Nebraska football has a NEW TEST against Michigan State on Saturday. Graham Couch of the Lansing State Journal joins Hurrdat Sports Live to give a preview of Michigan State’s perspective of the Big Ten battle with the Huskers. Dylan Raiola could COOK the Spartans’ pass defense. Have injuries taken their toll in East Lansing? How does Michigan State evaluate the matchup with the Huskers?
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We are joined now by Graham uh excuse me. Whoa. Got a little little thing. Did you get emotional thinking about Sparty there? I did. I got real emotional thinking about our next guest, Graham County, columnist for the Lancing State Journals. Apologize about that. Graham got a little scratch in my throat. How you doing this morning? I’m well. That’s the way a lot of MSU fans sound when they think about the defense. Oh, that’s tough. All right, Graeme, let’s just start there. Let’s start there. So, uh, you know, us being Nebraska based and right here in Omaha, we have a lot of our own consternation when it comes to how we feel the national landscape, uh, values and, uh, looks at Dylan Raayola at quarterback because obviously we see him at a higher pedestal than where many people put them. What’s the fan base of Michigan State feeling when they’re going up against Dylan with the past defense that uh, the Spartans have showcased through their first couple of games? Yeah, I I don’t think it’s specific to him at all. You’re you’re right. I mean, nationally, I don’t think the perception of him is is probably what it is locally. And part of that, though, is I think for MSU, their problems have been more about them. And they’ve faced a couple of good quarterbacks already, uh, both against USC and Boston College who who frankly, uh, ate them up, you know, and, um, so they’re not I think that’s just one of those givens. if you’ve got a capable, good quarterback, they’re concerned and they’re worried that if they can’t disrupt the timing and they give you all day that uh you know people will actually confuse Patrick Mahomes and Raola like that that so like that that’s I think that’s the concern but it’s it’s not a disrespect to him as much as there’s just overall real concern about the defense’s ability to uh disrupt any decent quarterback. So, Graham, as you kind of try and diagnose what the issues have been, you mentioned they they’ve seen a couple good quarterbacks um already this year, does it feel like it’s a it’s a scheme or a systemic issue? Is it a personnel issue? Like, what have what have you seen that I guess the question is, does it feel fixable over the course of the season? I mean, to to a small degree it probably is. I I think the hope that it is because otherwise it’s going to be potentially a long season. I mean the you know they’re coming off a buy as you know as every teams gets you know and then that sometimes is an important week where you improve a little bit. Um but the and there is some concern I think from portions of the fan base about Joe Rossy the defensive coordinator but you know he he’s been a pretty good coordinator a few you know a couple places and um I I just don’t think he’s an idiot. So, I think it’s the Jimmies and the Joe’s. And when you look at Michigan State’s, you know, sort of the way they constructed their roster and the priorities they this last off season, you know, they they clearly spent their money and their resources um improving their offense, which they’ve done uh both at receiver and um on the offensive line, you know, which needed an upgrade to survive this year. And so, they’re not a place that had unlimited resources this year. So, I mean, we’ll see what that looks like in the rev share era. And I know Matt Rules talked about this as well. And, you know, it’s it’s um you know, sometimes you don’t have the ability to just go buy the best defensive line in the country like Texas A&M did or whatever. And um that’s sort of where they are. They’ve got a couple, you know, decent young pieces that they like. They’ve got they’ve got I you know, frankly, I don’t even know what their level is at linebacker and in the secondary because I think they do have a couple decent pieces, but when you can’t get to the quarterback, you know, everything looks bad no matter what you have. So, you don’t even it’s it’s even hard to evaluate. The problem with what happened last week was they were also not or two weeks ago when they play last played against USC is they also weren’t very good against the run. And so, that had been something they’d been okay at. like if if you know if you can’t do anything then then you’re in trouble. So you mentioned the offensive line there and it’s been a place obviously with Ramil being reported he’ll be out for this upcoming week and and probably a few weeks into the future. And then you know you’ve got some guys there particularly at the guard spots that have struggled a little bit over the course of the season. What is I guess what’s been the what’s been the issue on the offensive line again? Is it a Jimmy and Joe situation where you just don’t have the horses or is it a thing where hey they still just need a little bit of time to gel together? Well, so this will be an interesting week for that because um you know I mean as you guys are aware Nebraska has not been uh great at at stopping the run, right? That’s just not been the strength of this has been a Michigan State team that has been uh noticeably improved now. Everything’s relative. Like they were just a really bad offensive line last year in all phases and they have been that at times quite a bit in the last decade. So the improvement I mean they’ve been able to run the football from time to time pretty well. Not maybe as consistently as they’d like. I think some of their bigger problems have been in protection of of of Aiden Giles. Um, and they’re lucky he’s as fleefooted as he is or, you know, they’d be in real they’d be in real