Shameful

The Spartans did the unthinkable Saturday and lost to the Northwestern Wildcats. That's right, the same NU team that lost to Duke. Duke. Let that sink in for a moment. This was a loss that goes right up there with last year's loss to ND as far as sheer embarassment. It's a good thing it was on the Big Ten Network and no one saw it. So, what went wrong?

1. Defensive Secondary: Just a sec... okay, I'm back. I had to go throw up just remembering MSU's pass defense yesterday. It was the single worst display of pass coverage I've seen in my entire life, including high school football. In fact, they looked like a bad high school team trying to defend the pass. They played soft coverage, 5-10 yds of the WRs, all day and waved at the ball carriers instead of trying to tackle them. They gave up 520 yards passing and 5 TDs to a QB who hadn't thrown a TD pass in 3 games. I'd say they played like a bunch of little girls, but I've coached powder puff football and those girls played with more ferocity and enthusiasm for tackling than the Spartans did yesterday. "Spartans! What is your profession?"

"Knitting?"
"Playing with paper dolls?"
"I like kittens."

Pathetic.

The Spartans also dropped at least 4 possible interceptions.

2. Offense: Sure, they scored 41 pts, but it wasn't enough. They could score to tie the game, but every time they had a chance to take the lead they couldn't get it done. That pretty much describes the QB, Hoyer, too. He makes some good plays, but comes up short when it matters.

3. Play-calling in OT: The coaching staff has been clear that they wanted to establish a run-first identity for this team. So what did they do in OT? Four-straight long passes, zero points, one big L.

4. Refs: Hopefully the refs never make too much of a difference in the game and the Spartans had plenty of chances to win this one. However, the refs missed at least two very obvious holding calls, despite 67,000 people pointing them out. Maybe it wouldn't have made a difference, but as hard as defensive stops were to come by, maybe it would have.

Homecoming against Indiana is now a gut-check game. NU and IU should have been guaranteed wins that would have put MSU well on their way to a bowl game, now the Spartans are going to struggle to not be a laughingstock.