Michigan State Football: Dantonio Needs to Right Ship or Kiss Legacy Goodbye

Michigan State football head coach Mark Dantonio needs to get his program back on track or a lot of good years will be quickly forgotten.

The Michigan State Spartans have benefitted from years of good press under head coach Mark Dantonio, but in less than a calendar year, much of that has been erased. It all started on the field with a dismal 3-9 campaign in 2016, but it was the offseason which has been substantially rougher on the MSU brand.

The result of the sexual assault investigation involving three Michigan State football players and one staffer is a dark cloud looming over the program, but there have been mini storms, too. On signing day, news broke that an MSU recruit expected to join the freshman class was arrested and charged with burglary and larceny of a firearm.

Last week, it was announced a second sexual assault investigation involving an MSU player was sent to the Ingham County Prosecutor’s Office. That player turned out to be Auston Roberston, a rising sophomore defensive end whose arrival to MSU was delayed due to a misdemeanor battery charge stemming from an incident with a classmate at his Fort Wayne, Ind. high school.

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Robertson was only allowed to join the 2017 freshman class after he went through “an extensive educational process with specific prerequisites,” Dantonio said in a statement following Robertson’s arrival. Unfortunately, Robertson did not learn from his mistake and, following some confusion as to his whereabouts, has been arrested and dismissed from the MSU football team.

With no news on the initial sexual assault investigation, you would think that the Spartans would be able to stay out out of the news for at least a day, right? Well, apparently things are so out of control in East Lansing that bad news surfaces even when it’s not there.

On Monday, it was reported that two additional MSU football players were released from the program—news that had Spartans fans and alums rightfully perturbed. As it turned out, that report was false—Dantonio quickly refuted the claims via his Twitter page—but the damage was already done.

Whether these players are suspended or this was simply false does not matter.
The university needs its head coach to fix this mess now or he will completely tarnish his MSU legacy.

Dantonio quickly won over fans in his first year for challenging Michigan’s disrespectful attitude following the Spartans’ 2007 loss to the Wolverines, infamously telling the Detroit Free Press, “pride comes before the fall.” The success he has had against Michigan and as a national player since then put him at legend status in East Lansing.

But it couldn’t be any clearer in 2017 that Dantonio should not be up on a pedestal. As the Wolverines parade through Rome, the apple of the eye of the national media, the Spartans continue to make themselves look like the inferior program the Wolverines made them out to be back in Dantonio’s first season.

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All Michigan State fans hope to see the Spartans return to the top of the Big Ten standings soon, but let’s not put winning ahead of decency. It’s time for the MSU football coach to stop talking about reigning his program in and actually do it.