Michigan State’s football team got absolutely hammered, losing 31-3 to Wisconsin at Camp Randall Stadium on Saturday, October 3rd, and frankly, they looked completely lifeless. The Spartans took a beating in Madison, and the grades coming out of that game are just brutal, showing a squad that’s struggling to find any kind of rhythm.
Offense? More Like Off-It
The offense earned a D- grade, and honestly, that might be generous. As their competition level steps up, so do the mistakes, across the board. Quarterback Alessio Milivojevic still looks painfully slow in his decision-making, missing open receivers with throws that were behind, wide, high, and even low. It’s tough to watch.
Backup QB Cam Fancher didn’t fare much better. He started the first drive of the second half, only to get knocked out of the game with an apparent right knee injury. The offensive line is a mess, missing assignments left and right. We saw left tackle Ben Murawski get beat off the edge, and right guard Nick Sharpe whiffed on an interior block, leading to a sack of Milivojevic when he tried to step up to avoid the first rusher on MSU’s very first drive. Yikes.
Receivers aren’t helping much either, struggling to create separation. Senior Chrishon McCray even had a critical drop in the fourth quarter on the fifth fourth down attempt the offense failed to convert. But hey, it wasn’t all bad news for the ground game! Running backs Jaziun Patterson, with 62 yards on 18 carries, and Marvis Parrish, adding 36 yards on 11 carries, actually did well in their first full game replacing the season-ending injury to Cam Edwards. They didn’t even have any lost yardage. Tight end Jayden Savoury also caught four passes for 26 yards on six targets.
Here’s the kicker though: no turnovers and no penalties. You’d think that’s a positive, right? But despite that, they went a combined 6-for-24 on third- and fourth-down conversion attempts, managed only 235 total yards, and failed to reach the end zone entirely. This is the first time they’ve done that after scoring in their previous two power-conference games. That conversion rate is just brutal and shows why they had no pulse offensively.
Defense Earned a Straight ‘F’ – No Joke
If the offense was bad, the defense was a complete disaster, earning a straight-up F. Their main job was to stop Wisconsin quarterback Colton Joseph, and they failed in the most glaring way possible. Joseph carved them up, accounting for 286 of the Badgers’ 373 total yards with his arm and legs. Think about that for a second.
Joseph exploited MSU’s already depleted linebacker corps, especially with senior captain Jordan Hall out of the game. He ran for a massive 141 yards on just 13 carries, including a 47-yard touchdown in the third quarter where he just burst past Cam Stodghill and Brady Pretzlaff and blew right through the rest of the secondary. That’s embarrassing. And that was AFTER he already threw two first-quarter touchdown passes! Just to rub salt in the wound, he delivered a 46-yard laser in the fourth quarter to a wide-open Malachi Coleman. Seriously.
The issues didn’t stop there. They continued to give up explosive plays. They failed to get a single sack or generate a turnover for the third straight game. Yeah, you read that right, three straight games without a sack or a turnover. And to top it off, they gave up 228 yards rushing. This defense has absolutely no answers right now, and it’s a huge problem for the team.
This article was created with AI assistance and published under Seattle On Tap’s editorial standards. See our Editorial Policy.
Originally reported by Yahoo Sports.
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