until you realize that's 95 yards below their season average.

On the other hand MSU's rushing attack was pretty anemic until last week. They'll need to play another pitch perfect game to take advantage of the Wisconsin defense. Like Michigan, Wisconsin has looked softer on the edges than in the middle which means expect heavy doses of Baker with a bit of Bell sprinkled in for good measure.

Advantage: Wisconsin

Coaching

You didn't think I walked through all the Bielema road-fail so that I could pick him in this section did you?

Advantage: MSU

Overall: Wisconsin is heavily favored in this game and they should be on paper. Statistically, they have the upper hand in almost every category. Still Wisconsin has not yet played an away game and the only quality opponent they've played is a Nebraska team that in my opinion is overrated. They look like Tarzan, but they've only played Jane so far. The Evidence says: 38-21 Wisconsin. THe What-If-Bielema-Choke-You-Always-Play-Cupcakes-And-Have-A-Crappy-Career-Road-Record says: 20-17 MSU.

Let's go with the What-If-Bielema-Choke-You-Always-Play-Cupcakes-And-Have-A-Crappy-Career-Road-Record on this one.

20-17 MSU.

Bonus: Ty and I have been invited to attend a meet and greet with the GameDay crew on Friday afternoon. If you have any questions you want us to ask, leave them in the comments and we will demand answers or #OccupyHerbstreit.

MSU Defense: The Fountain of Youth

There's a second part coming to this post. When, you ask, well I guess you'll just have to wonder about that. Probably next week.

As I was driving home from Saturday's game, I got Chris Vannini's tweet saying that the D-Line two games into the conference season has sacked the opponent's QB a total of 16 times. That's more than most of the NCAA has for the whole season in case you're keeping track at home. They held another strong offense 200 yards below their season average and had a pick six. Simply put, they are good. Like the first time you saw Jurassic Park good.

What was absolutely kicks me in the junk about this defense is how young they are. As Jamie Mac of the Just Cover Blog pointed out, seven of our defensive starters this year are from the class of 2010. (I would argue that Pickelman is more of a starter than Rashad White, but that doesn't really detract from the point.) The point is our defense is stupid young.

After a seasonal defensive performance the likes of which I haven't ever seen, at the end of 2011 we will definitely lose Trenton Robinson, Kevin Pickelman and more than likely lose Jerel Worthy. At the end of 2012 we'll get dinged some more when we lose Johnny Adams, Rashad White and Chris Norman. Here's the amazing thing folks, in 2013, the following players will still be at the positions they're playing today: Marcus Rush, Will Gholston, Denicos Allen, Max Bullough, Darqueze Dennard and Isaiah Lewis. Gholston may go pro, but eh, he's has to settle down some first.

In the class of 2010 we have a few other players who are seeing significant minutes. Kurtis Drummond has been seeing lots of time as our nickel back in our third down package. Tony Lippett has been tabbed as the next two-way player at MSU. Jeremy Langford seems to have found a home at corner grabbing a pick-six against FAU and looks to try and move up the depth chart from there.

We have managed to redshirt the entire class of 2011 save one, Taiwan Jones. Taiwan Jones is a manchild at 6'3" and 234 and has spent his freshman year so far destroying people on kick returns. So in 2011, we're redshirting three LB's, two CB's, 3-4 DT's depending on what position Brandon Clemons ends up at and 2 DE's. It's difficult to expound on how GOOD they'll all be because we haven't seen any of them play. However, ratings, we got 'em. All three and four star kids. I really thought coming into this season that redshirting all but one member of the 2011 class meant that our class needed seasoning, but what's obvious only now is that why bother burning eligibility when you can sit everyone and have them gain more experience?

It's beyond difficult to look at this current defense and not start thinking about if Dantonio has finally got his pieces into place to build the Championship Defense Dantonio has wanted since he came to town in 2006. We are young, we are kicking ass and with redshirting almost our entire defensive class we are going to be as good or better next year. If in 2012 we find ourselves in a position to ask ourselves if our defense is any good or not, it should be a pretty simple question to answer. We can just ask any of the nine returning starters from 2011.

MSU - Michigan: Saturday Night Takeaway

Well, I honestly had no idea what to expect going into this game. The game could have turned on so many points. If Mattison gets the blitz home, if Denard can Denard us, if Cousins shows up as 18 of 22 for 240 and 2 TD's or if Cousins shows up as 11 of 29 for a TD and 3 picks, if our O-Line is crap, if they can't stop the run. Nothing about either team seemed definite enough to base a real solid prediction, but, we tried anyway, because that's what you do when you have a football blog.

The Good

- Our defense is outstanding. They have made sixteen sacks in the first two games of the Big Ten season. MSU still has to face a real solid passing quarterback yet, but this defense has IT. Whatever the hell IT is.

- No sacks surrendered by our Offensive Line. This seems like it's one part adjusting the playbook for quick passes, one part that our Offensive Line is improving. The Offensive Line deserves a shout-out for this. Yes, they need work, but jeez they've stepped up to the challenge so far.

- Sadler may not have the booming leg or the Hagerup coffin corner thing down, but damn if he isn't efficient and he is already playing heady football. The Craig Jarrett Supertoe will come.

- Edwin Baker was found in East Lansing today. Apparently, he had been suiting up for MSU all along? His rushing total of 167 was more than his last four games put together. He did a great job busting the outside runs.

- Keshawn Martin got 3 catches for 31 yards and had some killer blocks in this game. I don't remember him ever being a run blocker of any import, but apparently, he can get the job done when it's time.

- Congrats to Keshawn Martin and Trenton Robinson. These two players will never know the sting of a loss to Michigan. Congrats to the rest of the redshirt senior class.

- I thought that Brady Hoke and his players comments were classy. In a game where we had a lot of thug-ish type penalties, Hoke and his players were complimentary of MSU, each other and gracious in defeat.

The Bad

- Seriously, WTF with the penalties? I understand they're might be a tiny element of intimidation with all of the roughness and I want to see big hits too, but if we were playing a team that was successful in captalizing on those sorts of errors, we'd have lost big. We're VERY lucky those penalties didn't come back to haunt us.

- It was very windy today, so obviously that's the reason we had two open-field fumbles and no interceptions. Baker had one and I think Martin had the other, I had a bad line of sight on that one. To assume Martin had an end around though is generally considered acceptable practice. I have no idea what that was about though.

The Ugly

- Kirk Cousins, 13/24 for 120 and 2 TDs with no picks. That's ugly.

The Takeaway

Our defense is talented, young and kind of stupid. I really hope we can hang onto Narduzzi after this year although, I'm mildly skeptical at this point. This defense is stupid good and Duzzer is gonna get some phone calls. Young and talented will help us vs. Wisky. Stupid will kill us. As obvious as the sun will come up tomorrow something has to be done about those penalties.

Michigan's defense was improved and will continue to improve. I think they will be a bit in flux for the next couple of seasons their D will continue to improve, their O will probably tail off a bit and then build back up. The D will improve because they will continue to get better players each year in the positions. The O will struggle as they make the transition from spread and shred over to MANBALL. I think in 2-4 years they'll be consistently back to playing pro-style offense and power defense.

While I'm enjoying this run of victory and will certainly have these words thrown back in my face the first time we lose, I look forward to making sure Hoke has his pieces in place and that we have ours. When our rivalry game can be about who played the best game and not who limited mistakes most effectively, those should be games that will fuel the rivalry for years to come.

Finally, HOLY SHIT THAT WAS AN AWESOME WIN!