MSU's Smith Fields Questions on Job Performance, Losing Streak

EAST LANSING --- Michigan State head coach Jonathan Smith had to answer several difficult questions on Monday about his job performance, how it's gone during Year 2 of his time at MSU, and on the team's active three-game losing streak.

The Spartans (3-3 overall, 0-3 Big Ten) are headed into their toughest game of the season yet. They'll be taking on No. 3 Indiana (6-0, 3-0) in Bloomington next Saturday, Oct. 18. The Hoosiers are coming off a victory over current No. 7 Oregon in Eugene, while MSU just fell to UCLA at home, 38-13.

You can watch his press conference in its entirity below.

Watch Jonathan Smith here:

In addition, a partial transcript of the press conference has been provided.

Transcript

Michigan State's head coach Jonathan Smith looks on during the second quarter in the game against UCLA on Saturday, Oct. 11, 2025, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing. | Nick King/Lansing State Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

SMITH: We got back into the building yesterday and took a deep dive on things and really talked a lot about the halfway point. Let's face it, six games in, 3-3 (record), and coming off a loss that was not good enough, obviously.

And it led, on the leadership of this team, discussion of what we want this thing to look like moving forward, any potential issues we might have, and it was great. A lot of accountability amongst the team, responsibility, coaches included.

Oct 11, 2025; East Lansing, Michigan, USA; Michigan State tight end Jack Velling (12) runs through the UCLA Bruins defense in the fourth quarter at Spartan Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Brendan Mullin-Imagn Images | Brendan Mullin-Imagn Images

I thought it was a really healthy day in regards to taking a deep look at where (we need to improve). Call it a lack of execution at times, and some of the guys trying to do too much, wanting to make a play for the team type thing and get outside the responsibility, and we got exposed multiple times through that.

And so guys (were) kind of owning up, talking about it, tweaked a little bit of how we looked at the video. Offensively, they watched it all as a unit, not just breaking down into your individual positions.

I thought that was healthy in regards to guys taking accountability. 'I could do this better...' And then they went back to work, a little bit shorter, but went back on the field and addressed it and tried to make some corrections that way because we do.

We've got to play better. You think about us as coaches, myself to start, we've got to get this team playing to their potential, and that was well short on Saturday.

Michigan State's fans look on after a UCLA touchdown during the third quarter on Saturday, Oct. 11, 2025, at Spartan Stadium in East Lansing. | Nick King/Lansing State Journal / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

And so we look at reasons why that takes place and then think about considerations of changes; schematically, how you approach it, practice, personnel, the whole thing.

So I thought it was a really good Sunday, and we got to be able to transition because we know where we're headed to work (in Indiana). Maybe the best team, one of the best teams in the country, playing really, really good football at their place. That'll be a serious, serious challenge that we've got to get ourselves prepared for.

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