MSU head coach Mark Dantonio didn’t have a whole lot to say following MSU football’s overtime defeat at the hands of the Indiana Hoosiers on Saturday night. He defended his players as much as he could and restated that the program has been very successful and has an expectation to come out and perform better.
Other than that, questions about the defensive line lack of pressure, running game struggles and uncertainty at the quarterback position were left up in the air, and he said he would have to “watch the film.”
On Sunday, Dantonio made more comments, addressing the quarterback position and clearing up some of the uncertainty from Saturday night.
“The people that sit there with their arms up in an armchair with a big ol’ beer can or soda pop, they’re just going to have to wait it out a little bit,” Dantonio said.
As for the other issues, particularly along the trenches on both sides of the ball, Dantonio will have his work cut out for him in those film sessions. The Spartans failed to get a sack on Indiana quarterback Richard Lagow, despite being without the Hoosiers’ two best linemen –– redshirt-seniors Dan Feeney and Dimitric Camiel.
The defensive front seven only have two tackles for loss and one quarterback hurry, credited to sophomore defensive tackle Raequan Williams, who also had one of the two tackles for loss. The offensive line got flagged for holding a few times and crumbled in overtime, letting Indiana get its first two sacks of the night on back-to-back snaps in the extra quarter.
“These are hard things to answer when you are watching it from ground level and until you watch film and see exactly what happened and you find out, was that a mental error or a structural error,” Dantonio said. “I think you have to assess those aspects when you see a play not working — offense, defense or special teams.”
As for the injury questions to senior cornerback Darian Hicks and Williams, Dantonio had the usual response.
“Yeah, I don’t talk about injuries,” he said.
Dantonio still thought his team was physically up to the challenge of competing and their level of fitness wasn’t the issue, though MSU looks sluggish and tired on the defensive end in the fourth quarter as Indiana scored all 24 points on their last four possessions, excluding the quarterback kneel to end the fourth quarter.
“I really didn’t think we were a tired football team out there,” Dantonio said. “I thought we were playing hard, but we didn't really have to substitute too much in our secondary. Played very well in the first half. They hit us on a couple plays.”
Dantonio and his staff will have to hit the tape hard before the Spartans' next game against a BYU offense that has the same explosive components as Indiana.
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