Looking to catch a good football game? Your best bet is to buy a ticket to Notre Dame vs. Michigan State, because this series usually guarantees something dramatic is going to happen, and for some reason the ticket is never as in demand as other Irish rivalries.
Last year’s high-wire escape win for the Irish pretty much encapsulated the last decade of games with the Spartans. Both teams had a chance to win, both nearly gave it away, and this time -- the Irish walked away with the victory.
As we did last year, we caught up with LVS of the Spartan blog The Only Colors, who has been paying plenty of attention to Mark Dantonio’s troops in their two opening victories against Western Michigan and Florida Atlantic. He was kind enough to give us all a scouting report, something Irish fans will need as they shake off the hangover from a tough loss last week.
(I also crossed the tracks and answered some questions for him on the Irish, so if you’re interested, give that a read as well.)
Inside the Irish: Assess the Spartans’ season so far. Two wins against underwhelming competition and an offense that seems to have transitioned to a ground attack. Has anything surprised you after two weeks?
LVS: The main surprise for me has been the running game.I expected that MSU would run the ball better than last season, but the results so far have been above and beyond what even the most optimistic Spartan fan could have hoped for.The offensive line is blocking very well, and Edwin Baker and Le’Veon Bell have looked superb.A third option at running back, Larry Caper, will be making his season debut this weekend, and should make a good situation better.Caper was MSU’s best running back for most of last season, and yet, amazingly, it seems that he’ll be struggling for carries simply because Baker and Bell have been so good.
Unfortunately, while the rushing attack has emerged, the passing game--which, as you implied, was the strength of the entire team last year--has struggled.In the first game, those struggles were at least partially a result of drops.(5, by my count.)But that wasn’t the case last week, when Kirk Cousins was relatively inaccurate, and threw a really poor interception from Florida Atlantic’s 1-yard line.I’m convinced that the passing game is going to come around; Cousins proved how good he was last season, and we still have a horde of talented receivers.Personally, I think Cousins is going to be motivated by how this game ended last year, and put together a good performance on Saturday night.
Earlier in the year, you guys ranked the ND game as the 4th toughest on your schedule, and thought ND’s chances hinged on Brian Kelly. Still feel the same way?
Having now seen the messiah-like substance that is Denard Robinson, I might be inclined to put our game in Ann Arbor ahead of Saturday’s game, in terms of difficulty.But, yeah, I’ve seen both of the Irish games so far, and they seem to be roughly what I thought they’d be: a talented group that occasionally makes mistakes due to inexperience.With that in mind, I’m glad we’re playing early in the season, and happier still that this will be ND’s first road game.
I think that Brian Kelly was a very good hire and will probably have a lot of success in South Bend.It’s simply a question of how quickly that success will come.After beating a Purdue team that looks worse than advertised, and losing to a Michigan team which is probably good but not great, I think it’s too early to tell if ND’s big jump will come this season.I’d guess that it’ll take at least another year or so, but this weekend could reveal a lot about that.
Last year you called Blair White’s breakout game. Anyone you see having a dynamic day this Saturday night?
I’ll choose Edwin Baker; while he’s been great the past two weeks, playing like that in front of a national TV audience would be a truer breakout.Anyway, he’s a powerful runner who nonetheless has the speed to get to the outside.And if he gets to the outside, given the problems ND’s had at OLB, he could very well turn those runs into big gains.MSU’s offensive line has been outstanding so far, and if they can give Baker some lanes, he’ll take them.
I’ll also hedge a bit by nominating Keshawn Martin as well.He’s an incredible punt returner, and, if ND kicks to him, I think he’ll do a lot of damage.You might see him gain big chunks on end-arounds or trap handoffs, too.
It’s the first road game of the year for the Irish. How difficult of an atmosphere will it be to play in this year?
