Michigan and Michigan State fans don't see eye to eye on much, but at this time of year, the two almost always agree on one overwhelming feeling:
At long last, football is back.
It's game week for both Big
Ten schools, with MSU opening the season against Toledo on Friday, Sept. 4 (8:00 p.m., FS1), before U-M opens its season almost 24 hours later against Western Michigan on Sept 5. (7:30 p.m., NBC).
It's been a busy offseason for both programs. Each has hired a new football coach, one has hired a new athletic director (the other will need a new athletic director by the end of the calendar year), one has named a new president, and the other thought its president was leaving, only to return to the university at the 11th hour.
The programs are in different spots − Michigan State is looking for its first bowl game since 2021, while Michigan is looking to return to the College Football Playoff for the first time since it won the whole thing in the 2023-24 season − yet each seems to walk in with a sense of optimism this season.
Much of that is due to the two men, Kyle Whittingham in Ann Arbor and Pat Fitzgerald in East Lansing, who now lead the programs. Below, our beat writers discuss what they sense of the vibes around their respective teams now that game week has arrived.
Pair of chaotic offseasons
Garcia: What a crazy offseason it was. It doesn't feel like all that long ago I was sitting in the Washtenaw County 14-A District Court, watching former Michigan coach Sherrone Moore plead not guilty to a pair of felonies and one misdemeanor charge as the snow fell in mid-December. He'd just lost his job, had a mental break and broke into the house of his mistress and threatened himself with butter knives and kitchen scissors. After months of court appearances, he was able to plead no contest and get his home invasion and stalking charges into two misdemeanors (malicious use of a telecommunications device and trespassing) and received 18 months probation. In the meantime, U-M had to move forward and find a new coach. Shortly after the team arrived in Orlando for the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl − which had to be near the top of the list for strangest vibes going into a season finale − Whittingham was announced as head coach.
Whittingham was clear about his expectations on Day 1, saying, "You will become us, we will not become you." Now eight months into fall camp, he's seemed to be exactly what U-M needed: an adult in the room who came with a staff he trusted and has experience running a program that prides itself both on toughness and discipline. "What you see is what you get," wide receiver JJ Buchanan recently said. That doesn't mean there aren't question marks (more on that later), but from a baseline overview, Whittingham has hit the ground running year one in Ann Arbor.
Solari: Things in East Lansing did not revolve around legal proceedings (for once), but the top-down tumult in the past 16 months has been fatiguing for fans and media alike. Alan Haller was fired. J Batt was hired as athletic director last summer. Jonathan Smith was fired, and Fitzgerald hired in December. Then after more turmoil with the Board of Trustees, university President Kevin Guskiewicz was on his way to Clemson and Batt bolted for Kentucky. Then Guskiewicz changed course and stayed, finally luring Dan Bartholomae away from Western Michigan to take Batt's seat at athletic director.
So if you're keeping score, a new football coach who hasn't coached a game yet is on his second athletic director already.
But where MSU's administration has been flailing, Fitzgerald has spent his first nine months on the job reenergizing the football fanbase and winning the offseason while swaying his initial doubters into believers. His ebulliently gregarious-meets-hard-nosed-toughmindedness evokes a blend of Duffy Daugherty and Mark Dantonio. His knowledge of the Big Ten, from being an All-American linebacker to his 17 years as his alma mater Northwestern's head coach, means he knows the landscape of the Midwest and passions of each fan base. And Fitzgerald has hit every right chord to stoke Spartan fans' flames, preaching the need to get stronger, to move people on the line, to run the ball hard, to play physically and aggressively on defense. Ultimately to become the "toughest team in the Big Ten" like the Dantonio teams he coached against and get back to competing for championships again.
“We’ve let that slip through our fingers," Fitzgerald said, "and now we gotta go snatch it back.”
All of that is well and good. Winning games first and getting back to a bowl game is imperative.
But now how good are you?
Garcia: Speaking of winning games, Michigan feels it has the talent to do just that, but there are a few hurdles to leap before it can simply get back to top of the pack in the sport − first and foremost, installing the playbooks of two new coordinators. Jason Beck takes over the offense and Jay Hill leads the way on defense, each implementing a brand new scheme in Ann Arbor. While both have had significant success at previous stops (for Hill especially), there's expected to be a learning curve with what he's asking of the defense. He said earlier this month it could take a few weeks or more before the group is really understanding the full scope of the scheme.
Frankly, it's time Michigan doesn't have. Yes, the schedule is primarily back-loaded, but it's tough front-to-back, starting with Oklahoma in Week 2 and Iowa in Week 4 before Penn State and Indiana back-to-back off a bye week in mid-October. That's before facing two of the toughest road games in the country: Oregon and Ohio State.
