It's been a tempestuous week-plus for the Michigan State football program. Following the suspension of head coach Mel Tucker without pay on Sept. 10, due to sexual harassment allegations, the Spartans were thoroughly dominated on the field at home on Saturday. Washington defeated Michigan State by a final score of 41-7.

Then, on Monday, MSU served notice of intent to Tucker that it will be terminating its employment agreement with him, effective. Sept. 26.

All of that is obviously a lot to deal with for the program's current coaches, players and support staff. Acting head coach Harlon Barnett spoke to the media on Tuesday and gave an update on the current mindset of the team, while also previewing Michigan State's homecoming game versus Maryland on Saturday (3:30 p.m. Eastern Time on NBC).

"We have, really, another big game here, homecoming, coming on Saturday," Barnett said in his opening statement on Tuesday. "We're looking forward to it with a good team and Maryland coming into town."

Last week, Barnett said that he would be meeting with every player on the team. He is still doing that this week and has met with over 80 Spartans as of now. Barnett also mentioned that the idea to meet with everybody individually came from current Florida State associate head football coach and defensive tackles coach Odell Haggins, whom Barnett coached with at FSU in 2018 and 2019.

Barnett covered a wide variety of topics throughout his media availability on Tuesday.

Barnett is well aware of what took place at Spartan Stadium on Saturday against the Huskies, and knows that it cannot happen again. He was adamant that those issues have been addressed and the Spartans are working to correct things.

"We need to do better as a a coaching staff and as a team," Barnett noted. "We've been addressing that throughout this week, and I feel like we'll be able to go out and play a much better brand of football on Saturday. Our players and coaches have really been putting a lot of great work (in) this week, just talking things through, and getting things worked out to where we can go out and execute."

Barnett mentioned that the importance of being focused on the small details and disciplined in everything the Spartans do. He felt that there were too many mistakes made versus Washington, which the team is looking to get cleaned up.

"The word I've been using this week, focused on, is 'discipline,'" Barnett said. "If we're disciplined, we're going to give ourself a chance to play a much better ball game on Saturday — less penalties, substitution errors and things like that. We can't have those things and we talked about that a lot. And so discipline is the key."

Another thing that Barnett brought up was "attacking the details." He mentioned that players were doing things the right way throughout the week of practice leading up to the contest versus Washington, but then during the actual game, that was often not the case.

Figuring out a way to translate the success during practices into the games is what Barnett and the coaching staff are working on heading into Saturday's tilt with Maryland.

"We're focused on the details, the discipline of everything right now," Barnett said. "And how do we get that accomplished in the game when the crowd is hollering, 75,000 (people)? We had a great crowd out there on Saturday. How can you remain focused and disciplined to just do your job, just like you did in practice? So that's the focus. That's what we're trying to get done."

Of course, the result from Saturday was inexcusable from an on-field performance perspective, and Barnett was clear that it has been addressed with the team.

He also credited defensive coordinator/linebackers coach Scottie Hazelton for being able to motivate the defense after a tough week. Hazelton and the graduate assistants pulled up scores of NFL games over the past several years and showed "multiple examples" of teams that played in the Super Bowl or won the Super Bowl and gave up 41 points (as the Spartans did on Saturday) in one game earlier during the regular season before moving on to find success that season.

"We had to address the elephant in the room," Barnett said about the lopsided loss to Washington. "We definitely addressed that. We got our butt kicked on Saturday. OK, bam. Now, how do we improve from that and get better from that? It was one game."

Barnett also mentioned that the ability to fix things must start with him, and that it also takes all 11 players on the field to execute and find success.

"I didn't escape a failing grade," Barnett said about Saturday's loss. "That starts with me, and then everybody else ... Everything wasn't terrible. You saw some hope and some light at the end of the tunnel. It just wasn't consistent enough. You need all 11 (players) to execute."

Barnett also mentioned that the team has only made some "slight changes" since he took over as acting head coach. The staff wanted to keep things mostly normal for the players, and the coaches are currently coaching the players the same way they always have. The timing of things like practices and meetings has remained similar as well.

With that said, Barnett does feel like this is more of a regular week for him due to the timing of everything. He was able to watch the Washington film right away on Saturday night and then jumped into the Maryland film on Sunday. So he feels "more prepared" heading into Saturday versus the Terrapins.

Michigan State Vice President and Athletic Director Alan Haller met with the players on Monday to inform them that the university had sent Tucker notice of termination.

The day before, Barnett was made aware that Haller planned to meet with the players on Monday, but he was not told specifically what it was about.

