Michigan State football: 3 quick takes from Boston College loss

What did we learn from Michigan State football after their final non-conference matchup and first loss of the year?

Well, undefeated was nice while it lasted. Michigan State football was back on the East Coast this past weekend, this time in Chestnut Hill to match up with Boston College. Unfortunately for the Spartans, the Eagles stole a 23-19 win.

For Boston College, it was its “Red Bandana Game”. The Red Bandana game is a tribute to Welles Crowther, a Boston College alum who passed away while saving people on 9/11. In addition, this game was a late kickoff, being in the 8 p.m. ET slot. Despite pouring rain and injury concerns (four wide receivers out, third starting right guard of the season), the Spartan and Boston College faithful showed out strong.

In an announced sellout, the Boston College Eagles beat the Spartans thanks to a late touchdown pass and an interception in the end zone.

I apologize for the late posting, turns out a night game and a 12-hour drive the next day can certainly take a lot out of you. Who would’ve thought? Here are my quick takes on the loss, though.

1. Run defense was lacking

After forcing a three-and-out to open the game, the MSU front-seven was repeatedly shut out of plays. Despite approximately 10 players taking snaps in the front-four, no one could disrupt the Eagles from making a play. This culminated with the first Boston College touchdown drive, where the Eagles stretched the ball outside.

At one point, Chuck Brantley had four tackles in a row. The next play, they ran opposite of Brantley and Turbo Richard outran Ed Woods to the end zone.

However, after that, the defense clamped up. Wayne Matthews III played spy on Thomas Castellanos, trying to thwart his running threat. The Eagles only had 27 yards in the entire second quarter.

After a strong showing following a disaster to open the second half, the front gave up a 36-yard touchdown to Treshaun Ward. The third quarter did not get much better against the run. Boston College averaged over five yards per carry on the quarter as they out-gained the Spartans 114-51.

Boston College finished the game with 152 yards rushing, but another 30 rushing yards got lumped off from MSU tackling Boston College quarterback Thomas Castellanos for one of their four sacks or a few tackles for loss. On actual designated rushes for Ward or Richard, the Spartan defense failed to record a tackle for loss. The defensive front was rotated around heavily during the game, and a few players came up huge.

The linebackers stole the show on Saturday. On the second Boston College drive of the game, Cal Haladay stripped the ball free and Matthews III pounced on it, preventing the Eagles from taking an early lead. Arguably the biggest tackle for loss came from Jordan Hall, who stuffed Castellanos on a quarterback sweep on fourth-and-goal from the MSU 1-yard line. This gave Michigan State football the chance for a go-ahead score.

Since I am not planning on mentioning defense the rest of the article, I will mention it here: the pass defense did alright on Saturday. They held Castellanos to 15 yards on the ground and 140 through the air, sacking him four times. Unfortunately, the main play that fans will remember is the late 42-yard touchdown to Lewis Bond, which came against Angelo Grose and Malik Spencer. In both of their defenses, they had appeared to be shaken up throughout the fourth and had just come back on field following a timeout prior to the play.

2. The “Aidan Chiles experience” was in full effect

On Saturday, we again saw the best of Michigan State football QB1 Aidan Chiles, and the worst of Chiles. In the first half, Chiles was keeping the Spartans alive. Besides an untimely pick that led to a Boston College score, Chiles was dynamic for the Spartans. His highlight reel play of the half was on a broken play. Chiles evaded a few defenders and turned a 5-yard loss into an amazing 22-yard gain. The play looked straight out of a video game, and it pumped up the team. He finished the game with 57 rushing yards and a touchdown, in addition to 6-7 first downs with his legs.

Throwing the ball, however, was a mixed bag. Throughout the night, Chiles showed flashes that had him ranked as a top-100 prospect and the top quarterback in the portal. Multiple times he worked through progressions to find a receiver who had found a hole in the defensive zone. On a deep pass to Montorie Foster, Chiles fit the ball perfectly to the receiver for 40 yards and cashed in with a quarterback sneak on the ensuing play.

On MSU’s go-ahead drive that spanned 9:24 of the fourth quarter, Chiles methodically picked apart the defense alongside running back Kay’Ron Lynch-Adams. The Spartans subbed in Nate Carter for a crucial third down on the Boston College 9. Chiles made arguably his best play of the night, rolling out and appearing to tuck the ball to try to gain the first with his legs. Nate Carter acted as a blocker at first, but then Chiles pulled up to pass. Carter had dropped to the goal line, and Aidan threw a great ball. Unfortunately, Carter could not corral the ball, resulting in the running back’s fourth drop this year.

