In taking over for the embattled Roushar, — who left MSU in February to take the running backs coach job for the NFL’s New Orleans Saints — Warner said his knowledge of the players and the personnel will be an asset to him in an expanded role with the team.

“Everybody is looking I’m sure to see what we’re gonna do to improve our offense, and I think those things are still out there to be answered,” Warner said. “Certainly I think, if you look at what we did last year, we came up short in a lot of cases. Scoring-wise and I think a lot of things led to that.”

After a lengthy career that includes holding the offensive coordinator position under Jim Tressel at Ohio State from 2001-11, many anticipated Bollman would move into the same role for the Spartans when his name surfaced a week ago. Bollman was a member of the 2002 Ohio State national championship staff along with Dantonio, although he served just one season of play calling duty for the Buckeyes.

Bollman, who was hired as the offensive line coach at Purdue in January, will move into the position of co-offensive coordinator and tight ends coach for the Spartans. He brings more than three decades of experience to the position.

In joining Dantonio’s staff, Bollman said he’s comfortable in his new position and he hopes he can bring some creativity to MSU’s offense.

“The first thing is if I’m gonna help be a leader, I have to be a great servant,” Bollman said. “So my goal is to be sure that I’m able to help everybody in all phases of the offense based on some of the experience I’ve had and help be creative and help evolve things where we need to fix things up a little bit.
“But some things have been done very well in this program for a long time and we don’t need to reinvent the wheel.”

During the 2012 season under Roushar, the Spartans finished 95th nationally in total offense and struggled to be effective despite the standout campaign by junior running back Le’Veon Bell.

The Spartans finished the season with a 7-6 record including a 3-5 mark in the Big Ten, concluding the season with a 17-16 victory over TCU in the Buffalo Wild Wings Bowl.

The Spartans enter the 2013 campaign without juniors Bell and tight end Dion Sims, along with contributing seniors running back Larry Caper and guard Chris McDonald, among others.

Certainly understanding the weight of losing talented players such as Bell and Sims, Warner said he’s still anxious to step into the position and see what the team is capable of moving forward.

“This has been my goal to get back to a position like this as a coordinator. Certainly my positions as a coordinator in the past are nowhere close to the one I have right now, though, and I will be in the big spotlight,” Warner said. “It’s something I’ve wanted for a long time and the opportunity is here and I’m certainly anxious. Appreciative but very anxious to be here and confident to go out these next couple months and down the road, hopefully make us a good offense.”