The Wildcats dropped to 1-3 on the season and 1-1 in the conference, after losing to Michigan this past weekend 20-17.

This week, The State News interviewed The Daily Northwestern’s game day editor Ben Pope. 

Editor's Note: This article was slightly edited for clarification purposes.

The Spartans and Wildcats have a similar pattern this season with low-scoring second halves, what seems to be the struggle for the Wildcats?

The offensive line has had a lot of injuries. Blake Hance, Rashawn Slater and Tommy Doles have all missed the past few games. And combine that with Jeremy Larkin, who was supposed to be the lead running back, having to retire due to a spinal condition, there really isn’t much of a run game left … The problems dated back before this injury stuff destroyed the running game.

The offensive coordinator, Mick McCall, for years has been sort of the guy that fans alway love to yell at, that he should get fired and this year I think that it’s starting to kind of make sense. Every single opening drive, they scored the first touchdown in every game, I believe. It just seems once the defense starts to make adjustments to what Northwestern is doing offensively, they just haven't really been able to respond with adjustments of their own. That has led to a lot of stagnation in the second half … It’s very hard to pinpoint one thing exactly, but it's mainly just a combination of not being able to run anymore, not really making the adjustments and having, I guess, some bad luck.

The Wildcats held a 17-0 lead against Michigan in the first half this past weekend, what were some of their strong suits from that game that can be duplicated against Michigan State?

Clayton Thorson has been around all the time as quarterback and this is his fourth year as a starter. He seems finally fully healthy again. In the first few weeks, he was not 100 percent and they were running out the backup on occasional drives to give him a break. I think he’s fully healthy again and after sort of being the victim of the Akron game throwing two interceptions and fumbling all returns for a touchdown, he sort of came out with determination in the Michigan game. 

The first few drives of the game were excellent. They had the return of Solomon Vault who is a speedy running back returner type and has been injured for over a year. He came back and that kind of helped sort out the offense a bit early on. This was moving smoothly at first. The defense was getting stopped, the secondary, which really struggled against Akron, did well against Michigan, and they really did well against Shea Patterson the whole game. Things went well I guess in the first half. If you look at final stats though, yes they blew a 17-0 lead, but Michigan out-gained them by almost a 2-to-1 margin and Northwestern should have lost by far more than three points.

The team will enter its second game without running back Jeremy Larkin. Who's stepping forward in his absence, and how will the Wildcats' running game fair against the Spartans?

John Moten in 2016 was the backup and did pretty well towards the end of the year, but last year lost out on that job to Larkin. He didn’t really play much and hasn’t played that much this year either until last week. I think he finished with 13 carries for 36 yards. Nothing too great and that’s really the kind of guy he is, he can grind out some yards on the ground but he is not the biggest guy and not the fastest guy. 

Solomon Vault came back from an injury and he is a small speedster, but he had 18 yards so he didn't really get much room to move either. True freshman Isaiah Bowser will probably be the other guy that will get a few carries, but we really haven’t seen much from him so far. I know that Michigan State has one of the best run defenses in the country so I’m very pessimistic that Northwestern will be able to move the ball on the ground against them, especially considering this rather unimpressive pass of running backs they have now. It would be a completely different story if Larkin was there.

Quarterback Clayton Thorson has challenged MSU the last two seasons. How can he do so again Saturday, and how has he improved throughout his collegiate career?

From his freshman year, he was sort of concussion prone. I would say … his internal clock runs a little too fast … I think he has improved his timing so far this year, especially in the first half against Michigan, who has a really good defense. He was hitting guys at the right time with the right pass and now that he is fully healthy I think he should be in position to do pretty well down the stretch. 

The big key will be getting Ben Skowronek more involved. He and Flynn Nagel are the two starting receivers. Flynn Nagel has had a good year and is on pace for career-highs in every category, but Skowronek, who was the leading receiver last year, has been pretty quiet. Skowronek is 6’4” or 6’5”, he’s a big target. He’s a big red zone threat … I think moving forward, that is the one area that Northwestern can really try and work on to improve the offense.

What is your score prediction and why? 

I think it will be a close game only because Northwestern seems to play well against Michigan State, having won the last two years despite being the underdog. I would go with Michigan State edging it out by a one score game, probably on the low-scoring side … I just think Northwestern's inability to really move the ball on the ground will be the biggest weakness that either team has in the game, and that could end up being the thing that decides this.

Score 23-17 Michigan State