"We recognized it. We didn't get it communicated to the field. We thought we had prepared the guys well enough, and we didn't. So, it's our fault as coaches," Fitzgerald said at Monday’s press conference. "But we got the stop, so everybody's like, 'Woohoo!', and I'm pissed off on the sidelines."

That reaction sums up how Fitzgerald views his team's performance through the first three weeks. The Spartans are 2-1, with their only loss to No. 3 Notre Dame, but he's not satisfied; he expects perfection, and he hasn't seen it yet.

"We've got to play much cleaner and much more consistently," Fitzgerald said. "I'm not going to stop saying that until we get there, and once we get there, it won't be good enough then either."

It's a standard the former All-American linebacker holds for every game, paired with a competitive attitude that convinces him his team should win every time out. His frustration over the 27-10 loss was clear in his postgame press conference Saturday, and he repeated it Monday, despite MSU being an underdog on the road.

The fan base has celebrated a competitive first half that ended with the Spartans down just 17-10 as a "moral victory." Fitzgerald doesn't see it that way; there are no such victories outside the scoreboard in his world.

"A little bit of that is rat poison," Fitzgerald said regarding moral victories. "Like, 'hey, good job you played hard,' that drives me crazy, like nuts."

He's a competitor who expects his team to be perfect and to win no matter who's across from them, even though he coaches a program that hasn't had a bowl game or a winning season since 2021.

Though it might seem unrealistic, it’s a standard that senior linebacker Jordan Hall wouldn’t expect to be any other way. That’s especially notable coming from a player who has played under four different head coaches during his four years in East Lansing.

“As a player, who wouldn’t want that,” Hall said. “I mean, if Coach Fitz (Fitzgerald) came in there and be like, ‘you know guys, we were supposed to lose that game. Good job.’ I don’t think he’d probably have a job.”

“That’s what you want out of your head culture guy, who has expectations, and those expectations aren’t set blindly. It’s not like we don’t have the capabilities and abilities to go out there and beat the No. 3 team. We just didn’t put the best things on the field that day.”

That standard may be exactly what helps the Spartans turn the page and reignite the winning culture that defined the program in the 2010s, though the real test comes this weekend against Nebraska.

MSU (2-1) opens Big Ten play against Nebraska (3-0). Kickoff is set for 5 p.m. Saturday at Spartan Stadium and will be broadcast on Big Ten Network.

Saturday's game sets the tone for the rest of the season, as the Spartans' performance after a loss will show whether they can respond accordingly. 

Last season is proof. MSU opened Big Ten play with back-to-back road losses, but both were competitive. The Spartans entered the fourth quarter down just 31-24 to No. 25 USC and tied 21-21 with Nebraska. Both games were within a couple of adjustments of wins. Those adjustments never came, and it was clear.

After losing to Nebraska, the Spartans were humiliated in their homecoming game by a one-win UCLA team that had already fired its coach, falling behind 24-7 at halftime before losing 38-13. That loss set the stage for the rest of the year. The Spartans finished 4-8 after opening 3-0, and it ultimately disconnected the fan base from then-head coach Jonathan Smith.

That's why it matters that MSU keeps building week to week, using every win or loss as a step forward. The next step is the Cornhuskers. What MSU can't afford is a blowout.

"We're a work in progress, but we're gaining on where we want to be from a consistency standpoint," Fitzgerald said. "My biggest job to do now is to get us to play with consistency. This team believes it can win, it knows it can win, it trusts it can win."