Following Michigan State’s loss to Illinois on Saturday, redshirt senior wide receiver Montorie Foster Jr. and redshirt junior linebacker Darius Snow reflected on what went wrong in the defeat and discussed what the team needs to do moving forward to close out the 2024 regular season with some momentum.

Coming off the bye week, a win against the Fighting Illini on the road would have pushed the Spartans closer to bowl game contention. Now sitting at 4-6 overall (2-5 in Big Ten play), Michigan State now needs to win its final two games — at home versus Purdue and at home versus Rutgers, respectively, — to guarantee a bowl bid.

Both players echoed what head coach Jonathan Smith had to say in his postgame comments, mentioning frustration about the loss to Illinois and a deep desire to make a bowl game a reality for this team.

To begin, Foster shared that he really had “no words" to describe the Spartans' performance on Saturday. He felt the team came into the game prepared, but the Spartans did not execute against the Fighting Illini.

“I felt like we had a good week of practice,” Foster shared. “... Honestly, I’m kind of frustrated right now.”