MSU FOOTBALL FRONT-BURNER: Spartans Nearing Spotlight on National Stage

Our weekly feature on MSU Football brings diverse responses to
a variety of questions related to the Spartans program. 

Panelists:

ATownAndDown (Follow him on M-Live)

SpartanMan82 (See SM82s True Lies About MythAgain Football post)

MSUSpartan76 (Follow him on M-Live)

This week's Questions:

1. The football team has nine wins now, the consensus-predicted win total for the season before it began. If MSU loses the next two games, will you consider the season to be a success?

2. Jeremy Langford came to the Spartans as a three-star "Athlete" with a 5.6 Rivals rating. Now he's on the verge of becoming a 1000-yard rusher as the starting tailback on a 9-1 team. How do you explain it?

3. The Michigan State Defense leads the nation in Rushing Defense and Total Defense, and is ranked in the top five in Scoring Defense, Pass Efficiency Defense, Passing Yards Allowed, Third-Down Conversion Percentage Defense, and First Downs Defense. Yet the mainstream sports media continue to put the Spartan Dawgs under the microscope each week only to announce that it's not a "legitimate" defensive unit. Why is this happening?

4. Did you observe any interesting developments, plays or story-lines from Saturday's game that may have gone largely unnoticed or lacked meaningful media focus?

(We encourage reader comments. Click the link at the bottom of the post.)

Our Panel Responds:


1. The football team has nine wins now, the consensus-predicted win total for the season before it began. If MSU loses the next two games, will you consider the season to be a success?

ATownAndDown (Follow him on M-Live)
At this point... no it would not be a success. A 9-3 prediction was under the premise that U of M, Nebraska and NW were top-25 teams. Include Notre Dame as a top-25 team that MSU was supposed to face, most prognosticators would assume MSU would win at least one of those games and thus go 9-3. Well here we sit half-way through November and have gone 2-1 against those 4. NW is on the precipice of missing bowl eligibility. So losing the fourth contest would be a disappointment. While Minnesota has had a nice season, their only quality win was against Nebraska at home. You would like to think that this team could close it out strong too. These are winnable games, and at this point, losing them would be a poor showing.

MSUSpartan76 (Follow him on M-Live)
I am unclear where the "consensus" came from. The general opinion I saw in the pre-season was that MSU would be "lucky" to have 7 wins, including disparaging remarks about the Spartans not even getting to a bowl. Regardless, the season is a success already. 6-0 B1G Ten start is something that has not happened in a long time. The current crop of seniors hold the school record for most wins by a senior class through their journey. The squashing of the Ann Arbor Charm School ball club was a record setting event, too. All that aside, MSU is not going to lose the next 2 and might win them both.

SpartanMan82 (See SM82s True Lies About MythAgain Football post)
Yes I will, especially with a bowl victory, but I realize I'm the only person in the Milky Way Galaxy that would do so.

People have to be realistic about sports competition. If MSU finished 10-3, it would make three double-digit win seasons in four years. How can that not be "successful"?

The great thing about our situation is that we probably won't lose the next two games, but if we win the next two, then lose in the B1G Championship, ask me again, and I'll still say it was successful.

Success in this league means putting together a win-streak, beating your main rival, avoiding player misconduct, and finishing with a high win total. At this point, we've got check-marks next to all of those points. Everything from here on out is "gravy".
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2. Jeremy Langford came to the Spartans as a three-star "Athlete" with a 5.6 Rivals rating. Now he's on the verge of becoming a 1000-yard rusher as the starting tailback on a 9-1 team. How do you explain it?

SpartanMan82 (See SM82s True Lies About MythAgain Football post)
It continues to amaze me to see the Mark Dantonio administration find players that nobody else thought was very good and/or take guys with unrealized potential and make them great. So many cases like this already, now we have Langford.

The four other schools to offer Langford were Bowling Green, Eastern Michigan, Illinois State, and Colorado.

