UM vs MSU: The better team tends to win the game
Before you neg the title as being the most obvious thing ever, let me explain.
There is often a narrative that comes with these type of games “You can throw the records out the window in a rivalry game like this”. What I found is that this hasn’t been the case lately. The team that has ended the season with more wins has won every game since 2001. (The infamous clock game at Spartan Stadium. They finished 7-5, we finished 8-4) The only slight exception was 2011 when we lost but finished 11-2, they finished 11-3. However, we can all agree that the 2011 team was a very fortunate 11 win team and MSU was probably just better that year.
The point is, often times intense rivalry games like these can make games closer than expected, but typically the better team still comes out on top. And unlike years past when the game was early and we didn’t know enough about both teams, there’s enough data this year that shows UM is just better.
Im not saying we can’t lose on Nov 16, but overwhelmingly the game has played out “as expected”. Similar with OSU. The team with the better end of season record has won every game since 2004. They have unfortunately just been flat out better than us.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
You may not say it but I will... WE CAN'T LOSE TO lil bro !!! #beatstate #hateweeks
I do not want a 14 point victory I want to put this team away big time!!!
November 6th, 2019 at 3:17 PM ^
Weeks! We don’t take a bye in our Hate for Staee!
November 6th, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
I don't really buy this. I think most times the game determines who the better team is, if that makes sense.
We don't often play Michigan State this late, and for a long time now both teams' fortunes have often been in large part dictated by the outcome of the game.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:21 PM ^
Right. How many times have we watched their season implode after a Michigan loss?
November 6th, 2019 at 12:32 PM ^
In 2005 they were 4-0, lost to us and collapsed to 5-6.
In 2003 they were 7-1, lost to us and finished 8-5.
That's about it really. In all four of Dantonio's losses to us, they were already looking mediocre when we played.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:44 PM ^
When MSU started 4-0 in 2005, they did beat Notre Dame in OT, but their other 3 wins were vs Kent State which finished 1-10, Hawaii which finished 5-7, and Illinois which finished 2-9. So it probably has as much to do with playing better competition as it does us breaking their spirits.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:32 PM ^
It's a pretty good comparison to Michigan in 2010. Started 5-0 with wins over UConn, ND (who finished 7-5 in regular season), a 5 pt win over FCS UMass, Bowling Green and Indiana. State was the first good team we played and they beat us pretty badly and we went on to lose to every team that had a pulse. I would argue we just weren't a very good football team.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:58 PM ^
Yeah it was more of a John L. thing if anything
November 6th, 2019 at 12:33 PM ^
Looking back to their seasons the last time I would say that happened was 2005. They were ranked #11 and we beat them in OT at their place. They were 4-0 at the time and went on to finish 5-6.
2006, 2007, 2012, 2016 & 2018 they already had multiple losses going into each of these games and Michigan beating them put them at about .500 or worse at the time.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:53 PM ^
They've been known to implode after a win.
In 1999, Saban's last MSU team (the one with both Plaxico Burress and TJ Duckett) beat Michigan 34-31. They had an inside chance at the Rose Bowl and an outside chance at being the first Big Ten team in the BCS title game (since the Big Ten and the Pac 10 had just joined the Bowl Alliance or whatever the hell it was called).
So what do they do? In their next two games, they get blown out of the water by both a mediocre Purdue team (52-28) and eventual Rose Bowl champion Wisconsin (40-10).
Michigan had already beaten both of those teams. Saban wisely packed it up before the bowl game, leaving the team to the immortal Bobby Williams.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:12 PM ^
That Purdue team had Drew Brees, was rather good, and went to the Rose Bowl after the next season.
But, both Michigan and Michigan State were good enough to play for the national title and fell short. The SEC championship game that year featured Florida and Alabama, both of which fell B1G teams in Michigan.
So, while I disagree with your assessment of Purdue, your critique of MSU is spot on. They played us and that was it for them. Saban knew it, too—after that 99 game against us, he said “I don’t see why we can’t have two great teams in the state and play one great game every year.” He wasn’t complaining about the media or Michigan; he was complaining about the emphasis of his own university and fanbase. When LSU offered to make football an actual priority, he was gone.
I will credit Dantonio with this: MSU’s post-Michigan collapse was an almost sure thing before he came along. He focuses on us, but he also got his teams ready to play the rest of the season, too.
