Dantonio using 7-stage coping method to overcome Iowa defeat

After his team’s tough loss to Iowa, MSU football head coach Mark Dantonio decided to use the seven stages of grief to help himself get over Saturday’s 15-13 last-minute defeat.

Mark Dantonio

Dantonio said the seven stages — shock and denial, pain and guilt, anger and bargaining, depression, reflection and loneliness, the upward turn, reconstruction and working through and acceptance and hope — have helped him get through.

“I’ve heard it before, so I thought it was a good time to bring it out, seeing how we’re all getting some questions,” Dantonio said Tuesday at his weekly press conference.

He said he spent 25 minutes on the exercise bike in the reconstruction and working through stage, recreating the important moments of the game, but said he wouldn’t change the calls made on the decisive drive.

“We’ve taken a football team in three years that had very little hope and now we’re playing No. 6 teams in the nation and saying we should’ve won,” Dantonio said. “And that’s the reality of the situation. We have a good football team and we’ll measure up.”

As a team, Dantonio said the Spartans hit “the upward turn” Monday and hit the stages of acceptance and hope Monday night.

“You move on, and I think that’s what you have to do,” Dantonio said. “Our players have done that.”

Decker out

Minnesota head coach Tim Brewster said Tuesday during the Big Ten Teleconference that the team’s star receiver, Eric Decker, will miss Saturday’s game against MSU with a strained foot injury.

Brewster went on to say Decker likely would not return until a potential bowl game.

At 4-4, the Golden Gophers are fighting for their bowl game lives against the Spartans this weekend.

Decker injured his foot on a sideline catch Saturday against Ohio State and left the game. He briefly returned before leaving the game for good.

Decker, one of the nation’s top receivers, has 50 receptions for 758 yards and five touchdowns this season.

He has thrown a touchdown, as well. His receptions account for 41 percent of Minnesota’s total catches this season, 62.5 percent of the
team’s touchdown catches and 51 percent of the Gophers’ receiving yards.

Paging the weatherman

As of Tuesday afternoon, the National Weather Service is calling for mostly cloudy skies and temperatures in the low 30s for Saturday’s game with a slight chance of rain and snow during the day.

Dantonio said he gets daily weather updates and the coaching staff is preparing for all situations.

“I think we have to play to that environment, obviously, and that’s why we have a football team that can be balanced,” he said.

“We have to be balanced; we have to be able to run and throw it. If the wind’s blowing like crazy, you can’t throw it down the field as well, way down the field if it’s that bad, but we play accordingly. We have plans for that based on the weather.”