Friday, January 1, 2016

A sad way to start 2016

Where to start?

The best indication of how bad a game is for me is the relative lack of alcohol consumed by yours truly. I drank one Stella Artois in the first half of MSU's 38-0 drubbing, and then no more.

In fact, I barely paid attention to the fourth quarter. I'd say that approximately midway through the third quarter, I muted the sound on the TV to avoid the inevitable Alabama lovefest, and by the fourth quarter I was barely even watching the game.

It was only slightly less horrendous than the 2011 Capital One Bowl. At least in this game, the Spartans finished with a positive yardage total (26 carries for 29 yards).

Alabama deserves credit for what proved to be a brilliant game plan. When Derrick Henry didn't even touch the ball in the Tide's first possession, my initial reaction was that they were over thinking it and getting too cute. But quarterback Jake Coker executed the pass-first strategy to perfection and the Spartans never adjusted.

But defense actually seemed the least of their worries because the Spartans couldn't move the ball an inch on offense. And in what might have been the turning point in the game, MSU blew an opportunity to cut the Bama lead to 10-7 (or at worse, 10-3) when Connor Cook stared down his receiver and threw a momentum killing interception. The game went downhill from there.

So, in times like this, I need to remind myself of how far this program has come since the dark days of Bobby Williams and John L. Smith. This pain will pass, and may prove to be just another growth ring in this program's development.

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