Fitzgerald wins Michigan State debut 30-20
Pat Fitzgerald's first game as Michigan State's coach came down to the fourth quarter, and a shaky secondary means the 30-20 win over Toledo leaves as many questions as answers before Eastern Michigan arrives.
Fitzgerald wins his debut, but the secondary has homework
Pat Fitzgerald's first game as Michigan State's head coach ended the way he'd said all camp he wanted it to feel — like a fight. The Spartans held on to beat Toledo 30-20 on September 4 at Spartan Stadium, and after 17 seasons at Northwestern, Fitzgerald got exactly the stress test he'd been asking for: "I think pressure is a privilege. I really do. I think that means you're prepared for an opportunity," he'd said days before kickoff, and Toledo obliged by taking a 20-19 lead into the fourth quarter on a 71-yard touchdown run, per Chris Vannini. Alessio Milivojevic, the redshirt sophomore simply handed the job over the summer with no portal competition brought in, answered right back, going 26-of-34 for 247 yards and finding Rodney Bullard Jr. for a 4th-and-1 touchdown that put Michigan State back in front for good, per Vannini.
Toledo30-20Bullard Jr., newly eligible this season, was the best player on the field who wasn't kicking — 7 catches for 90 yards and the go-ahead score, plus the two-point conversion in traffic that stretched the lead to 27-20, per Spartan Avenue's postgame breakdown. But that same recap flagged the problem Fitzgerald has two weeks to fix before Big Ten play starts: Toledo's John Alan Richter, a quarterback who'd thrown for 699 yards across his previous two seasons, shredded a shaky Michigan State secondary for 196 yards and two touchdowns in the second half alone, with Charles Brantley and Tre Bell both getting exploited in coverage. A defense with the head coach's Northwestern roots is going to need better than that against Eastern Michigan and then Notre Dame.
THE KICK IS GOOD t.co/BOMuzb3MbP
The safety net all night was Liam Boyd, the Charlotte transfer kicker who made 5 of his 6 field goal attempts, including a career-long 51-yarder, with his lone miss — a blocked 54-yard try — the only thing that let Toledo back into it, per Spartan Avenue. "THE KICK IS GOOD," Michigan State's own account posted as it happened, and by the fourth quarter that had become the safest bet in East Lansing. It's fair, as that recap put it, that "it's not the best sign when your kicker is one of the stars of a win" — but a debut win is a debut win, and Fitzgerald has his first one.
Get the ball to Rod and good things happen
Michigan State keeps pace early in a crowded Big Ten
One night's results left Michigan State in unusually good company. Illinois, Minnesota and Purdue also opened 1-0, USC has already banked two wins, and Rutgers stumbled to an 0-1 start — weeks before the games that actually sort the conference race start counting.
None of that means much yet against Toledo's level of competition, but it does mean the margin for error against Eastern Michigan and then at Notre Dame is smaller than a 10-point final suggests. Michigan State's first real look at where it stands in the Big Ten doesn't arrive until conference play, and until then the record is exactly as good, and exactly as untested, as everyone else's around it.
A 15.5-point line and a chance to actually pull away
Michigan State is favored by 15.5 points against Eastern Michigan on September 12 at Spartan Stadium, with the total opened at 51.5. Eastern Michigan enters 1-1 after a 21-27 loss to San José State, a program that gives Fitzgerald a chance to answer the one real complaint from the opener — the fourth-quarter letdowns — against a team the numbers say his group should handle comfortably.
Fitzgerald called himself and Toledo's Mike Jacobs "mirrors of each other" ahead of the opener, first-year coaches each starting over with 50-plus new players; Eastern Michigan doesn't offer that same symmetry, just a Saturday to find out whether the version of Michigan State that led 19-14 in the third quarter or the one that let Toledo take a fourth-quarter lead is the one that's sticking around.