Michigan State Football: Top 30 games in school history

January 1, 2014; Pasadena, CA, USA; Michigan State Spartans defensive end Denzel Drone (42) reacts after the Spartan defense stops the Stanford Cardinal offense on fourth down during the second half at Rose Bowl. Mandatory Credit: Gary A. Vasquez-USA TODAY Sports

5. MSU vs. Stanford (2014)

The common theme of most of these games happens to be late drives that either stop the opponent from scoring to win or ones in which the Spartans score to go ahead for good in the final ticks. The 2014 Rose Bowl against Stanford happens to be the former.

A classing, the 100th Rose Bowl was between the No. 5 Stanford Cardinal and No. 4 Michigan State Spartans — Michigan State’s first appearance in the big game since 1988 against USC. It had been a while since the Spartans had played for the Big Ten’s most coveted trophy outside of the conference champions’ trophy and the national title.

This was expected to be a defensive battle, and that it was. Heck, the iconic play of the game happened to be a 4th-and-1 stop with 1:43 left in the fourth quarter by Max Bullough’s replacement at linebacker, Kyler Elsworth.

Bullough was suspended before the Rose Bowl for unspecified reasons, which have still never been revealed, and Elsworth, a lightly used senior linebacker, played great in his absence, coming up with the leaping head-on stop, along with Darien Harris, of Stanford fullback Ryan Hewitt.

Celebrating a Rose Bowl victory was oh so sweet.

Next: 4. MSU vs. UCLA (1956)