Hey, look, Michigan State’s season has officially gone from awful to a clown show. Throwing down versus one Michigan player who is coming back from an ACL after getting stomped on the field? Bush league. The suspensions help mitigate a few things but overall this is a terrible look for Mel Tucker’s leadership, the team / program, and most importantly the university.
Team of the Week – Minnesota – A+ – Just when we left them all for dead they…shut out a conference for for the first time since the 2000s. Wowza. It might just be a one-game blimp against the offensively inept Scarlet Knights and it is probably far too little far too late to claw back into the western race but they stopped the bleeding, Mohamed Ibrahim went wild and set the well-deserved touchdown mark for the Gopher program. Finally, how can any Big Ten fan not appreciate a 10+ minute drive for 99 yards and a touchdown? C’mon, our league lives for that. A loss to RU wouldn’t have ended the bowl hopes but a win all but guarantees it. UM’s home stretch is at Nebraska, Northwestern, Iowa, at Wisconsin. I can’t imagine them losing that Northwestern game. The other three are also winnable…if the Gophers can repeat the dominance they had in their 31-0 shelling of Rutgers.
Indiana – Off
Illinois – A- – The first half offense was dominate…the second half, eh. They didn’t need to do much offensively because the defense was AMAZING all game but still, just six points after the band played. The ugliest drive of the second half for me was after a Nebraska fumble, Illinois went 4 plays, 2 yards, 3 points. How very Iowa of them. You’d like to see the hammer be dropped there. Having said all that, the offense was great in the first, Chase Brown had nearly 150 yards, Tommy DeVito was hyper accurate going 20 for 22, and the defense pitched a second half shutout and had four takeaways. I just wanted to see a more complete game.
Iowa – A – Look, I’m a realist, I’m not going to claim Iowa is back or their offense figured it all out based on beating atrocious Northwestern. In this single game, they played well. The defense posted a first half shutout, gave up a score after a crazy rare special teams miscue, and then the depth chart players in mop up time gave up another score. They got amazing pressure all day with 7 sacks and, just for box score padding, a meaningless interception at the end of the first half. Defense did what we expected. The offense put up 33 points and looked competent. But I need to stress again, IT WAS NORTHWESTERN! This game said more about Fitz’s horrific coaching staff ruining the well-run program he built. He needs to clean house ASAP.
Maryland – Off
Michigan – A – I know, I know, five field goals and four of them were 39 yards or less isn’t exactly the beatdown we all expected but in the context of this game, clearly Michigan made the right call. The Spartan offense was not reliably moving the ball in the second half and when they were in the first half, they decided on one long drive to go for it on fourth and came away empty. Taking the points and trusting your defense was the right call in how the game was shaping up. Doing the same against say, Ohio State, probably won’t work too well since you will probably start trading touchdowns for field goals but against MSU it was trading punts for field goals. Well coached game by Michigan and the thoroughly dominated MSU along the lines, racking up 276 rushing yards (177 for Blake Corum). It was the type of win Fielding Yost would’ve probably enjoyed.
Michigan State – F- – Ignoring the insanity in the tunnel after the game…MSU continues to be pathetic. How Scottie Hazelton continues to have a job is beyond me. In all the well deserved jokes about Iowa and Brian Ferentz, at least there is familiar connection so you can understand why Kirk – albeit misguided – would struggle with firing his son. But Why does Mel Tucker have that feeling for Hazelton? I understand Hazelton did well at Kansas State and Wyoming before coming to East Lansing but in the year plus eight games he has been with Tucker, the defense has been dreadful. With Tucker having a defensive mind and Hazelton having his resume, what the hell is going on? My guess: too many cooks syndrome. Tucker says one thing, Hazelton says another, player gets confused, player doesn’t know what they are doing on any given play. By cutting Hazelton loose, Tucker can focus on actually coaching this unit. Or, maybe Tucker just needs to be the CEO and stop even attempting to talk to the defense, something the late, great Norm Parker and then Phil Parker (no relation) have enjoyed at Iowa.
Nebraska – D- – A little hard to grade because Casey Thompson’s injury sapped this team of any chance of a comeback (although he wasn’t playing particularly well before that). No matter how you slice it, gaining less than 250 yards and having 4 giveaways (-3 for the day) against a team as good as Illinois is no path for pulling an upset. This loss also marks the second in a row and the fifth of the season. So at 3-5, what are the paths for a bowl? Not great to be honest. They still have a crossover at Michigan. I honestly don’t see a way for Nebraska to win that game. That means NU has to go 3-0 in their remaining western games. Those opponents are: Minnesota, Wisconsin, and at Iowa. Based on how well Illinois ran on the Huskers, one would think Minnesota and/or Wisconsin stands a great shot at taking down Nebraska. That puts the bowl path to the extremely narrow: 5-7 and pray we still get an invite. The question is though, why would Nebraska even accept a bowl at 5-7? That mark wouldn’t be enough for Mickey Joseph to keep his job and they wouldn’t have the new coach running camp or practices for bowl prep. If I’m in that athletic office, I’m thinking long and hard about turning any 5-7 bowl down. Ultimately getting one last go for the seniors would be nice and Husker nation travels so well, but this is pure conjecture and will probably be a moot point because in reality Nebraska is more likely to be 3-9 or 4-8 than 5-7.
