It was not always pretty, but Michigan State got the job done in the 2023 season opener and ended Friday night with a convincing 31-7 win over Central Michigan.
Of course, one of the biggest question marks Michigan State fans had entering Friday's contest was who was going to be the starting quarterback, as head coach Mel Tucker did not publicly reveal that information prior to the game.
It was redshirt junior Noah Kim who beat out redshirt freshman Katin Houser and true freshman Sam Leavitt for the starting role.
"I think it was like a week or so before the game, a week or two, I don't even remember," Kim said when asked about when he was told he won the starting job.
Kim's first-career start got off to a bit of a rocky start, however. After one quarter of play, Kim only completed one pass on five attempts for negative-two yards, and the Spartans failed to put up any points.
After two quarters of play Kim completed just 10 of his 22 pass attempts (45.4%) for 145 yards and zero touchdowns. Michigan State took a narrow three-point lead, 10-7, into the locker rooms at halftime.
Kim did have a nice first-half connection with redshirt freshman wide receiver Jaron Glover, and seemed to get more comfortable as the game went on.
Kim had a much more efficient second half, completing eight of his 11 passing attempts for 134 yards and two touchdowns, with no interceptions.
Kim struggled and was off target early on in the game. He also had some dropped passes that hurt his numbers. However, he bounced back in a strong way. He finished the night with a respectable stat line of 18-for-31 (58%) for 279 yards with two touchdowns and zero turnovers.
Overall, Tucker was pleased with how Kim played, and he chalked up the early struggle to first-game "jitters," lack of execution, and a good defensive effort by CMU.
"I just thought we had some jitters out there," Tucker said. "It was just first game out, new team, new season, at home, a lot of nervous energy. I thought Noah (Kim) played well. I told the coaches at halftime, I liked the way he was playing. He threw some good balls, had some drops early. (It could have) been a different (first) half if we executed a little bit better.
"I just think it was jitters, and obviously give Central (Michigan) some credit. They've got some good players. They were coming out playing hard, and it was ... physical early, and they were getting after us."
Kim actually disagreed with the notion that it was "jitters" or nervousness that caused his early struggles, but thought it had more to do with small mistakes that were adding up.
