Mark Dantonio hasn’t been the head coach at Michigan State since the winter semester of 2020 and even though he came back for a short stint as extra help for Harlon Barnett, he’s been out of the game for the better part of a decade.
That doesn’t mean he doesn’t still have his fastball.
The legendary Spartan head coach has been spending time around Pat Fitzgerald’s program this offseason and he just spoke to the team on Friday and it sounds like he could coach a college football game tomorrow if he wanted to.
It takes grit. pic.twitter.com/MotGUfRd62
— Michigan State Football (@MSU_Football) August 14, 2026
Although he’s obviously getting older and isn’t a little more subdued than during his prime coaching days, Coach D clearly still has that fastball. He’s always been known to motivate his teams to squeeze the most out of them so this is the perfect balance to Fitzgerald’s fiery demeanor. Dantonio is much more soft spoken than Fitzgerald but the message still gets across.
He still sounds like the Coach D that we all remember from a decade ago. This sounded like a post-practice speech that Dantonio would give during his prime. He’s still got it, folks.
Every Spartan fans loves them some Dantonio and seeing him spend time with Fitzgerald and around the program again is a beautiful sight. It only took getting the right coach in place to bring him back around consistently. Fitzgerald is also knocking this culture thing out of the park by bringing back guys who helped build that culture during the golden era that was the 2010s.
Let’s hope he remains around the program for Fitz’s entire tenure. It would be extremely beneficial.
Mark Dantonio is the perfect advisor for Pat Fitzgerald
During the prime Dantonio days, Fitzgerald was at Northwestern and the two had some incredible battles that will go down as classics. There was the famous “mouse trap” game as well as the overtime thriller in 2017 that the Wildcats won, but it was one of the best games of the season.
Fitzgerald and Dantonio have a great relationship and having that around more is only going to help the former as a head coach, especially when the latter has laid out the perfect blueprint.
Dantonio and Fitzgerald have a ton of respect for each other.
It’s also going to be nice for Fitzgerald if he’s ever struggling to have someone like Dantonio give him advice and let him know which direction to take things. He has a wealth of knowledge regarding the Michigan State football program and what works in East Lansing.
Fitzgerald could not ask for a better advisor than Dantonio.
Plus, the retired former Michigan State head coach clearly still has that passion for the program and he seems pretty willing to help and come around the team. That’s the family atmosphere that gets talked about. He’s been retired for seven years but he still likes to come back to speak to the team and meet the guys. That’s a guy who really loves Michigan State.
Michigan State has a pretty good setup right now with Fitzgerald picking Dantonio’s brain.
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