November 6th, 2019 at 2:31 PM ^
That Purdue team did have Drew Brees but despite that they ended up 7-5 and struggled against bad Northwestern and Indiana teams. The 52 points they had against MSU was by far their highest point total of the season against a Big Ten school or Notre Dame; next highest was 33 against an 8-4 Minnesota team. All of their wins against non-cupcake teams *except* the win over MSU were narrow (eight points or less).
The best explanation here is that MSU imploded after the Michigan game.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:17 PM ^
Naturally they imploded. But every team that Purdue squad lost to, including us, Penn State, and Georgia in the Outback Bowl, was ranked when they played them, and Purdue spent most of the year in the top 25. They were ranked 20th when they beat MSU.
MSU imploded, but they weren’t playing bad teams. They were playing good teams and got trucked.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:27 PM ^
I get that. But what game would you point to and say “the better team clearly lost”? Maybe 2017? If we won that game we would probably ended the season with the same record but we weren’t a very good team with Okorn at qb.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:41 PM ^
This is the same type of reasoning that leads to people not considering Wisconsin, MSU, or Penn State as "big games" last year. We ripped Michigan State's heart out last year. Who knows what kind of season they would have had if they had won that game.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:47 PM ^
Do you think we have significantly better seasons in the RichRod era if we win those games?
November 6th, 2019 at 1:27 PM ^
Nope, I think in general Michigan moves on just fine (or not) after a Sparty loss.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:34 PM ^
MSU's offense was already a dumpster fire by the time they played us. OSU was still going to beat them, and they played Nebraska in a snowstorm with their backup QB. I would say they performed as expected. Defense was lights out and the offense was terrible.
The only way their season would've turned out better is if they sat Lewerke so he could fully heal and Felton Davis doesn't injury his Achilles.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:39 PM ^
We may have ripped their hearts out but that's not what caused them to have a bad season. They pulled a rabbit out of their ass against PSU the week before they played us to get to 4-2. Then in the three games immediately following ours they played pretty well. Beat up on Purdue and Maryland and played OSU pretty close for most of that game.
It wasn't until 4 weeks after our game did the wheels fall off and they really imploded.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:47 PM ^
I would say in both 2015 and 2017 the better team lost. I think 2011 is probably another candidate, though if I remember correctly, both teams benefited from a lot of luck that year. With each, the record masked some big deficiencies.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:21 PM ^
You can make a case for 2015. I think it's close.
In 2017, that would only be true with Speight or maybe Peters at QB. With JOK we just were not good offensively at all.
November 6th, 2019 at 2:14 PM ^
In 2015 they went 12-2 and won the B1G. We were 10-3 and they beat us in the big house.
In 2017 they went 10-3 and we were 8-5, and again, they beat us at the big house.
I think the teams were very close those 2 years but I also think the better team won.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:12 PM ^
This is why you have to look deeper than just the number of wins the team gets. For one thing, the schedules aren't the same. For another, if one of the most insane plays in college football history doesn't happen -- or, heck, if Michigan thinks to cover the fullback wheel route -- then Michigan ends up with a better record. So, that one play proved that MSU was better that year?
Anybody who watched that 2015 game could tell who the better team was, and the better team lost.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:29 PM ^
I don't know how you can say that in 2015 MSU was the better team when it took the miracle of all miracles for them to pull off a win. O'Neill fields that punt cleanly and MSU doesn't win the East, doesn't win the B1G and doesn't make the playoff. They likely wind up 10-3 compared to our 11-2.
November 6th, 2019 at 3:32 PM ^
2015 MSU was a huge fluke, like 2011 Michigan. They escaped week after week by the skin of their teeth until getting flattened by Bama.
Now in 2017, I’d say they were a little better than us when we had O’Korn, though it was close.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:51 PM ^
Geez. The OP presents a position and good supporting data and you go all MLive on it. Tsk, tsk.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:32 PM ^
I think there is something to this in general. When a ranked team has a bad loss; or an upset, it seems like its unlikely for them to bounce back quickly; which can derail a season.
So the ranked team that was playing well that you beat in the 5th week then loses the next one, and that one shakes their confidence and they lose a 3rd to another big game. By that time they aren't ranked anymore and people say 'Oh, yeah you beat them but they weren't that good...'
It's college. These are younger, more emotional teams.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
Very enlightening.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:19 PM ^
But but but heart and grit and want-to and effort and lunch pail and toughness and hear football...
