As you may have noticed, Pat Fitzgerald has been scheduling official visits all week. Michigan State football is gearing up for a huge spring followed by a summer that will feature several big visitors.
Fitzgerald is assembling his first full recruiting class as Michigan State's head coach after signing one that was mostly Jonathan Smith's guys and his own transfer class.
To succeed at Michigan State, he knows that he has to recruit well in the state and also the rest of the Midwest. Just look at where the best players from the Mark Dantonio era were from. Most of his elite guys who went on to the NFL were from the Midwest and in state.
Fitzgerald must have taken notes.
The first-year head coach scheduled several big-time in-state visits this week, including with arguably the top player in the state, Bryce Kish.
According to Corey Robinson of 247Sports, Kish has locked in an official visit with Michigan State for June 5-7. This is a huge visit for Fitzgerald and the Spartans because the four-star edge rusher is considered one of the best recruits in the entire country.
Kish had been unranked on most recruiting outlets until Rivals boosted him all the way into the top 65. He's up there with Dakota Guerrant, Gideon Gash, and Myles Smith. All of those guys could become Spartans in the absolute best-case scenario.
He'll be on campus a week after Smith, but it would have been nice to pair those two together on the same weekend.
Michigan State is in a good spot with top Michigan recruits
The state of Michigan is absolutely loaded with talent this cycle, and the Spartans are in a good spot with several of the top prospects.
Dakota Guerrant, a four-star wide receiver, four-star offensive tackle Dewey Young, four-star defensive back Gideon Gash, four-star defensive end Myles Smith, and four-star tight end Anthony Cartwright are all high on the Spartans' list, and Fitzgerald seems to have a good relationship with most, if not all, of them.
This would be a good year for Michigan State to dominate in-state recruiting, but it's not going to be easy with Kyle Whittingham down the road.