The Nebraska Cornhuskers (4-0, 1-0) defeated the Michigan State Spartans (2-2, 0-1) 31-13 on Saturday evening. This is Nebraska's first 4-0 start since 2016 and the first win in a Big Ten opener since 2019.
Nebraska improved to 11-4 all-time against Michigan State, including 6-4 as Big Ten opponents. The Huskers had 369 yards of total offense and held the Spartans to 257 yards.
Michigan State coach Pat Fitzgerald met with the media following the loss. Fitzgerald was coaching in his first Big Ten game since 2022, when he led the Northwestern Wildcats. The Spartans coach now holds a 6-7 record against the Huskers.
The Spartans turned the ball over three times while failing to force any turnovers of their own. The Michigan State head coach knows that
can not continue for his team to have any success in Big Ten play this season.
"They've got a very good football team. I said that when I stood up here earlier in the week, and you know we made enough mistakes to make it easy for him. You know, losing the turnover battle 3-0 to, obviously, not starting fast was something that we felt like we needed to do, and we did not... the turnovers just were, you know, costly, to say the least."
Several plays were impacted by replay review, including a first-down catch in the red zone that was overturned and led to a missed field goal for MSU. Fitzgerald made it clear that he's looking forward to watching the game and hopes to understand how the officials made several replay calls.
"I thought there were two plays that looked very similar. That's all I'll say from my vantage point from the replays I saw. Um, one was upheld and one had indisputable video evidence. That's the barometer. That's the threshold it has to get over. That's what they ruled. So, I look forward to seeing the angles that I get that they saw that were indisputable video evidence because I did not see that on the replays that I had access to."
Michigan State hits the road to play the Wisconsin Badgers on Saturday, Oct. 3. Nebraska returns to Lincoln and will host Maryland at Memorial Stadium this Saturday. Kickoff is scheduled for 3 pm. CT on FS1.
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This article originally appeared on Cornhuskers Wire: What Michigan State coach Pat Fitzgerald said after loss to Nebraska
