3 seems like the upper end of what's a reasonable ranking for us. We're somewhere between solid and elite in every position group except LB and QB. LB looks like it could be an issue so hopefully we can get 2 more guys to emerge besides Gedeon. But our D-line and secondary are so good that they can hide subpar LBs so maybe it won't matter. The QB position, however, will be key in determining if 3 ends up being a good prediction or not. While, I fully believe in Harbaugh's ability to coach QBs, I'm worried it could take too long. It took Rudock 10 games before he really figured it out and maybe O'Korn or Morris or whoever doesn't figure it out until next season, you never know. That being said, I think O'Korn will be really good and the team will actually live up to expectations. I can't wait for the season to start!
I agree with this. I took a closer look at the 4 Big 12 teams and the only quality opponents they play are each other, with the exception of maybe Tennessee for OU. Unless OU wins out, a 1 loss Big 12 champ has no more than 2 quality wins and 11 wins overall. Compare that to possibly 4 and 11 for UM, we should have the edge over Ok St, Baylor and TCU.
Who would have thought at the beginning of the season both Utah and BYU are both potentially 10+ win teams and Oregon would struggle this badly. I'm glad this worked out this way though.
I don't think Florida matters at all if they drop the SEC championship game to Bama. I'll give opponents their most reasonable records and UF's best wins are over 9-3 Georgia, 9-3 FSU, 8-4 Ole Miss and 8-4 Tennessee. They'll have losses to 10-1 LSU and 12-1 Bama. UM's best wins are over 12-1 Iowa, 11-1 OSU, 10-2 NW and 10-2 BYU with losses to 11-2 Utah and 10-2 MSU. With a conference title, our resume looks clearly better than UF's.
Even if ND doesn't lose again, I can still see a way in for us. Stanford drops the game against ND but beats Utah in the Pac 12 championship game. Okie St beats Baylor and loses to OU, OU beats TCU but loses to Baylor, TCU over Baylor. OU, TCU and Baylor have 2 losses each and Okie St has 1.
If we win out we could have wins over teams with 12, 11, 10, and 10 wins. With a 11-2 record, 4 quality wins (I'll definite it as teams with 9+ wins) and a conference title, our main competition would be 11-1 Okie St(conference champ), 10-1 LSU, 11-1 OSU, 11-2 Stanford(conference champ) and 12-1 Iowa, with 2, 2, 1, 2 and 2(or 3) quality wins respectively. I think we would have a strong enough resume to beat them all and get in at #4.
Whether or not they return to irrelevance is completely independent of how we act. We can ignore them all we want but if they keep winning 12 games a season, they're still relevant. Irrelevance will only happen when Harbaugh beats Dantonio so many times he forces him to retire and Sparty goes back to winning 6 games a season.
For the season, he's averaged 223 yds, 54.5% completion percentage, 13 TD, 2 INT, 7.6 ypa
He's definitely improved over the season but that Illinois game looks a lot like an abberation. He looks like a guy who can throw a good deep ball but isn't very accurate or consistent. I'm thinking the only real way he can hurt us is by throwing a few deep balls but given their offensive line issues, we shouldn't have too many issues with him. Then again, we thought Minnesota wouldn't get 100 yards passing against our defense and instead Leidner has his best game of the season so who knows?
Based on how Big Ten tie breakers work, we won't need to be ranked ahead of OSU to make the Big Ten title game. And if we beat an undefeated or 1 loss Iowa in the title game, who knows, the CFP committee might view our whole body of work more favorably and by virtue of our head to head win, move us into 4th ahead of OSU. It certainly is possible to think 11-2 Michigan with a win over OSU is more deserving than 11-1 OSU.
I really want Mike D'Antonio to stay at MSU so Harbaugh can beat him 6 times straight and force him to retire. Also don't appreciate the Maryland hate, they're pretty chill.
I wasn't saying that we need attrition from them to win, I agree that they won under very fortunate circumstances. Not only did they need the refs to help them out, they also needed some low percentage plays to happen at the right times just to be in it at the end.
The point I was trying to make is that if we played well enough to win easily this year, we could easily blow them out next year. I get that you're still mad, not that I can blame you, but next year, I doubt you'll care that much even if we beat a 2-5 MSU, as long as we win. That play is never gonna go away but if Harbaugh is as good as Bo was against them, then it's not gonna mean much when we can say 8 straight and Harbaugh forces Dantonio to retire.
