EAST LANSING - After a winter of staff shuffling and demotions, Mike Tressel stands the strongest of the Spartan assistant coaches. He is a rising star in the world of college football defensive coordinators.
In his first year as sole defensive coordinator, Tressel’s unit ranked No. 1 in the nation in rush defense in 2018, No. 10 in total defense and No. 3 in points allowed per drive.
But Tressel doesn’t want to hear about last year’s accolades.
“Our guys know that 2019 is a new year and the things that happened last year mean zero,” Tressel said during Michigan State media day on Monday at Spartan Stadium. “We told them that you can’t do the same things and expect the same results; you need to do more.”
Preseason All-Americans Kenny Willekes and Joe Bachie remain as driven as any Spartans in recent history.
“There is no let-up in those guys,” said senior defensive tackle Mike Panasiuk.
The hungry, relentless mindset, along with eight returning starters on defense, has the Spartans aiming to be one of the best defenses in the country, if not the best.
Tressel sees clear paths for improvement.
“Our big area of improvement is pass rush,” he said. “We feel like a consistent pass rush can be huge for us and then we continue to talk about the things we always do: tackling, closing space, leverage, football IQ translated to the football field and not just in the classroom. And it’s every one of our veterans understanding: Hey, I need to take a step and trying to identify areas where they can do it.
“We regard every one of our starters as a returning starter and we have asked them to identify their strengths, identify their weaknesses and have a plan of how they can grow. You won’t grow if you just go to practice and go through practice. You need to have things you identify, and every one of them have identified some areas.”
PUSHING THE MENTAL ENVELOPE
Monday marked practice No. 4 of preseason camp. It was MSU’s second day in shells (helmets and shoulder pads). The Spartans weren’t wearing full pads and couldn’t tackle to the ground, per NCAA rules, but there were plenty of hard thuds taking place.
“Around here when you put helmets and shoulder pads on, it gets pretty full-contact,” Tressel said. “So we’re starting to get a chance to see how the young guys can handle Big Ten contact going against the big offensive linemen we have.”
And veterans are being pushed to see how much of a mental workload they can handle.
“We are already trying to challenge our older guys in terms of checks and adjustments,” Tressel said. “We are doing some different checks and adjustments that we didn’t do on a game-to-game basis last year and seeing how much more they can handle mentally without slowing down.
“We know people are studying us in the off-season just like we are studying other people, so we need to grow every year. It’s not just challenging Joe on what more can he recognize and what more can he communicate or audible on the field but the other 10 guys have to be able to see it too.”
Monday brought a fresh set of mental tests.
“In every single practice we have a new situation of install, trying to get our guys to understand football I.Q., and what given situations mean,” Tressell said. “So we had two-minute situations today that were a little different than the norm. We spent a little bit of time on third-and-medium and what kind of plays you can anticipate there. Every day there is some type of situation so our guys can begin to apply football knowledge when the game is snapping.”
Tressel is searching for that edge of high football awareness combined the ability to play fast without getting too bogged down mentally.
“There’s a lot of confidence in having a lot of returning starters,” Tressel said. “And then when you have one or two new guys on the field, the veterans know who they need to communicate with, who they need to calm down. When you have six new guys on the field there’s a whole bunch of people who might be scrambling a little bit. But it feels real good when most of the guys are back.”
WHAT ABOUT THE NEW GUYS?
Tressel wanted to see some hard thuds taking place Saturday and Monday, and he wanted to see how MSU’s incoming freshmen handled it.
“I have learned some things about some guys,” Tressel said. “I was impressed with both of our (freshman) defensive ends (Adam Berghorst and Michael Fletcher).
“They are tough guys. You knew they were big, 6-foot-6 long guys that can be big and run, but they are showing some real toughness and relentlessness, which is good to see. They are taking that from Kenny and the boys. They are showing some toughness to add onto the natural talent they have.”
Tressel likes the young horses he has inside, too.
“We have a group of four defensive tackles in J.D. Duplain, Maverick Hansen, (Jacob) LeFave and (Evan) Brunning who are all big-bodied guys who can run. Those guys are real hard to come-by and what we’re looking for in this defense is that relentlessness, that toughness, that fight. And they are showing that.”
LeFave and Brunning are walk-ons. LeFave (6-3, 273, Brighton) was recruited primarily as an offensive lineman. He enrolled in January and is getting looks on defense this month, Tressel said. Brunning (6-5, 282, Oxford) was first-team Detroit Free Press All-North last fall.
LINEBACKER UPDATE
I was wrong in forecasting freshman Chase Kline as a potential candidate for the back-up Mike linebacker job this fall, after Kline’s terrific outing as a money linebacker in the Green-White Game.
Instead, Kline is going to continue to rep as a money ‘backer while Ed Warriner has returned from a spring injury to earn most of the second-string reps behind Bachie.
“Ed Warriner is back and he’s full-go and he is doing a very good job for us,” Tressel said. “Tyriq Thompson is still rotating in for us. We have to make sure we have a veteran guy that’s rotating in there. Beyond that, we have to see how Luke Fulton comes along. Noah Harvey has played a little bit of Mike, so he has some practice experience in there.
“It’s practice four, so it’s too early to tell, but we have some pieces.”
Thompson is a returning starter at money linebacker. Coaches are occasionally repping him in the middle as an in-case-of-emergency Mike linebacker.
Fulton (6-2, 230, Fr., Poland, Ohio) is a candidate to play himself into a role, possibly on special teams.
“Luke Fulton’s I.Q. has been real impressive,” Tressel said. “And Marcel Lewis has shown some real strike ability, some real pop.”
That shouldn’t be a surprise. Lewis (6-0, 219, Fr., Eastpointe, Mich/Chippewa Valley) had the hardest-hitting high school film of any member of MSU’s 2019 recruiting class.
“He showed that in high school but you never know what’s going to translate,” Tressel said. “Sometimes it doesn’t translate as fast because there’s thinking going on. There is a little thinking going on with Marcel, as you would expect, but when it’s time for contact, it’s natural hits.”
As for Kline, Tressel agreed that the 6-foot-4, 235-pound redshirt freshman from Chardon, Ohio has something to offer.
“He’s a football junkie and he’s a guy that wants to be in there and learn and run the show,” Tressel said.
But there are no plans to audition him for the back-up Mike linebacker spot at this time.
“Not yet,” Tressel said. “He hasn’t been on the football field yet so you don’t want to put too much on the guy’s plate but he certainly is a guy that could do that.”
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