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 Saturday, November 3, 2001
MSU took advantage of Wolverine line
By Gary Danielson
Special to ABC Sports Online
EAST LANSING, Mich. -- There was no design on Michigan State's game-winning play. Jeff Smoker bought time and threw it up for grabs. It happened to be T.J. Duckett waiting for it. It was one of those Hail Marys.
|  | | Michigan's Marlin Jackson can only watch T.J. Duckett catch the game-winning score. |
You have to ask why Michigan was rated so highly. I question how the Wolverines' schedule was third best in the nation. It's clear that they were playing inferior talent.
This isn't a vintage Michigan team. You can't lose seven key players on offense, and be as good as you were the year before. It's impossible. Michigan's running game is horrible. They can't get any big plays from it, and John Navarre seems to struggle on the road.
But the difference between this Michigan team and the '97 one that won a share of the national championship is not Brian Griese. It's Charles Woodson. They had a takeaway corner on that team. They don't on this one.
Michigan is a decent football team and it will probably win the Big Ten championship, but this is not the best Michigan team I have ever seen. And it's not going to be easy to win the Big Ten. Illinois is on their heels. One more mistake, and they could fall out of it. It could happen at Wisconsin, or it could happen against Ohio State. Any one that can run the ball will put Michigan in danger.
The running of Michigan State won this game. The Spartans got sacked 12 times and still ran for nearly 200 yards. If they weren't able to run the ball, Smoker would have been sacked 20 times. It was an amazing performance against the No. 1 rush defense in the country. Michigan State had a good game plan -- a great utilization of two tight ends, an adjustment of Charles Rogers to keep Michigan honest, and got a courageous performance by Smoker, who didn't make any mistakes despite getting sacked so many times. Plus, Duckett -- when healthy -- looks as good as any back as I've seen in a while.
Michigan has an undersized defense. A lot of people have been trying to throw the ball too much against this defense. A good Big Ten offensive line with a big running back is going to run on those undersized linebackers, and Michigan State did all day.
When you add to that mix a big-play receiver like Rogers, Michigan was a little nervous to put its safeties at the line of scrimmage because they have the worst pass defense in the Big Ten. They didn't want to go one-on-one with Rogers.
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 Jeff Smoker finds T.J. Duckett for the game-winning TD with no time left on the clock (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Backup QB Jermaine Gonzales checks into the game and catches a 20-yard TD from John Navarre (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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The Wolverines get called for pass interference in the end zone and T.J. Duckett makes them pay (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Marquise Walker scores on touchdown passes of 15 and 18 yards (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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Charles Rogers hauls in the 18-yard touchdown pass from Jeff Smoker (Courtesy: ABC Sports).
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