3 Up, 3 Down: Michigan State Football blasted by No. 8 Washington

On Saturday afternoon, I entered Spartan Stadium wondering if I would experience a small miracle. By the end of the night, I had watched Michigan State football endure an absolute nightmare.

In their first game since the suspension of head coach Mel Tucker, the Spartans ran into a buzzsaw in No. 8 Washington, who cruised to an easy 41-7 win over MSU in East Lansing.

Michigan State had no answers for Husky quarterback Michael Penix Jr. and his offensive weapons, as U-W racked up a whopping 713 yards of offense and averaged 9.9 yards per play. The argument for most explosive offense in the country probably comes down to Washington or USC, and we saw why firsthand tonight.

Three Up

I'm not going to do our readers the injustice of trying to manufacture "three positive takeaways" from the debacle that we just witnessed. With that said, I'll point out a few nice moments...

In terms of the actual football which was played, there wasn't a whole lot to celebrate. MSU held Washington to a couple field goals in the red zone in the third quarter, and sophomore safety Jaden Mangham came up with an interception in the fourth quarter.

Offensively, backup QB Katin Houser led an 11-play, 99-yard drive midway through the fourth quarter off Mangham's interceptions. Houser had a 61-yard completion to Christian Fitzpatrick in the fourth, and Houser scored on a four-yard carry to cap the drive.

That's all I got on the field.

In terms of sentimental moments, former head coach Mark Dantonio got a huge ovation from the Spartan faithful at the start of the game when he was shown on the video board. Dantonio, of course, is back with the program to serve as an advisor to acting head coach Harlon Barnett. Spartan Stadium was absolutely packed in support of the program during a tough time, and it was a cool moment to hear the crowd express their love and appreciation for Dantonio tonight.

Michigan State also honored the 10-year anniversary of the 2013 team, which won the Rose Bowl and finished that season ranked No. 3 in the country. The Spartan Stadium crowd gave those Spartans the welcome home that they deserved.

Three Down

1.) Penalty, after penalty, after penalty

Let's ignore the atrocious defense and inept offense for a second. Michigan State's operational procedures were an absolute mess tonight. The Spartans committed 11 penalties which resulted in 83 penalty yards. There were substitutional errors, procedural errors and lack of composure errors.

It's hard to say how much of this was due to Tucker's absence — after all, these sorts of things have plagued MSU during his tenure as well. But, it was worse tonight. Acting head coach Harlon Barnett was handed a horrible situation here, and unfortunately he's going to take some heat for how rocky and undisciplined the Spartans looked tonight.

2.) Offensive ineptitude

Michigan State had nothing offensively tonight. The Spartans can't reset the line of scrimmage in the run game, and that resulted in 69 sack-adjusted rushing yards and 2.8 yards per carry tonight. After exceeding 100 yards rushing in the first two weeks, Nathan Carter was held to 48 yards on 17 carries tonight.

Almost all quarterbacks are going to struggle when they get nothing from their run game, and a new starter like Noah Kim is going to be affected by that more than most. Kim never looked comfortable tonight, and that was reflected in his state line: 12-of-31 passing, 136 yards and an interception.

Offensive coordinator Jay Johnson gets a lot of heat from the fans, and deservedly so at this point, but tight ends coach Ted Gilmore and O-line coach Chris Kapilovic should start catching some heat as well for their inability to get MSU's run game operational over the last 15 games.

3.) Blown coverages and missed tackles

Michigan State's fanbase was subjected to the same torturously poor defensive performance that they've come to expect from Scottie Hazelton. As stated above, the Spartans had no answers for Washington coach Kalen DeBoer's scheme or Penix Jr. The Huskies' starters did anything and everything they wanted tonight.

Most of us expected Washington to have a big offensive night. This is one of the most explosive teams in college football after all. But, Michigan State once again suffered from blown coverage assignments, missed tackles and an ineffective scheme. The Spartans did finish with nine quarterback hurries tonight, that's another positive takeaway, but MSU did not have a sack tonight.

Back to the drawing board, Scottie...

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