It looks like Langford "bought into the system", "worked hard and kept his mouth shut", and "didn't take no for an answer". He had one thing going for him to start, and that was his 4.4 speed. The rest of the credit goes to him and his coaches.

ATownAndDown (Follow him on M-Live)
The kid can run. Look Langford has always been talented. The question was always could he perform on a consistent enough basis to be a starter. If you remember the fumble return he had a couple years ago against Florida Atlantic you will remember the raw talent he showed as a runner. It was a matter of controlling that talent and getting at least 3-4 yards on a consistent basis. It would appear that something has clicked because even to begin the season, it didn't appear that it was coming together for him. The way he as been getting his yards has been as a workhorse. He plugs away and gets better as the game progresses. Against both Nebraska and U of M, their defense just couldn't hold the flood gates closed and Langford was able to break big TD runs late. Very nice development by the staff. And hey, lets give some credit to that OLine in front of him too. They are definitely providing him with some opportunities.

MSUSpartan76 (Follow him on M-Live)
The offensive ecosystem is thriving. Passing has become something defenses have to respect. The offensive line is healthy and deep. Tight ends and receivers are making plays. Special teams are giving the team good field position and making the FGs.The defense is, and yes this includes Nebraska, smothering opponents, and the result is that a kid that can run with the rock in his hand is piling up yards.

Stars or Rivals ratings do not give any idea of how the kid fits into the team's system, how quickly he can learn the playbook, how quickly he can learn how to play as a team with the other players on the field with him, including on-field communications, or even how his off the field situation affects his performance.

What we have with Jeremy is a kid with good athletic ability, good potential, and a great desire to be the best he can be. Put a kid like that in with great coaches and he will always exceed his recruiting rating. Always.

About those stupid recruiting sites. Maybe 1/3 of the 15,000 potential recruits are ever assessed and those that are get their rankings posted within the first 3 months after the prior signing day and the evaluations are made by 20 "recruiting experts." Right. Ever try to read one of the in-depth stories on a HS player? Pay site. Those recruiting sites are not about assessments, they are about making money.
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3. The Michigan State Defense leads the nation in Rushing Defense and Total Defense, and is ranked in the top five in Scoring Defense, Pass Efficiency Defense, Passing Yards Allowed, Third-Down Conversion Percentage Defense, and First Downs Defense. Yet the mainstream sports media continue to put the Spartan Dawgs under the microscope each week only to announce that it's not a "legitimate" defensive unit. Why is this happening?

MSUSpartan76 (Follow him on M-Live)
Well, the Spartans have played nobody. Right? And never does Michigan State win a game, it is always a gift or they got lucky or their opponent just up and lost. So how can the team get credit for anything? Take a hard look at the Nebraska game.

• Nebraska rush offense (No. 16) 240.3 yd/gm. They gained 182 yds vs MSU, or 76% of their average.
• Nebraska pass offense (No. 89) 200.3. They blew the Spartan Dawgs off the field gaining 210 yards. 67 of those yards came in the final drive when the game was already over.
• Nebraska scoring offense (No. 33) 35.1 pts/gm. The Cornhuskers got 28 points versus MSU, which includes that end of game TD.
• The Nebraska offense was held to their 7th worst performance in 10 games and that does not discount the 75 yards in the final drive.

SpartanMan82 (See SM82s True Lies About MythAgain Football post)
The Michigan Mainstream Media Machine (M-4) was working up a lather all summer, getting ready for more bedroom romps with U-of-M Football this year...then reality hit with Akron and UConn. As they've been "jilted" by Brady Hoke, they're mad and they want to take it out on someone. And that would be MSU.

There is no such thing as the "Nation's Top Defense". The NCAA stats can help identify the group of teams at the top, but there is no way with open scheduling to determine a true #1 team, much less a true #1 defensive unit.

It is blatantly obvious that MSU has as good a defense as any other team in the country, but somehow the professional sports reporters can't let it go at that. Since there are no more glaring weaknesses on the Spartan team, they choose to attack its strengths.