Northwestern – F- – How do you make Iowa’s offense look good? No, seriously, how bad does your scheme and play calling have to be to let Iowa put up 398 yards of offense and 33 points – 20 of them in the first half? I don’t want to hear about “oh the talent gap” blah blah blah. Let’s face facts, NU’s overall defensive talent isn’t 27 points worse than Illinois’s is. Yet, Iowa managed just six measly points against the Illini. This way, WAY, more about Xs and Os and not Jims and Joes. Did I use that cliché right?
Ohio State – B+ – Well after not having too many punches to take this season, the Bucks showed that they can indeed face some adversity and still win. Penn State led 14-13 at half and then again early in the fourth 21-16 before Ohio State was able to take advantage of some Penn State miscues to win. Despite all this I can’t put the game in the A range because Ohio State needed four turnovers to help get over the hump and were woeful on third down going just 4/12. That performance was gritty and gutsy and got the win, but that same performance against Georgia? Tennessee? Alabama? I don’t see it. If this is OSU against their best competition of the season thus far AND playing in a nasty road environment, then they aren’t there just yet as a true title contender. They have time to get there no doubt, but it isn’t there yet.
Penn State – B- – What can be added to this game that I already didn’t talk about in OSU’s grade? Oh yeah, the elephant in the room. No, that’s not quite right. The big red dog in the room: Clifford. Sean Clifford. What a strange career he has had. The same day he passes Trace McSorley as PSU’s all time passing leader and throws three TDs in a valiant upset bid, he also has three INTs, including a backbreaking pick six in the fourth quarter while down just six points. He’s a really talented quarterback but not talented enough to bolt for the NFL. He’s won a lot of games at Penn State, just not ones that get PSU over the hump as a program. A little bit better ball security by him and luck, his career would be very different. The best comparison I can make is from just up the road: Big Ben. His career was amazing but the last few years of it he only had flashes of that Super Bowl winning talent he had in his youth and they could not longer win big playoff games with him. When Roethlisberger retired no Steelers fan complained. When Clifford wraps up his career at Penn State, no Nittany Lions fan will complain. But give it time, time heals all wounds. In five years Big Ben will get resounding cheers and standing ovations when they honor him in the Steel City. The same will be true for the Cliff dog when they honor him in Happy Valley.
Purdue – Off
Rutgers – F – The ugly offense we have grown to dislike at Rutgers struck again in their shutout loss to the Gophers. It all stems from the quarterback play. Trying to sneak into a bowl, they’ve played the trusted veteran Noah Vedral at times and but will also call on hyped prospect Gavin Wimsatt to get him reps at times. The result has been more bad than good and against Minnesota it was all bad. Vedral and Wimsatt combined to go 9/24 for 86 yards, 0 TDs, 2 INTs. It is basically impossible to win games playing that poorly at quarterback unless you a) don’t pass it much and run the triple option (see: Paul Johnson’s best years at Tech and Navy) or b) have an insane day running the ball thanks to an amazing running back (see: last Sunday with the Titans). Rutgers doesn’t run the triple option and doesn’t have Derrick Henry…so it was…brutally ugly offense.
Wisconsin – Off
Game of the Week – How could it be anything other than the Ohio State – Penn State game? Lions gave the Bucks their best punch and Ohio State took it and was able to rally despite trailing in the game.
Why Did I Watch This? Award – Minnesota may have only been up 14-0 at half but by that point RU had touched the ball four times, produced 58 yards of offense, punted three times, and fumbled once. Gross.
Gambling Report Card:
- Illinois at Nebraska – UI (-7.5)
The Illini were up 11 at the half and then shutout the Huskers in the second half en route to a 17 point victory.
- Northwestern at Iowa – Points (UI -11.0), Under (37.5)
Fitz hates Iowa and this is his Super Bowl. I expected a lot more scrap from the Cats and none was there. I think I know how to bet NU the rest of the season. They’re dreadful. Still cost me this week though as I went 0-2 from this one.
- Michigan State at Michigan – UM (-23.0)
I praised Harbaugh on getting field goals in their grade. Now I’ll hammer him here. You won by 22, ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!?!
- Rutgers at Minnesota – Points (UM -14.0)
Gophers looked dreadful for two weeks and Rutgers looked competent. That flipped in Minneapolis as the Scarlet Knights were a clown college football team while the Gophers returned (at least temporarily) to their early season form.
- Ohio State at Penn State – OSU (-15.5), Over (62)
Got a much needed split as I had a wretched week. All it took was an insane fourth quarter that saw 45 combined points scored. Whelp, I’ll take it any way I can.
Week Record: 2-5-0
Season Record: 47-36-2
Big Ten and Counting 