Overall, from what the players have told Barnett and their assistant coaches, the players are in mostly good spirits despite the tough situation.

"He hit me up the day before and said, 'I want to meet with the team,' and he didn't say for what," Barnett said about Haller. "He said, 'In the morning, before practice or after practice?' I said, 'After practice. Let's get through practice.' And so he met with those guys at noon.

"He met with the 10 assistants after them and then he met with the support staff after that and shared the news with us. I'd rather not (have) any news come to the guys like that, but let's just get it out there and go ... But they've been good. The guys have been really good."

In addition to Hazelton, Barnett noted that fellow assistant coaches such as offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Jay Johnson, offensive line coach/run game coordinator Chris Kapilovic and really the entire staff, along with associate head coach Mark Dantonio, have been really helpful throughout this process.

Barnett felt a lot of love and support from Michigan State fans leading up to the game. Fans were cheering loudly on the Spartans' walk from the Kellogg Center to Spartan Stadium.

Barnett also pointed out that the Spartans currently have a winning record, and still have a lot of goals to accomplish. So there are positives moving forward.

"We're 2-1," Barnett said. "We have a winning record right now. We're starting with the beginning of the Big Ten season. We had a great representation last week of Spartan Nation here. On the walk, all the way to the game, to the stadium itself. I mean, it was awesome.

"The energy, everything. I just hope that everybody comes back this week with that same energy, that same passion, and we will bring it ourselves as a team, even more so. We have to bring more passion up from our end, and like I said, the discipline thing. So, we want to bring the discipline and the passion and the energy. Just like the fans, let's do it all together, work together, and let's cheer these young men on. We love Spartan Nation."

Of course, by halftime, the game was essentially over. Washington took a 35-0 lead into the locker rooms and it was clear that the Spartans were overmatched.

By the third quarter, the majority of fans had left and Spartan Stadium was mostly empty. Barnett understands that the team's performance needs to be better and mentioned that it's up to the team to keep keep people in the stands.

"We have to to play better," Barnett said, matter-of-factly. "We have to make them want to stay. 'You can't leave.' Make them want to stay at Spartan Nation. So, that is the goal by playing better football and being a better disciplined team and putting a better product on the field. So, they'll come back. Spartan Nation is strong and resilient. Hopefully they'll come back this week and have that same energy at the beginning and all the way to the end this week."

For the second week in a row, Michigan State will have to face an incredibly talented quarterback. Through three games, Maryland's Taulia Tagovailoa has completed 66 of his 99 passing attempts (66.7%) for 889 yards (296.3 yards per game), five touchdowns and two interceptions. He's also scored a rushing touchdown.

The Terrapins are off to a 3-0 start in 2023. Maryland has started slowly in each of the past two games — versus Charlotte and versus Virginia, respectively — falling behind 14-0 early in both games. However, the Terps showed how quickly their offense can score, putting up at least 38 points in both contests and winning by large margins when all was said and done (38-20 against Charlotte and 42-14 against Virginia).

Barnett knows that facing Tagovailoa and the Maryland offense is not an easy task.

"We have another excellent quarterback coming in here," Barnett said about Tagovailoa. "(He) moves around in the pocket a lot, and it's gonna be a challenge for us. We've been playing this guy now for three years."

Last week, Washington quarterback Michael Penix Jr. torched the Michigan State defense through the air on his way to 473 passing yards, four touchdowns and zero interceptions. UW gained 713 total yards, which was the most the Spartans have allowed in program history.

Barnett was asked about the challenges Tagovailoa brings for the Michigan State defense, and asked specifically about the similarities and differences between Penix and Tagovailoa as quarterbacks.

Barnett noted that Penix prefers to stay in the pocket, while Tagovailoa is fairly comfortable throwing from anywhere, including on the run.

"Taulia, man, this dude is all over the place," Barnett added about Tagovailoa. "He's running all over the place. So, he's different in that manner, that he'll move out of the pocket a lot, he'll throw the ball from anywhere. Whereas I think (Michael) Penix, he's more of a pocket guy. Although we've known him to be a runner years ago at Indiana and all that kind of stuff. But he's trying to stay in the pocket a little bit longer and throw from the pocket.

"Where Taulia, he wants to be in the pocket, all of them do, but he don't mind getting out and running around and still throwing it. And so, he's going to be a challenge, just trying to capture him and get him on the ground. That's the challenge."

The Spartans will look to bounce back against the Terrapins on Saturday afternoon.

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