Spartan Stadium gets particularly loud and nasty during night games, and this Saturday won’t be any different.Our stadium isn’t the biggest one in the world (although at 75,000+ capacity, it’s certainly not tiny), but the double-deck design traps sound and makes for a particularly loud atmosphere.I’m sure the Irish players are expecting a hostile atmosphere, and they’ll get it.
Last year’s team seemed to get away from the traditional Spartan offensive attack, and the first two games seem like MSU is trying to turn the offense into a physical football team. What can Irish fans expect from head coach Mark Dantonio and the Spartans on defense?
You can expect a defensive line that’s solid against the run and middling in pass rush, one of the best linebacking corps in the country, and a secondary that’s better than it was last year, but is still probably sub-par.
Briefly: Colin Neely had an excellent game at defensive end last week, and Jerel Worthy is a very solid defensive tackle.You may see a bit of William Gholston at defensive end.He was one of the top defensive recruits in the country last year; he’s 6'7", strong, very quick, and has looked excellent in limited playing time so far this year.I have a feeling that the coaching staff might take the wraps off him on Saturday.
Greg Jones leads the linebackers, and is quite simply one of the best defensive players in college football.Eric Gordon and Chris Norman are the outside linebackers and they aren’t bad, either.As a group, they’re excellent against the run and are deadly on the blitz.They’re weaker in pass coverage, and I fear that Kyle Rudolph may be able to exploit them.
The secondary was a trainwreck of unbelievable proportions last year, and pass defense (or really lack thereof) destroyed MSU’s season.I think they’re better this year.Chris L. Rucker is still vulnerable, but Johnny Adams has looked fairly good at the other corner, and the safeties (Trenton Robinson and Marcus Hyde) have made some nice pass breakups.That’s not to say that Notre Dame won’t have success throwing the ball, but I feel better about the secondary than I did last year.
The coaching staff has used a very, very basic 4-3 in the first two games, with very few blitzes and no exotic stuff.I suspect that we’ll see more variation against ND; the talk all through the off-season was about how MSU will play a lot of 3-4 this year.We haven’t seen that yet, but this could very well be the week.
Obviously, Notre Dame won a close one last year. The past eight years of this game have been filled with tight games, tough defeats for both squads, and a growing intensity to the rivalry. Where does this game stand for Michigan State?
Firmly behind the Michigan game in the Spartan consciousness, but very important nonetheless.It’s Notre Dame, so whether the game is home or away, it’s a nationally televised game and a headline-grabber.If the 2006 meltdown had come against almost any other team, people would have forgotten about it after a few weeks.But it was against Notre Dame, so everyone remembers.(Mike Valenti didn’t help in that regard.Thanks a lot, pal.)Each year there are conference games that mean more to me than this one; for instance, this year the Iowa and Wisconsin games will be huge.But this one is always near the top.The fact that they’ve been very, very good games in recent years (and also that we’ve won plenty of them) certainly doesn’t hurt.What’s your gut feeling for Saturday night?
I’m usually pretty manic-depressive about predicting MSU games, so the fact that I’m reasonably optimistic about this one disturbs me some.I love the way we’ve run the ball so far, I think that Kirk Cousins will be highly motivated to atone for his interception last season, and while I don’t think our defense is going to dominate Notre Dame, I certainly don’t think they’ll be steamrolled, either.It’s always risky to count on a quarterback playing well in his first road start, and I think we’ll have some success blitzing Crist and rattling him.There are plenty of ways MSU could lose this game: Michael Floyd could go off, as could Kyle Rudolph (and the latter is more likely, in my opinion), we could turn the ball over a ton, we could have horrific defensive breakdowns, and so on.But I think the first two games have been perfect for MSU: challenging enough to keep the team interested, but not challenging enough to force the coaches to open up the playbook or for the players to be tired/banged up heading into this game.Furthermore, playing this game in East Lansing will make a difference.From the beginning of spring practice, there’s been a terrific vibe surrounding this MSU team; they’re talented and ready, and I think they’ll pass their first big test of the year.30-24 MSU, or something like that.