Inside the Spartans: Mark Dantonio's Michigan State revival is coach of year worthy job
MINNEAPOLIS – Mark Dantonio apologized for the cough drop jangling in his mouth, a needed remedy after standing through two straight Saturdays of wind and rain for three-plus hours.
“Hold on a second,” he said as a brief pause his postgame press conference, taking it out of his mouth. “There, that’ll make the internet.”
The storm had given way to levity. The pride and joy showed in his smile, could be heard in his banter. The wry wit which endeared him to Michigan State fans trickled out as family members chuckled in the back of the room.
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And why shouldn’t he Dantonio happy? His Spartans are 5-1 and ranked at the season’s midpoint. They are 3-0 in the Big Ten for the seventh time in his 11 seasons. They are one win away from becoming bowl eligible after missing out last year for the first time on his watch.
“It’s obviously an incredible feeling,” sophomore defensive end Kenny Willekes, one of MSU’s newcomers to the field, said after Saturday night’s 30-27 survival at Minnesota. “Going 3-9 last year, that did not feel well, that did not stick well with us. We made it a personal goal of ours this offseason to get better and not let that happen again.
“So sitting at 5-1 after six games is incredible.”
Content, however, is another thing. Dantonio sees there are things to fix, mistakes that come with playing 13 true freshmen and a number of first-year players. But he’s been in repair mode for the better part of the last 11 months. Doing it on the field, honing his craft in his place of solace, is what a coach like Dantonio strives for week in, week out.
And in mending his own program, he revitalized his national image. And none of his peers can make as strong a case for national coach of the year at the season’s halfway point as Dantonio.
“Well, I knew that we would come back and bounce back,” Dantonio said. “I knew that we had a football team that I was excited to be around and to coach. Our coaches as well. We like each other. I think we play to each others’ strengths as coaches’ players and players’ players.”
After missing a bowl game for the first time in his MSU tenure, a quagmire of a 3-9 season that was his worst and the program’s worst since 1982, Dantonio faced unprecedented problems and attrition. What he was witnessing around him, the stability which he and his coaching staff fought hard to build over a decade, appeared to be fracturing. The issues the Spartans were dealing with are not uncommon to college football programs, but the swiftness with which it seemed to be unraveling made it more alarming and eye-opening.
Yet in spite of all of that, navigating those tough times on and off the field has brought out perhaps the best coaching job by Dantonio and his staff in their 11 seasons in East Lansing. They have embraced playing newcomers at an unprecedented level. He and his disciples have done so to both prepare for the future and win in the now.
When it appeared the window of elite membership was closing, the Spartans jammed their “not-so-fast” wedge in it.
“I expected to be successful,” sophomore Brian Lewerke said. “The loss to Notre Dame, we beat ourselves, but it was early. I expected us to be undefeated at this point, but those things happen.”
On each side of Lewerke, linebacker Joe Bachie and running back LJ Scott nodded as the words came out of their quarterback’s mouth. The Spartans’ confidence, their on-field swagger, has returned. Yet there remains a humility in their tone after seeing how quickly sustained success can fall apart, let alone what amounts to right now a six-game positive trend.
And Dantonio and his players are not quick to forget the lessons of 2016.
“We don’t want to go back to what we did last year,” junior running back Madre London said. “It can always get worst. We’re 5-1, we could be 5 and however many games are left – we could be losing the rest of them. We’re just trying to stay humble, keep working and take nothing for granted.”
Asked if he appreciates his staff’s effort to erase last season’s bitterness, Dantonio uncharacteristically and emphatically dragged out the first three words of his answer: “Yes…I…am.”
“I’m able to sit back and look at that and say, ‘Hey, our staff is coaching them up.’ We’ve always coached them up, we’ve always found a way to get guys going,” Dantonio said. “We’ve always found a way to get guys coming to every football game ready to play. Our coaches have done a tremendous job. They have great relationships with their players, and they push them and they coach in a positive way. I’m not surprised about that at all.”
And it’s not about pretty victories, it’s about surviving the sometimes painful-to-watch foibles that come with a young roster. The past two waterlogged end-of-game finishes displayed the resilience he and his assistant coaches have been preaching for nearly a year, even if it required a few breath-holding moments in the waning seconds against the Wolverines and Gophers.
At the worst now, it appears the Spartans could be headed for a season similar to their first taste of success under Dantonio, an 8-5 season that turned them into a perennial January bowl participant.
At best? That remains to be seen but should not minimize how far and how fast Dantonio and MSU have returned to relevance.
“We’re what, at the halfway point right now?” Dantonio said, almost surprised how quickly it’s arrived. “So what we do between now and the end of the season will really define us, I understand that. But it’s good to be 5-1.”
Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari. Download our Spartans Xtra app for free on Apple and Android devices!