Beyond the coordinators, there are new faces everywhere on staff, with running backs coach Tony Alford as the only coach who's led Michigan in a regular season game. However, as is always the case in football, it comes down to those on the field.
Michigan has elite running backs in Jordan Marshall and Savion Hiter, and its top two wide receivers of Andrew Marsh and JJ Buchanan could be the team's best in a decade. But just about everybody knows this season will largely be determined by sophomore quarterback Bryce Underwood and if he's able to take that next step in his game.
The defense should be solid with a deep edge room, but questions of the depth at defensive tackle and in the secondary, combined with the inexperience of the linebackers are all reasons to give pause.
Whittingham said a successful season would mean playing meaningful games in November. That feels like a reasonable expectation, and if the campaign ends with nine or more victories (in the regular season) it should be considered a success for Year 1.
Solari: For Fitzgerald, the path to getting MSU back to a bowl game for the first time since 2021 − and to do it as consistently as Dantonio did with 12 postseason appearances in 13 seasons − started with rebuilding the lines of scrimmage, particularly for the run game.
His emphasis on mining the portal for past production at the college level resulted in getting four transfer offensive linemen (left tackle Ben Murawski, center Trent Fraley, guard Nick Sharpe and tackle Robert Wright Jr.) along with four transfer running backs (Cam Edwards, Marvis Parrish, Jaziun Patterson and Kenneth Williams) to blend with players he inherited and retained on the roster. It will be up to new offensive coordinator Nick Sheridan, an acolyte of Alabama coach Kalen DeBoer, to make that work and to get quarterback Alessio Milivojevic comfortable after he got knocked around a lot in his four starts to end last season.
Fitzgerald also kept defensive coordinator Joe Rossi, which helps the familiarity with returning key pieces in linebacker Jordan Hall, defensive tackle Ben Roberts and safety Nikai Martinez. However, the secondary is overhauled with three new starters around Martinez. The depth on the defensive line is a major question mark, with a lot of unproven young players who have the potential to emerge at tackle and edge rusher. And the same goes for the linebacker room beyond Hall, with Brady Pretzlaff coming off an injury and a number of transfers working to blend in and give Fitzgerald the type of tenacity and toughness he demands from his old position.
With so much newness, it is understandable why the sportsbooks set an over/under at 4.5 wins this year for the Spartans. Plus, add in a lot of coin-flip games with opponents also trying to figure out their own identities. But with Fitzgerald injecting so much optimism and energy going into a season for the first time in almost a decade, that change also feels like a breath of fresh air. The schedule sets up favorably, with the Notre Dame game on Sept. 19 a measuring stick as to how far MSU has come in a short time in turning the philosophical changes Fitzgerald installed into tangible results on the field in terms of style of play. Road games against Wisconsin and UCLA will lead into a trip to face Whittingham and U-M to begin November and potentially a push for a bowl berth. The penultimate game at home against Oregon also will serve as a litmus test of how far Fitzgerald needs to go to get the Spartans back to competing with the Big Ten's upper echelon.
MSU is coming off a 4-8 season and is 33-38 overall and a paltry 18-35 in Big Ten games over the six seasons since Dantonio retired as the school's all-time winningest coach. One of the last things Dantonio said after his final game and victory at the 2019 Pinstripe Bowl is "the basic minimum" for the Spartans is getting to six wins and the postseason. That seems attainable for Fitzgerald's debut season, though a thin layer of depth across the program makes for a tenuous line if any major injuries affect the starters.
Fitzgerald's mission is a long-term plan to turn chips on shoulders into 'ships in showcases. MSU won't be pushing for that yet. The basement remains closer than the ceiling, with a three- or four-win season the worst-case scenario if things go awry. But if he is able to work his Fitzmagic and turn talk into reality, along with keeping his star players healthy, an eight-win high mark feels less far-fetched as the season approaches.
Tony Garcia is the Michigan beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at apgarcia@freepress.com and follow him on X at @RealTonyGarcia.
Make "Hail Yes!" your go-to Wolverines podcast, available anywhere you listen to podcasts (Apple, Spotify) or watch live on YouTube.
Contact Chris Solari:csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.
For openers for MSU: Rockets
Matchup: Michigan State (4-8 in 2025) vs. Toledo (8-5 in 2025); season opener.
Kickoff: 8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 4; Spartan Stadium, East Lansing.
TV/radio: FS1; WJR-AM (760).
For openers for U-M: Broncos
Matchup: Michigan (9-4 in 2025) vs. Western Michigan (10-4 in 2025); season opener.
Kickoff: 7:30 p.m. Saturday, Sept. 5; Michigan Stadium, Ann Arbor.
TV/radio: NBC; WCSX-FM (94.7).
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan, Michigan State experts set table for expectations in 2026
