After back-to-back 11-win seasons, an appearance in the inaugural Big Ten championship game and MSU’s first bowl win since 2001, head coach Mark Dantonio doesn’t want anyone involved with the MSU football program to get complacent.
“The most important thing of all is all of us need to earn our jerseys,” Dantonio said Tuesday during his first spring football press conference of the year. “Whether you’re a coach here or whether you’re some part of our staff, … whether you’re a manager, a trainer, the quarterback or the tailback, every day you go out there, you need to earn what you’re getting. You need to earn the jersey that you’re wearing and make a big deal about that as we go forward.”
The Spartans have been forced to rebuild since the last time they took the playing field, due to the departure of 10 starters from the 2011 squad. Of those 10 starters, seven played on offense, including former wide receivers B.J. Cunningham, Keith Nichol and Keshawn Martin.
The Spartans essentially will have to retool their entire passing attack around a slew of inexperienced skill players. At the moment, sophomores Tony Lippett and Keith Mumphery are listed as the starting wide receivers on MSU’s spring depth chart.
Sophomore wide receiver DeAnthony Arnett — who transferred from Tennessee to be closer to his ailing father — likely will see some playing time as well, if he is able to procure a hardship waiver from the NCAA.
Dantonio said although the underclassmen don’t have the same level of experience as the departed receiving corps, he is confident they can step up and make an impact in 2012.
“We’ve got guys here that I think can be game-ready,” he said. “I think they’re (very) capable of giving us explosiveness out there in big plays.”
Stepping up
With the graduation of quarterback Kirk Cousins, the Spartans have had to look elsewhere for their leadership needs, which Dantonio said so far has come from junior quarterback Andrew Maxwell, senior linebacker Chris Norman and junior linebacker Max Bullough.
“We have our council that we elect periodically, and (those three) are guys that over and above get the most votes in terms of leaders,” he said. “And I would think that those are the guys that people are looking to right now.”
Dantonio noted there is no shortage of leadership on the team and estimates that about 80 to 85 percent of his players were captains on their high school teams. However, Dantonio added finding a team leader isn’t something he and his coaching staff could force on the team.
“You’re always looking for who are going to be those leaders for you, and who’s going to be those guys that you look to in crunch time,” he said. “But those things naturally tend to happen. We’ll push it a little bit as coaches, but the players have to take ownership, and we’ll go as far as they want to go.”
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