Comparing pass defenses - a reason for hope.

While we all know how crap-tastic our pass defense has looked recently, we must take note of the fact that MSU's pass defense is 10th in the Big Ten, while ours is 8th. So if ours is as bad as it apparently is, how bad must MSU's be? Could this be an artifact of the fact that we've learned how to (gasp!) tackle, thus leading to fewer YAC?