I can't wait for the future. Especially next year's game against these guys. Just look at who they lose. Cook, Burbridge, Allen, Clark(RG), Calhoun, Heath(DT), Thomas, Harris(LB), and probably Conklin. It's basically their best players. We return pretty much everyone that matters and if we find a QB, look out, it could get ugly for them real fast.
I was thinking exactly the same thing. The whole game, I was talking about how well Cook was throwing the ball and how good Burbridge was for making all those tough catches. If Cook was even just an above average QB that MSU would have struggled to put up 10 on us. Still, as well as he played, MSU was very lucky to have 21 offensive points and needed some kind of a break on each scoring drive. If just a few things go our way, we could have held them to single digits.
If Lewis returns, we'll basically have the same defense next year. I don't know exactly how good our defense will be or how good MSU's offense will be but if Dantonio doesn't figure something out, something resembling that 2013 game, with the roles reversed, could be in the works.
Feel this so hard. I've always felt that there was no need to be disrespectful towards them but with how MSU people I know, even some people I considered friends, acted with the taunting and insults, I'm going to give them so much shit when we win next year. I can take the whole arrogant asshole act to the next level. They asked for it.
Feel this so hard. I've always felt that there was no need to be disrespectful towards them but with how MSU people I know, even some people I considered friends, acted with the taunting and insults, I'm going to give them so much shit when we win next year. I can take the whole arrogant asshole act to the next level. They asked for it.
I have to admit, I did hate MSU a lot, maybe more than OSU, for a couple of days after the game but then I realized that it really was the way we lost that I was most pissed about and that I would have felt the same way if it had been to some completely unrelated team like say Virginia Tech. The only reason why a loss to MSU is worse than another team is dealing with all the Spartys in your life, who seem to feel the need to go out of their way to make you feel bad. I got multiple phone calls and texts right after it happened from them taunting me about it. They all seemed to take far more enjoyment from the fact Michigan had a painful loss than MSU winning the game. Even now, all they seem to talk about is how much this loss hurt us, even though their team is well in the playoff hunt. Could you even imagine us doing that if we beat MSU in that fashion? We would be talking about winning the Big Ten and possibly the national title and focused on ourselves.
Mike Hart was totally right about MSU being little brother. Jemele Hill's tweets and rant after the game perfectly encapsulates the Spartan mindset of how they care more about Michigan hurting than MSU succeeding. Even after all these years of success, they are still seem to need collective validation from Michigan to feel good about themselves. They are the ultimate Little Brother program.
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3 seems like the upper end of what's a reasonable ranking for us. We're somewhere between solid and elite in every position group except LB and QB. LB looks like it could be an issue so hopefully we can get 2 more guys to emerge besides Gedeon. But our D-line and secondary are so good that they can hide subpar LBs so maybe it won't matter. The QB position, however, will be key in determining if 3 ends up being a good prediction or not. While, I fully believe in Harbaugh's ability to coach QBs, I'm worried it could take too long. It took Rudock 10 games before he really figured it out and maybe O'Korn or Morris or whoever doesn't figure it out until next season, you never know. That being said, I think O'Korn will be really good and the team will actually live up to expectations. I can't wait for the season to start!
I agree with this. I took a closer look at the 4 Big 12 teams and the only quality opponents they play are each other, with the exception of maybe Tennessee for OU. Unless OU wins out, a 1 loss Big 12 champ has no more than 2 quality wins and 11 wins overall. Compare that to possibly 4 and 11 for UM, we should have the edge over Ok St, Baylor and TCU.
If I had a vote, I would put Nebraska at #25. A bunch of quality losses and causing MSU fans to be salty af is good enough for me!
Who would have thought at the beginning of the season both Utah and BYU are both potentially 10+ win teams and Oregon would struggle this badly. I'm glad this worked out this way though.
I don't think Florida matters at all if they drop the SEC championship game to Bama. I'll give opponents their most reasonable records and UF's best wins are over 9-3 Georgia, 9-3 FSU, 8-4 Ole Miss and 8-4 Tennessee. They'll have losses to 10-1 LSU and 12-1 Bama. UM's best wins are over 12-1 Iowa, 11-1 OSU, 10-2 NW and 10-2 BYU with losses to 11-2 Utah and 10-2 MSU. With a conference title, our resume looks clearly better than UF's.
