Michigan State, which had lost seven games in a row coming into Saturday, has now won one game in a row. That’s because Michigan State played Rutgers on Saturday, and Rutgers is just terrible. The final score was 49-0 in the Spartans’ favor.
The state of Michigan beat Rutgers a combined 127-0 this season
It’s not good, folks. Things are not good.
Photo by Dave Reginek/Getty Images
The game included Rutgers doing this:
That’s a Rutgers quarterback trying to throw a screen pass to a receiver, but instead tripping on his own running back and shot-putting the football into the turf.
It’s not how it’s supposed to be done, at least not exactly. But it’s a pretty good metaphor for how Rutgers football has done for the past several years.
The game also included Rutgers punting from the Michigan State 30-yard line at one point. While that’s a nice gesture if Rutgers is merely trying to fit in as an official Big Ten school, it’s not a great football strategy.
Rutgers needs to stop playing teams from the state of Michigan.
And that’s going to be tricky, because both Michigan and Michigan State are in the Big Ten East, which is Rutgers’ own division.
You’ll recall that on Oct. 8, Rutgers hosted Jim Harbaugh’s Wolverines, and things got exceptionally ugly. Michigan won 78-0 in a game that produced a ton of sad images and also some pretty remarkable stats, such as these:
1. The 78-point margin was the biggest in an FBS-on-FBS game this millennium, according to the database at Sports Reference.
2. Rutgers had 6 (SIX!) yards of offense in the first half. That, ESPN said, was the fewest in the sport in almost two calendar years, since Wake Forest got 6 in the first half against Boston College.
3. Rutgers lost 7 yards on the first five plays of the second half, crossing into negatives for the day. The Scarlet Knights didn’t for good get into the black in total yardage until about midway through the third quarter. They finished with a sterling 39, including 5 passing yards. Michigan had 600.
4. Rutgers did not get a first down until the fourth quarter. ESPN reported that the last team to play a major college football game and not get a first down was Western Carolina (against NC State) in 1990. The Knights gave it the old college try!
Now Rutgers has played a demonstrably terrible team from the same state and lost by 49 points. This has not been a good year.
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