November 6th, 2019 at 12:22 PM ^
Mork as much as we like to rag on him knows how to get his guys up for this game. He has a schtick and he makes it work for him. The sale of his soul and his infernal weather machine helped alot too.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:52 PM ^
Well he may need to get creative because putting everyone in a helmet and walking arm in arm across our field is probably not an option. IMO someone needs to get Devin Bush on the sidelines (maybe with his dad?).
November 6th, 2019 at 12:58 PM ^
How bout we get Satan and let Dantonio know, right before kickoff, he's there to collect on the contract?
November 6th, 2019 at 12:27 PM ^
Fair point.
I am pretty confident we will win. I am just afraid of the journey to get there.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:28 PM ^
So this rivalry is overdue for an upset. #BPONETAKES
November 6th, 2019 at 12:35 PM ^
Michigan has not quite lived up to the hype at the beginning of the season, and have been vulnerable at times to lesser teams who fight their asses off rather than plain give up Rutger style (Illinois, Maryland). Sparty is having a difficult go of it- things aren't looking great for them right now, but I guarantee Dantonio will have these guys all playing with a chip on their shoulder, due to last year's pre-game stuff, as well as if they have read anything in John Bacon's book about MSU- also about little brother comment made 20 years ago. Michigan always seems to be Sparty's Superbowl, and they would like nothing better than to take down the Maize & Blue with them into a Black Pit of Negative Expectations while going down in flames- a last gasp on their season. Watch out for wounded animals. If you don't put them down hard, they will turn and tear you apart. So, please go out and destroy Sparty and put an end to any mystique they think they have over Harbaugh and the Wolverines.
Go Blue!
November 6th, 2019 at 12:43 PM ^
as well as if they have read anything in John Bacon's book about MSU
good one, we all know sparty can't read
November 6th, 2019 at 12:40 PM ^
GTFO with your reality and universal truths, there's disrespekt and "JUST THE TYPE OF GAME MORK WINS" at play here.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:44 PM ^
You point to end of season records and yet you assume that Michigan will have a better record that MSU when the season is over.
MSU is 4-4 and has games against Illinois, Michigan, Rutgers, and Maryland left.
UM is 7-2 has games against MSU, IU, and OSU.
It is not inconceivable that the result of the UM/MSU game will determine which team has the better end of season record.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:49 PM ^
The better metric to use is SP+, where the better team at season's end is 11-3 in the last 14 matchups. One of the three was the punt game in 2015.
No secret who the better team is.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:50 PM ^
Above I said the OP made a fair point. To you I say, good point.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:38 PM ^
Many things are theoretically possible. On the other hand:
Wins by Big Ten programs since the start of October:
Michigan: 4
Penn State: 4
Indiana: 4
Minnesota: 4
Ohio State: 3
Illinois: 3
Wisconsin: 2
Iowa: 2
Purdue: 2
Maryland: 1
Nebraska: 1
Rutgers: 1
Northwestern: 0
Michigan State: 0
— Scott Bell (@sbell021) November 3, 2019
November 6th, 2019 at 12:48 PM ^
I know that we all struggle with some sense of BPONE, but for heavens sakes - their offense is putrid! I have a hard time believing that our D is going to allow them to do much of anything offensively, and our offense has got a lot more weapons to use against them. We're at home, we're coming off a bye week, and we will certainly be pumped up to take it to them. Let's throw some anger into the mix and we will be loaded for bear!
November 6th, 2019 at 1:21 PM ^
The Hulk is the wrong color.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:51 PM ^
el queso es viejo y mohoso. ¿Dónde está el baño?
November 6th, 2019 at 1:11 PM ^
Down the hall, second door on the left. Then make sure someone throws out the cheese.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:54 PM ^
I said this in another thread but it bares repeating. The fact that MSU returned tickets speak volumes. I would love to see minimal green in the stadium next Saturday. My plea, leave your Sparty friend at home PLEASE don't bring them because they are your best friend. Don't bring your Sparty spouse because you think it is cute to be dressed as rivals at the game. Find someone maize and blue to bring.
November 6th, 2019 at 2:19 PM ^
and I REALLY want to beg season ticket holders to not give or sell your tickets to Buckeyes for the love of God please no amount of money is worth it.
November 6th, 2019 at 8:36 PM ^
There are two guys that have seats 4 seats to our right that wear Michigan gear every game and then show up in Buckeye gear every time. They have done so for 30 years.
November 6th, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
I had to neg you for the thoughtlessness in finishing your post with "They have unfortunately just been flat out better than us". Your entire post could have been far better structured.
November 6th, 2019 at 1:13 PM ^
They have been under Dantonio.