EAST LANSING - Mark Dantonio once said he has a black mark on his soul for the University of Michigan.
Dantonio is older and maybe a little more calm these days, and should be secure in his standing as a legendary head coach at Michigan State University, but that black mark probably hasn’t faded.
The black mark has been passed down to the current Spartans who will renew hostilities with Michigan at noon on Saturday at Spartan Stadium.
Dantonio said nice things earlier this week about Michigan and the level of sportsmanship the Wolverines have played with in his team’s three meetings since Jim Harbaugh became head coach. But the fighting side of Dantonio is perked up a few notches this week, as is the case every year. A good clean fight, that’s what Dantonio’s players usually wage. And that’s what his players usually succeed in delivering.
“I think it's just who he is as a person, his demeanor,” senior safety Khari Willis said, when asked if there is anything about Dantonio’s personality that has enabled him to win eight of the last 10 meetings in this series. “He tells us what we need to do and how we need to prepare ourselves. I feel like we're up; we're geared up for this game.”
Michigan State enters with a 4-2 record, ranked No. 24 in the nation, back in the rankings after upsetting No. 8 Penn State.
Michigan is 6-1, ranked No. 6 after beating Wisconsin last weekend.
A six game win streak against Western Michigan, SMU, Nebraska, Northwestern, Maryland and Wisconsin has Michigan observers talking about a path to the National Championship.
This from a program that hasn’t won a Big Ten title since 2004. Since that time, Ohio State has won it seven times; Penn State, Michigan State and Wisconsin have each won it three times.
The freshmen who will play on Saturday were barely out of diapers the last time Michigan won the Big Ten. That’s the Big Ten championship, not the National Championship. Michigan hasn’t won an outright National Championship in 70 years. That’s one fewer than BYU. There’s no shame in that, unless your program claims to be the best in the sport’s history.
Michigan hasn’t beaten a ranked team on the road in more than 11 years. That’s 0-17 since 2006. That’s failure of Detroit Lions proportions.
But Michigan beats Wisconsin and, hey, prepare for that trip to the White House. They enjoy trips, you know.
No other fanbase or media corps should be more cautiously pessimistic than Michigan’s. Yet they return every year, boasting expectedly, like Linus in the pumpkin patch.
Michigan battled back from a 17-0 deficit to beat Northwestern, a team which beat Michigan State. No one is mapping out paths for Michigan State to do anything, except possibly win another one of these games on Saturday - and that’s probably why Dantonio usually wins this game.
BIG TALK
Michigan State made its three captains available for interviews on Tuesday. No one else was allowed to talk. There are worries that players might say what they really think.
When junior linebacker Joe Bachie was asked if there is anything different about Michigan’s offense compared to past years, he said: “Obviously they have a highly-rated quarterback over there and I don't think they have had one past couple years since I've been here. There's big talk about him.”
The quarterback is Shea Patterson, a transfer from Ole Miss. If you live in this state, you may have heard about him during the summer. And heard about him. And heard about him. And heard about him.
“Their offense is good,” Bachie said. “They are talking highly of their o-line. It's an exciting game, rivalry game. We'll be ready for it.”
Senior safety Khari Willis had a similar take.
“They think real highly of their quarterback,” Willis said. “One of the things he brings that maybe they didn't have in the past is ability to run and make plays with his legs. They still like to do some of the similar things and they will have some pieces out on the edge, as well. It's going to be a challenge but one that we're looking forward to definitely.
“O-line, like Joe said, they talk highly of those guys, as well."
Who is “they”? Who is doing the talking they speak of?
They didn’t say.
Where is the talking taking place? Probably the pumpkin patch.
You can criticize Michigan State players for being aware of the talk. But they kind of enjoy the resistance. It helps implant the defiant chip on the shoulder that the Spartans speak of during most years when the team is good.
They didn’t have the chip earlier this year, which coincided with heavy injuries on the offensive side of the ball, and some drab performances. They say the chip is back.
“We play better when we have the chip on the shoulder,” Felton Davis said after the Penn State game. “That’s actually how we like it sometimes.”
No one thought Michigan State could beat Penn State last week. Willis used the doubters to his advantage. He handed out poker chips to his teammates, asked them to bring their chips to the locker room at Beaver Stadium, and slam them down on a table, on chairs, on the bench, anywhere for emphatic impact.
“It's definitely a mentality we took last year," Willis said. "And with the adversity we faced this year, we needed to get back to that type of mindset. That's been part of the program since I got here."
It works for them.
“If people want to doubt us,” Davis said, “keep doing it.”
Michigan State has been messy most of the year. But in every game, there have been flashes of excellence, beginning with the run defense.
If you have a good run defense, it sets the foundation to beat a lot of teams.
On Saturday at Penn State, the pass defense was sound and correct for four quarters, for the first time. The o-line was functional. The combination made Michigan State difficult to beat. Penn State couldn’t finish the job.
Next, the Michigan State wide receivers need to provide help for Davis. I counted seven catchable balls that fell to the grass at Penn State last weekend. Not all of them were easy catches, but Michigan State receivers are not finishing the 50-50 balls. With Cody White, Darrell Stewart and Jalen Nailorout last week due to injuries, the replacements seemed to need 70-30 balls, or better, in order to finish catches.
Saturday’s game ended with Davis in severe hip pain. Final-drive hero Laress Nelson was helped to the sideline after his lower right leg was rolled up on while making a catch in the final minute. That injury looked serious.
Brandon Sowards, a walk-on, struggled at wide receiver in the first half against Penn State. He got wrenched while returning a punt early in the second half. He didn’t return to the game.
Nailor has been out since the Indiana game.
Nailor, Stewart, Sowards, Nelson? Will those receivers play in this game? We don't know. White definitely will not play. Wide receiver availability is a problem.