Even if ND doesn't lose again, I can still see a way in for us. Stanford drops the game against ND but beats Utah in the Pac 12 championship game. Okie St beats Baylor and loses to OU, OU beats TCU but loses to Baylor, TCU over Baylor. OU, TCU and Baylor have 2 losses each and Okie St has 1.
If we win out we could have wins over teams with 12, 11, 10, and 10 wins. With a 11-2 record, 4 quality wins (I'll definite it as teams with 9+ wins) and a conference title, our main competition would be 11-1 Okie St(conference champ), 10-1 LSU, 11-1 OSU, 11-2 Stanford(conference champ) and 12-1 Iowa, with 2, 2, 1, 2 and 2(or 3) quality wins respectively. I think we would have a strong enough resume to beat them all and get in at #4.
Coincidence I hope. I would be so disappointed if Harbaugh doesn't get an opportunity to do to Dantonio what Tressel did to Lloyd.
Whether or not they return to irrelevance is completely independent of how we act. We can ignore them all we want but if they keep winning 12 games a season, they're still relevant. Irrelevance will only happen when Harbaugh beats Dantonio so many times he forces him to retire and Sparty goes back to winning 6 games a season.
I loved her response. So salty.
It doesn't matter how you win right Sparty?
I'm kind of shocked that Kansas isn't anywhere here, they have a lot of quality losses.
I bet MSU is going to talk about how they're being disrespected at #7.
Hack is still really questionable for me, look at his numbers for the last 4 games:
Indiana: 21-39, 262 yds, 53.8%, 2 TD, 0 INT, 6.7 ypa
OSU: 7-13, 120 yds, 53.8%, 1 TD, 0 INT, 9.2 ypa
Maryland: 13-29, 315 yds, 44.8%, 3 TD, 0 INT, 10.9 ypa
Illinois: 21-29, 266 yds, 72.4%, 2 TD, 0 INT, 9.2 ypa
For the season, he's averaged 223 yds, 54.5% completion percentage, 13 TD, 2 INT, 7.6 ypa
He's definitely improved over the season but that Illinois game looks a lot like an abberation. He looks like a guy who can throw a good deep ball but isn't very accurate or consistent. I'm thinking the only real way he can hurt us is by throwing a few deep balls but given their offensive line issues, we shouldn't have too many issues with him. Then again, we thought Minnesota wouldn't get 100 yards passing against our defense and instead Leidner has his best game of the season so who knows?
We're basically Alabama with a slightly worse offense, I'll take it.
I would say I now know how MSU felt 2 weeks ago but our guys actually made a play to win the game instead of having a gift dropped in their laps
I would say I now know how MSU felt 2 weeks ago but our guys actually made a play to win the game instead of having a gift dropped in their laps
I would say I now know how MSU felt 2 weeks ago but our guys actually made a play to win the game instead of having a gift dropped in their laps
I would say I now know how MSU felt 2 weeks ago but our guys actually made a play to win the game instead of having a gift dropped in their laps
I would say I know how Sparty felt 2 weeks ago but we actually made a play to win instead of having a gift dropped in our lap.
I would take Hill in a heartbeat. More competition can only help and if O'Korn can start with Hill here, we'll have a top notch starting QB.
I can't wait for the future. Especially next year's game against these guys. Just look at who they lose. Cook, Burbridge, Allen, Clark(RG), Calhoun, Heath(DT), Thomas, Harris(LB), and probably Conklin. It's basically their best players. We return pretty much everyone that matters and if we find a QB, look out, it could get ugly for them real fast.
I was thinking exactly the same thing. The whole game, I was talking about how well Cook was throwing the ball and how good Burbridge was for making all those tough catches. If Cook was even just an above average QB that MSU would have struggled to put up 10 on us. Still, as well as he played, MSU was very lucky to have 21 offensive points and needed some kind of a break on each scoring drive. If just a few things go our way, we could have held them to single digits.
If Lewis returns, we'll basically have the same defense next year. I don't know exactly how good our defense will be or how good MSU's offense will be but if Dantonio doesn't figure something out, something resembling that 2013 game, with the roles reversed, could be in the works.
Or they try and compare the two plays and keep on bringing our's up.