Bowl bid almost certainly on the line for Michigan State football in visit to Rutgers
EAST LANSING — The last time Michigan State football visited New Jersey, Kenneth Walker III and Jalen Nailor were high-fiving their way down the sideline to a how-is-this-happening 6-0 start in Mel Tucker’s second season.
It feels like a lifetime ago.
So much has changed since the Spartans’ sudden revival suggested a program once again on the rise. Walker and Nailor left for the NFL after that stunning 2021 season in which the Spartans went 11-2. Tucker went 7-7 over his next 14 games, then was suspended a little less than a month ago and fired a little more than two weeks ago, the glow from '21 seemingly wiped out even before his admitted actions that led to his termination.
And so as MSU returns to Rutgers on Saturday, it does so as a program desperately in need of something to feel good about again. Anything, really.
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Big plays on offense. Some mojo. The next breakout star. Most of all, a win for the first time after a month of turmoil.
The Spartans (2-3, 0-2 Big Ten) come off their bye week mired in a three-game losing streak. Interim coach Harlon Barnett is winless, his chance to take over permanently likely fading with every defeat. Penalties and turnovers continue to prove costly. Surprisingly, only three players have left the program since Tucker’s firing, but injuries have produced a roster nearly as short-handed as last season's.
Saturday’s game against the Scarlet Knights (4-2, 1-2), coming after a much-needed bye week to decompress and recompose, begins MSU’s brutal homestretch to the season: Seven games over the next seven weeks, including next week’s night game at home against No. 2 Michigan, with a visit to No. 3 Ohio State on Nov. 11 and the regular-season finale against No. 5 Penn State on Nov. 24 at Ford Field in Detroit.
Which makes Saturday essentially a must-win for the Spartans’ hopes of making a bowl game: Any wiggle room disappeared with the Cooper DeJean punt return touchdown for Iowa on Sept. 30 that nixed MSU’s upset bid, as the Spartans gave up the final 16 points of a 26-16 defeat.
Barring a miraculous upset against one of those powerhouse programs, they'll need to run the table against the unranked squads — Rutgers, Minnesota (Oct. 28), Nebraska (Nov. 4, MSU's final game in East Lansing) and Indiana (Nov. 18) — with three of those on the road.
“Once you start looking ahead, even if things are going well, you can slip up in the in the moment,” junior linebacker Darius Snow said Tuesday. “So focus on the present.”
Those future tasks are complicated by having to play the Gophers a week after facing U-M and the Hoosiers a week after facing OSU. Also complicated? The lack of offense, and who will be the quarterback this week against the Scarlet Knights (and potentially each week after if neither Noah Kim nor Katin Houser seize the job and deliver some points).
“We understand we're representing a lot of people,” Barnett said. “But at the end of the day, it's about us in the locker room and us trusting one another, being unified and believing that we can go out and win each and every game that's left on our schedule. So if we continue to have that type of mindset going throughout the rest of the season, we'll be fine.”
ON THE FIELD: Michigan State football at Rutgers: Scouting report, prediction
A loss in Piscataway, of course, will speed up the future's arrival. The rivalry meeting with Michigan next week, as always, will hone MSU’s focus and intensity. It will be the first U-M/MSU night game in East Lansing, as well as the first meeting of the squads since last year’s postgame altercation in the Michigan Stadium tunnel. That won't change the status of Barnett’s team as heavy underdogs, though.
After that?
Fans’ attention will shift toward the hope of basketball season and the hype of finding Tucker’s replacement. Players will start assessing whether to stick around for the next head coach. Coaches’ minds will start figuring out their own futures.
Beat Rutgers, though, and the possibility of a bowl game remains. And for a program in need of any optimism right now — any type of normality — having something to chase on the field is vital.
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan State football looking for normality in visit to Rutgers
