Staudt: Hollis looks to adjust MSU’s 2017 football schedule

Michigan State’s Athletic Director Mark Hollis is determined to adjust next year’s football schedule “as soon as we can announce it.”

The Spartans want to open at home on Labor Day weekend, which is currently their bye date before 12 straight Saturdays of games are currently scheduled. MSU, at the moment, has four home games to begin the season starting on Sept. 9 against Bowling Green before Western Michigan, Notre Dame and Iowa all visit Spartan Stadium. Hollis wants an impact game on the opening weekend, perhaps at night, which has been the norm on Labor Day weekend the past few years, so I’m guessing the Bowling Green game is in jeopardy.

HOLLIS ON THE ROAD: Hollis estimates this year he will have spent 250 days on the road “mainly because I’m chairman this year of the NCAA men’s basketball tournament committee.” It’s his final year of such an assignment and his schedule likely will be reduced to a great degree once the Final Four is finished next April in Phoenix.

2016 HALL CLASS: Of the eight new members inducted this week into MSU’s athletics hall of fame, Steve Juday provides the most memories for me. He became a first team Associated Press All-American quarterback in his senior season, 1965, when the Spartans went 10-0 before losing the Rose Bowl, 14-12 to UCLA. The Bruins were a team MSU beat in East Lansing to open that season. Juday admits to being thrilled when Hollis called him to inform he’d been named by a committee as a member of the 2016 hall class. Juday worked 30 years in Midland for Dow Chemical before retiring to a small lake between Traverse City and Charlevoix. He wanted to play baseball along with football at either Michigan or Michigan State after graduating from Northville High School and says MSU just was a better fit for him.

MSU-NOTRE DAME: Notre Dame’s loss to Michigan State last week dampened enthusiasm for tickets on the secondary market this week for future home games in South Bend this season. Stub Hub says prices began at $28 apiece for Saturday’s game against Duke. The face value was $150 for tickets for the Michigan State game. Hollis says he has a tremendous relationship with Notre Dame Athletic Director Jack Swarbrick and the two are trying to figure a way for the schools to keep playing football against each other in the future — but it isn’t easy given Notre Dame’s desire for a national schedule geographically and with its Atlantic Coast Conference commitments.

STEEP PARKING: Not many schools can charge what Notre Dame does for individual home game parking passes. Top face value price in South Bend was $150 for the south end zone lot and $115 apiece for spaces adjacent the library. It was amazing to watch 80,000 people canvass the entire campus for the MSU game beginning at 7 a.m. for a kickoff that did not occur for nearly 13 hours later.

GAME DAY: Central Michigan University is hoping ESPN’s Game Day will originate in Mount Pleasant next Saturday for the Western Michigan game. I get that the two schools are off to terrific starts this season. But I’ll be shocked if ESPN passes up Louisville at Clemson, by far the national game of the day, if not the entire season. As it is the CBS Sports Network will air the MAC showdown game, which begins at 7 p.m.

GAME OF THE CENTURY: Michigan State’s official celebration of the 50th anniversary of the 10-10 tie with Notre Dame in 1966 will be held on Oct. 12, part of Homecoming Week. Six former star Spartans will gather along with Notre Dame’s George Goeddeke at Wells Hall for a 6 p.m. discussion of what was then called “the Game of the Century.” Collections of artifacts will be on display in Room 101 of Conrad Hall. The main program begins at 7 p.m. in Room 102 with game footage shown and fullback Bob Apisa’s acclaimed documentary “Men of Sparta” will be shown. Other former Spartans from that team scheduled to appear are Sterling Armstrong, Regis Cavender (who scored MSU’s lone touchdown that day), Clinton Jones, Jimmy Raye and Jerry West.

INJURIES PLAGUE TEAMS: Potterville, Suttons Bay and Benzie Central are all Michigan high schools who have forfeited games this season because numerous injuries have depleted their rosters to the point where they felt they could not safely field a team. One solution might be to play the eight man game, currently in use by 52 schools who now have their own state tournament.

WOMEN’S GOLF: Stacy Slobodnik Stoll figures she’s one of a “handful of players” who are the best golfers in their own right who coach Division 1 women’s teams across the country. And truly Stoll is a very good player, often competing in tournaments against her own players in the summer. Stoll is hosting 11 other schools in this weekend’s 19th annual Mary Fossum Invitational, being played at the Forest Akers West course with the final round set for 9 a.m. Sunday. MSU’s women’s program sets up home tournaments on a 6,300-yard course, similar in length to what the LPGA courses tend to measure.

EQUESTRIAN TEAM: It’s not a sanctioned MHSAA sport yet, but Williamston High School has a very good Equestrian team, nonetheless. Williamston won the Reserved Championship Title recently, a three-day event covering two weekends in Mason. Regional competition will be held Oct. 1 and 2 in Mason and coach Emily Miller has four standout seniors — Makenna Ware, Addison Chisholm, Maddie Monroe and Madison Chase.