3 things I'm looking forward to with Michigan State football in 2024

While there are many great things about paternity leave like finding out how good the Kelly Clarkson show is, it also allowed me to flip on the Big Ten Network during the Michigan State takeover during a time I would normally be working. Oh, and taking care of a new human being is a lot of fun, too.

But the first thing that I watched was the Michigan State football at Indiana game from last November.

While it did technically count as a win for the Spartans, it was more of Indiana handing them the W on a wild intentional grounding call. But as much as I thought last season's football season and more recently, the men's basketball season burned me out of Spartan athletics, the seed has been planted in my brain that Jonathan Smith can do great things this season.

Here are three things I'm looking forward to come late August when the Spartans kick off a new season.

3. It can't possibly be worse than last year, right?

Yes, I said the same thing about the 2023 season after the abysmal 2022 season, but Jonathan Smith has shown the ability to turn around programs quickly, going 2-10 in his first year at Oregon State to 10-3 just four years later and that was with a program that had nowhere near the talent that the Spartans have been bringing in.

Smith had three straight seasons of being ranked dead last in the Pac-12 in recruiting, yet finished fourth in the conference last year. I'm not saying the talent on this team is elite by any means, but after looking over the roster, there seems to be plenty of talented players who weren't getting competent coaching last year. Smith has surrounded himself with high-level assistants, specifically with offensive line coach Jim Michalczik and defensive coordinator Joe Rossi, the two areas that when the Spartans are winning championships, it's because these two groups are excelling.

The Spartans won't win the Big Ten this year (spoiler alert), but I'm looking forward to competitive games against good competition and not losing because of coaching malpractice and dumb mental errors made by undisciplined players. There's also a high probability that Smith doesn't getting tangled in an off-field incident that would cause an embarrassing national headline.