In other words, the answer is: Media Bias (against MSU).

ATownAndDown (Follow him on M-Live)
I think it has to do with the whole premonition that "Its too good to be true." Bama puts up the numbers like MSU and they would have one of the greatest defenses of all time but that is because Bama is supposed to have the guys to put up video game numbers. That upstart school from Michigan that doesn't wear maize and blue isn't supposed to do that. So it has to be a mirage, right? I say let them call it flawed. Let them poke holes. Let them question who we have played. Narduzzi will use it and have the Spartan Dawgs ready for the next opponent, who won't find comfort in some mainstream media member's claims of MSU's defense not being legit. All you have to look at is the comments from Brian Kelly after the ND game. Kelly was scared of what the Spartan defense could do. And some of the mainstream media guys proclaimed that Kelly was supposed to have found the holes in the defense. I am sure if MSU makes it to the B1G Championship Game, the first thing (and possibly the only thing) on the OSU game plan will be how to get around the defense because the Spartan Dawgs are good... real good.

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4. Did you observe any interesting developments, plays or story-lines from Saturday's game that may have gone largely unnoticed or lacked meaningful media focus?

ATownAndDown (Follow him on M-Live)
Besides the actual smile that Coach D gave when Langford ran in for that last TD? I have been on it all season. I am still not a fan of the play calling at times. 1st and 10: Williams rushes for 2; 2nd and 8: Williams carries two guys for 6; 3rd and 2: Williams in the Wildcat. Even if Williams makes that play its a bad call.

How about 3rd and goal from the 8... lets have a play where Cook wonders around like he is confused, direct snap to the RB to hand it to Lippett to pass to Gleichert. So that close to the goal line, you are going to take the ball out of your QB's hands, not allow him to make any presnap adjustments, take your best WR out of the play as a receiver, make your RB irrelevant for pass protection or as a receiver, in order to pass to a blocking TE or your QB? Why not run the statue of liberty play or is Treadwell's 40 time not fast enough?

We were picking up yards in chunks on the ground when we ran power football. You look at the big plays we have had, mostly come from running our base offense. Its not spreading things out. Its not trickeration. Its not goofy looks. So why are we so quick to get away from that? Nebraska's DC is the latest opponent to make a comment that was telling of the play-calling: "We need to stay patient because they will try and press." Basically, they went with the let them pick up chunks doing that because Warner will get impatient and call something cute and that's when we stop them. Are 13 play 75 yard TD drives sexy? Nope but they are TD drives just the same.

When I look at that missed play on our first drive with Lippett wide open in the endzone, I see a great play call. Play-action boot. Defense is crashing to stop the run and Cook is outside of the pocket away from the pressure (where he has been very good). When the DB realizes that Cook can run he had to decide to come up on the run or leave Lippett. We didn't capitalize but it was there for the taking. How many wildcat plays this year has there been anything there? How many WR passes have been super impressive? That play call wasn't fancy or deceiving. It just created an opportunity. Our players need to execute but the play callers have to create more situations like that through those kinds of calls. Not running the Oopty Opp offense.

MSUSpartan76 (Follow him on M-Live)
Start with Mike Sadler did not get B1G Ten Special Teams Player of the Week. 4 of 7 punts inside the 20. Nebraska managed 2 punt returns for a total of -4 yards and some of that is because of Sadler.

SpartanMan82 (See SM82s True Lies About MythAgain Football post)
I just think the coaches did a good job of showing "new looks" on offense, with formations we hadn't seen before, and some new plays. They didn't always work, but those guys are earning their money during the week.

One bone to pick, though. When we scored to take a 12-point lead in the fourth quarter, we needed to try a two-point conversion to make it a 14-point lead. The only value of a 13-point lead at that stage of the game (34-21) was to protect against Nebraska scoring a touchdown and two field-goals. But at that time, it was very unlikely they would get three more chances to score. Nice to see that we got away clean with that coaching judgment error.




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