The excitement in his voice grew as he talked about MSU’s 37-21 victory over Iowa, and he couldn’t give enough compliments to his senior class — now the winningest class in program history.

They sit at the top of a program that has had glory years and miserable stretches, Rose Bowls and disastrous seasons. Dantonio has a long way to go before being considered one of the great MSU coaches, but as his fifth season begins to wind down, it’s clear he’s on the right track.

He came to MSU after the Spartans were plagued by John L. Smith and immediately began turning the program around.

“With the nature of what Coach Dantonio is doing here at Michigan State, there have been a lot of things that have been first-time or best-ever,” senior quarterback Kirk Cousins said. “We haven’t won (at Iowa) since ‘89, so a lot of firsts and a lot of special accomplishments with Coach Dantonio.”

But this weekend is just the tip of the iceberg.

In his 2007 debut season, Dantonio took MSU to its first bowl game since 2003, and the team already has secured its fifth straight bowl game.

The 2010 Big Ten Coach of the Year’s turnaround of Spartan football is the third biggest among NCAA FBS teams, as he moved the Spartans from a 6-7 record in 2009 to 11-1 in 2010 — when they also won their first Big Ten championship in 20 years by winning for the first time against Penn State in State College, Pa., since 1965.

This season, MSU earned its first win at Ohio State since 1998, defeated Michigan four years in a row for the first time since 1962 and took down Iowa on the road for the first time in my lifetime.

I could go on and on, but needless to say, the stats don’t lie, and what Dantonio is doing at MSU is pretty remarkable. While this year’s senior class is breaking records left and right, the defensive-minded coach is earning respect for the program after being ignored for so long.

He has taken the always-underdog Spartans and transformed them into a team with the nation’s No. 3 defense that goes through the Big Ten with a target on its back.

“We’ve been hunted the last two years here,” Dantonio said. “I think that’s something that we need to understand. We are a program now that people are hunting down. … To be able to push through this this year after the discouragement last year (at Iowa) is a sign of progress and a sign of maturity.”

For the most part, the Spartans have survived the hunt this season, and as long as they keep advancing closer and closer to the Big Ten championship game, that target is only going to get larger.

Michelle Martinelli is a State News football reporter. She can be reached at mart1114@msu.edu.