trouble. Um, so yeah, it it I think it’s a line that is improved. That’s okayish. That’s um that’s not the reason they can’t do things as a team, but it’s not where you need to be to to compete to contend in the Big 10 and and and push people around and win win win enough battles. They’re just So I I think they’ve got a really good offensive line coach. That’s one area I pretty confident in their coaching ability. I just think they’ve they’ve still got work to do in development and and recruitment and um and they have had some injuries, but they they’re better depthwise than than they were a year ago. So, you know, they can withstand them and everybody has injuries. It’s like one of those things, you know, if you’ve got a full complement of defensive backs, then that’s that’s the news, not the fact that you got injured defensive backs, the way football goes these days. Graham, when looking at uh kind of how this contest may shake out, you mentioned the running game for uh Michigan State and just getting ready for it. is the general vibe that you’re getting leading into this week, coming out of that by week, that this could be more of a matchup that Michigan State allows Aiden Child to try to, you know, win the game and play like a quarterback duel against Dylan Ryola and just, you know, keep the ball in his hands or is it a slow it down game, limit the possessions and just run the ball and try to get out of there as fast as you can and uh see how lowcoring this one can go? Yeah, I mean their offense needs to help their defense out in certain ways, but um you know I don’t you know and if they can run the ball and they can have you know length, you know, length of possession and and and really do that to to be the team that would help. I don’t think I I think what they need to do is score points on offense and and they’ve got a good offense. They’ve got some explosive ability on offense and if they’re scoring then that’s fine. Uh, I you know, it’s a real question this weekend is exactly how explosive Nebraska is relative to what this defense is. I mean, I think the way Michigan State sees this week, at least a lot of MSU fans do, and they’re probably right on this, is it’s it’s a telling week. Not not so much that they have to win the game. It’s a road game at a solid team in Nebraska. But, you know, I think a lot of us watched Nebraska play Michigan and saw that, you know, they did not win the battle at the line of scrimmage. And so, if if if you don’t hold your own there uh against Nebraska, then it’s probably going to be trouble a few other times this year. And so, it’s about how it looks, that it’s competitive, that it looks like two teams that belong on the field against each other. And I think offensively they’ll be okay whether they can run the ball or not. I mean, they should be able to based on what Nebraska’s shown. Nebraska’s pass defense has been really good. MSU’s pass offense has been their strength, but they ought to be a good enough pass offense at this point from what we’ve seen to to still, you know, have their moments there. So, um, I I think it’s about just being productive offensively and there’s, you know, I know there’s a lot about complimentary football, but at this point, complimentary football is scoring points. Graham, how do you think they’ll weigh? You mentioned it there. Their their pass offense for Michigan State has been their strength obviously going up against the strength of the Nebraska defense in the secondary and their pass defense. How much do you weigh because this is a conversation we’ve been having a lot in Nebraska honestly is how much do you weigh kind of who you want to be and trying to take advantage of what you perceive the defense of the opposing or the weakness of the opposing defense to be versus hey this is what we’re best at. This is what we’re good at. We should stick with that. It’s a good question. Um, I mean, I think if they can run the ball, they’ll, you know, they’d like to do that. They like to be balanced. The thing is where they are potentially, I mean, their difference makers are in the past. I mean, if you’re talking about where they’re Nick Marsh really, really good. Yeah. I mean, Nick Marsh is an NFL player. He just got, you know, it’s just going to take a minute until he’s um, you know, he’s only a sophomore. Um, but he he’s got a chance to be a first round pick. You know, Aiden Aiden Child is um it’s hard to know exactly what NFL scouts think of him, but he he’s a greatly improved player um who has all the tools. And so that that’s you know, he he’s got proability, put it that way. I don’t I don’t you know, there’s consistency things or things he’s going to have to show over time that the whether he’s that player. Omari Kelly, the receiver that they picked up from Tennessee State, been in Auburn early in his career. when I talk about upgrading the offense in the offseason, like he’s a he’s a legit um you know, if that’s your number two receiver, you’re in really good shape guy. And they have some other speed guys and and real strength there. And so I I I think you got to, you know, they’re going to play, you know, they’ve got Michigan still on the schedule, they’ve got Indiana, they got Penn State, like they if you’re going to compete with those teams, those guys are going to have to be special at times. And they’ve got to be guys who it doesn’t matter who the defense is. And what, you know, I think when I look back at like the the best Michigan State teams think about, they’ve had players, if you go back eras, I mean, guys everybody’s heard of, you know, the TJ Duckets of the world, the Placo Burus, Charles Rogers. didn’t matter if it was Alabama or whoever was on the field. Those guys were a problem. And I think the passing game has some athletes where that is the case. And that’s got to show itself if they’re going to have a chance to punch up and pull up sets. Uh so Graham, I you brought up you wondered how or