“I would be out there, and I wouldn't even know what group of receivers was coming out there,” Lewerke said. “I just had to figure it out in the huddle.”
Who’s left? Cam Chambers? He injured his hand while making a catch in the first quarter. He went into the locker room for examinations. X-rays must have been negative, because they wrapped up his hand and sent him back onto the field.
In the third quarter, a pass bounced off his bad, wrapped hand, was intercepted and nearly returned for a pick-six.
Dantonio isn’t talking about injuries. We’re left wondering whether Chambers will be able to play this weekend. Michigan State needs him, hand wrapped or not.
In order to win this game, Michigan State will at some point need to incorporate the pass game, throwing to receivers whose names we might not know. And they’ll have to do it against perhaps the best pass defense in the country.
That’s the most difficult, dangerous matchup of the game for Michigan State. The Spartans must navigate it without making the big mistake.
The rest of it? Michigan State is capable of handling it. Michigan State can contain the Michigan run game, if not stuff it entirely.
Michigan State’s defensive back seven stopped a Heisman Trophy candidate QB last week. They limited Trace McSorley through the air and halted his designed keepers and freelance runs.
Patterson is an effective passer when on the move, or when quick pass-game routes are table-set for him.
When Patterson has to drop and read from the pocket on third-and-six or longer, he struggles, sometimes dangerously. That’s where Michigan State needs to get him, and keep him there. Stopping the run is the first step toward that end.
GET OVER YOURSELVES
Michigan was one dropped interception away from losing at Northwestern, which would have caused an apocalyptic meltdown. Michigan State was one dropped interception away from losing at Penn State. Neither of these teams is great.
But the matchup is great. The contrast is great.
In East Lansing, they know the Spartans are pretty good at times, have been wobbled by injuries, and have flaws to fix.
In Ann Arbor, they’re talking National Championships in the pumpkin patch.
At Michigan State, a 10-10 tie against Notre Dame in 1966 is revered as The Game of the Century. Notre Dame played for the tie at the end. Michigan State accepted it, shook hands.
At Michigan, a 10-10 tie in 1973 with Ohio State is regarded as a ripoff. Michigan fans still complain that they should have gone to the Rose Bowl that year. Instead, a vote of Big Ten athletic directors selected Ohio State.
Michigan angrily feels their team deserved to go to the Rose Bowl. Okay, so tell me why Ohio State didn’t deserve it?
Ohio State finished with the same record as Michigan, and played to a tie at Michigan.
Why didn’t Ohio State deserve the Rose Bowl bid? Why is Michigan still complaining about it 45 years later?
Only Michigan is self-absorbed enough to feel that a tie should go to the whiners.
I don’t hate the Michigan coaches. I don’t hate the Michigan players. I hate the circus. I don’t like the clowns, the carnival barkers or the bearded ladies.
If Ole Mich beats Michigan State, their players will boast that L.J. Scott referred to the Wolverines as MSU’s “little sister” at Big Ten Media Days in Chicago, in July.
Scott isn’t likely to play in this game. He didn’t play against Michigan last year, so his choice of words in Chicago was silly. But the words will be remembered by Michigan players after the game, but only if Michigan wins. The Michigan brand loves to portray its program as the big, strong, benevolent good-guy who only gets rankled for heavy-handed retribution when someone disrespects them. Their fans love the fairy tale, no matter how many times it's been read to them at bed time.
They played this card after beating winless Nebraska in September. Coaches reminded Wolverine players during the practice week that Nebraska coach Scott Frost claimed his Central Florida team out-hit the Wolverines when UCF lost to Michigan in 2016.
I don’t think any of the Michigan players talked about Frost’s words prior to the Nebraska game. But afterward, Michigan players gleefully talked about getting some sort of revenge on Frost due to the way he apparently hurt their feelings or challenged their manhood a couple of years earlier.
It made for swell carnival barking. Of course none of the Cornhusker players had anything to do with what happened in 2016.
Actual revenge could have come only if Michigan’s players from last year’s 8-5 team had played against Frost’s Central Florida team of a year ago, the one that went 13-0 and beat Auburn in the Peach Bowl. Yeah, I don’t think that would have went well for the Wolverines. Frost's Central Florida team would have beaten Michigan by three touchdowns. So it’s best they picked their battle and sought revenge on the winless Huskers, feeling so accomplished afterward.
Whether or not L.J. Scott plays in this game, the good-guy rhetoric is set for the post-game press conferences, if Ole Mich wins. If Michigan doesn't win, the carnival barkers will look for a bad call, or a questionable hit that proves Michigan State is unholy.
It's all so predictable and juvenile.
Michigan State players are driven to keep them quiet.
“We are going to prepare for these guys with everything we've got,” Bachie said. “You've got to bring your best to this game. You have to prepare that way.”
This year, the carnival barkers are forwarding a new angle. The only reason Michigan State has had success with Michigan in the past decade, they say, is due to the fact that Michigan State places more emphasis on this game than Michigan.
“Michigan State makes this game their Super Bowl,” is a refrain we’ve heard a few times this week.
That might be the stupidest thing I’ve ever heard in my life.
That’s like telling your neighbor, “Well, the only reason your lawn looks good is because you mow it. And fertilize it. And use an edger.”
So is Michigan State supposed to meet Michigan halfway and make this game about which team can win while trying the least?
And then while having a contest to see which team can win while trying the least, let’s see which team can do it while on a crowned field in the rain with bad officiating and faulty time keepers. Anything to curtail credit from Michigan State and keep the pumpkin patch plowed for next year.
And people wonder why Michigan State players love winning this game so much.
The Spartans make no apologies for placing high emphasis on it.
“We're going to come out of this game and we're going to prepare with everything,” Bachie said, “and we're going for it all.”
The black mark never graduates.
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