weren’t sure how NFL scouts would would think about Aiden Childs and his ability. I’m curious how uh Michigan State and their fans feel about Aiden Childs. obviously gotten off to a pretty good start this year. Like what’s the what’s the thinking around just in East Lancing and how people are receiving his performance early in the year? Yeah, I mean it’s it’s changed uh completely from last year in terms of how he’s perceived. Um I mean last year I think people were pretty disappointed by it. Um you know he came in with a lot of hype. He was a true sophomore. He was still 18 years old when the year started. you know, he’s really young for his age. Um, or for his young everybody’s young for their age. Young for his grade, I should say. Yeah. Um, and uh, but he was, you know, I I think there was disappointment. There was also disappointment because, you know, in the whole Jonathan Smith arriving, transfers coming in, transfers coming out. You know, Michigan State lost Sam Levit, who’s at Arizona State, who’s a really good quarterback, and they got Child. So, there’s that comparison there. And um but this year, I mean, it’s just it’s turnovers are his big issue. You know, he hasn’t that hasn’t been a problem this year. And you know, he’s done a much better job of keeping his eyes up and making plays and and um you know, I I just think people are beginning to trust that he’s the player he’s shown. And now at this point, they’ve had they played a USC team that, you know, I don’t want to say their strengths on defense because they have some guys on the defensive line that are are tough. Um but they’ve beaten and they’ve beaten a Boston College team that’s sort of fallen apart. Um so it’ll it’ll be interesting. These are these are the moments where he’s got to kind of prove that. But people are beginning to trust him and people like him and and I don’t think any MSU fan thinks he’s think he’s their Graham when they when uh just looking at this game from the Michigan State perspective as well when it comes to just the the totality of the entire season. where where does this Nebraska game rank or just uh where is it valued uh amongst some of the other games either that came before or after it? Is it one of those that the fan base is looking at as maybe a turning point game that they’re going to learn something about their program? How are they valuing this comparative to the rest of the schedule? Yeah, I mean I think it it’s a little bit of a swing game. Um, now they’ve said that about other games, but that’s sort of what this season is and and is that other teams show themselves and things unfold. Um, you know, they’re they’re three and one and they have UCLA next week who’s awful coming to East Lancing, right? So, at the midpoint, you’re 4-2 at worst um going into the second half, but the second half of the season is at Indiana, Michigan at home, at Minnesota, Penn State at home, at Iowa, and then you got Maryland at at a neutral sight sort of forward field. Like people don’t know where the next win’s necessarily coming from and and that includes Nebraska, but they view Nebraska as a more beatable team than probably at least at least three of the teams left on their schedule. And so when you’re talking about a team that hasn’t been to a bowl game in a while, hasn’t been playing from above 500 in a while, it’s it’s sort of a um you know, I don’t want to say it’s a pivot point, but it it’s a it’s a game that that matters. It’s consequential. if you win it, it can potentially change a lot about, you know, what what your season looks like. If you don’t, um, people are wondering how you get to six a little bit. And so that’s, uh, that’s that’s how big it is. Uh, Graham, I’ll get you out of here on this. You mentioned kind of the recent struggles of of Michigan State football and kind of some of the things they’ve been going through and the challenges that the schedule presents in the back half of the season. What what constitutes a successful year two for Jonathan Smith in in East Lancing? They need momentum and and that that can look a several different ways. That could be they they got to get to a bowl game. They got to get to six. I think that would be problematic. But when I say momentum, it’s got to feel that way. you know, it’s it’s losing that last game to Maryland wouldn’t be great if that, you know, or if it was a the Michigan game is going to be really really important and and partly that they have a chance to win it, but also in how he treats it, how they looked. I mean, last year they went to Michigan and they were sort of pushing Michigan around early in the game. They had probably his worst coach game, a couple disastrous decisions that turned the game and Michigan wound up winning pretty comfortably in the end. And then there was a scuffle on the field and um you know Michigan State’s AD at the time complained about it to the Big 10 office and when the Big 10 office did nothing and MSU kind of put his tail between his legs and people did not appreciate the fight like the the hatred from Michigan around these parts is real and they just and so that and they didn’t feel like Jonathan Smith understood the rivalry. Um and they they just felt like they let themselves get bullied. So that game is going to determine a lot of it’s a home game of of sort of the psyche of the fan base in this season. But um you know they’ve got to have momentum coming out of it for it to feel like a success. I think you’ll you’ll sort of know it when you see it. And that the minimum of that is a competitive day against Michigan and six wins. Um but it might even take slightly more. That’s Graham Couch, columnist for the Lancing State Journal. Graham, appreciate the time as always. Uh, I hope you enjoy the game this weekend, but I hope you enjoy it a little bit less than we do. Sounds good. Thanks for having me. That’s Grant G from the Lancing State Journal.
1 Comment
put a spy on the quarterback maybe?