During the last Spartan drive of the game, Chiles and tight end Jack Velling could not be stopped, taking the ball from the Michigan State 25 to the Boston College 36 in three plays. Chiles did a lot of things right this game, passing for 241 yards on 35 attempts in very sub-optimal conditions.

Unfortunately, Chiles had a series of lows as well. His first interception of the day came on a pass to the Boston College 22, giving away a series that easily could have given the Spartans another three points in a four-point loss. He also had two or three passes sail on him that could have been intercepted, but good efforts by the MSU receivers or, in one case, Boston College friendly fire eliminated another interception. He also had one throw to Foster on busted coverage that should have been an easy touchdown, but it didn’t have enough air under it to let the receiver get a score. His second interception came right after the Spartans fumbled the second-half kickoff, and they evaporated a seven-point lead into a three-point deficit in the first 2:38 of the second half. A majority of Chiles’ first 12 targets to Foster were overthrown, intercepted, or nearly intercepted. The receiver finished with four catches.

The final drive started off great with Chiles-to-Velling thrice, but then it ended suddenly.

Chiles took a risk on a deep shot, targeting Foster for the 13th time. However, Foster was double-covered and it was an easy interception for the Eagles. The Spartans still had nearly 40 seconds of game clock, two timeouts, and only 36 yards till paydirt. Additionally, this throw came on a first-and-10 situation. There was plenty of time to drive and work the ball down the field.

To say the least, it was a frustrating end to such a promising drive.

3. In spite of frustrations, how much is on Aidan Chiles?

In Chiles’ defense, the conditions and personnel situations were completely stacked against him. Outside of Foster and Aziah Johnson, the only wide receiver to have a career reception heading into the game was Zach Gillespie, who had just caught his first two career passes late in the blowout last week. The entire middle portion of MSU’s wide receiver depth was gone. Nick Marsh, Alante Brown, Jaron Glover, and Antonio Gates Jr. were all out with injury and did not travel. Additionally, freshman receiver Jaylan Brown also did not travel. The Spartans had four scholarship receivers (Foster, Johnson, Jaelen Smith, Austin Clay) and a group of walk-ons. This is nothing against Gillespie and Jack Yanachik, who performed admirably throughout the game, but neither of them are a Marsh or Glover.

On top of the receiver room being depleted, the Spartans were onto their third right guard of the season, that being Brandon Baldwin. He was previously a starting tackle, but Jonathan Smith elected to kick him inside and give Stanton Ramil his first career start. Boston College knew this and had quite a few outside blitzes nearly get home, leading to some of Chiles’ best plays of the night. The only time Chiles got sacked, by Donovan Ezeiruaku, it should have been a penalty. The quarterback was dragged down by the back of his pads and bottom of his helmet.

From that issue, the run game had a hard time getting going. Carter finished with nine carries for nine yards, with his final eight carries earning him a grand total of four yards. Taking out Chiles’ rushing attempts, the Spartans had 70 rushing yards on 24 carries. It is hard to win football games averaging fewer than three yards an attempt. He was forced to be the offense, either with his legs or with his arm. Unfortunately, he was not aided by a clear East Coast night.

Finally, the conditions in Chestnut Hill were awful. Take it from me, who was on the field before the contest started. Pregame, Thomas Castellanos and a couple of his receivers were electing to do some of their warmups in the concourse next to their entrance tunnel rather than taking the field. When getting a few photos in of the team warming up pre-game, I was nearly hit by an errant punt. Picking it up, the ball was hard to handle and it was a task just to toss it back to an equipment staffer a few feet away.

The field was soaked, and the rain only picked up during the game. It rained from at least 10 p.m. on game day until 2:30 a.m., which was when I got back to my hotel. There was no let up. Wind was not much of a factor, with Alumni Stadium being built into the ground, but it was still clocked around 12 mph and the rain was swirling up near the press box. This was not the day to have a quarterback making his fourth career start toss the ball 35 times to his backup receivers, being blocked by a patchwork line.

In all honestly, this could be Chiles’ worst game this year. Considering all he had working against him, it still showed why he is our QB1. Nearly 300 total yards with everything against him is not bad at all. If he can continue to improve his decision making and add just a bit of touch on his throws, the Big Ten will be dreading him.

In summary

This game hurt. Michigan State football gave away what should have been a 4-0 start to the season and enter the meat of the schedule at 3-1. The Spartans’ next four games are Ohio State, Oregon, Michigan, and Iowa. Picking up a win on Saturday would do wonders on the Spartan bowl hopes, as the Spartans also get the surprisingly resurgent Illinois and Indiana later in the year. At a minimum, the Spartans now are forced to steal at least one game of these six if they want to going bowling in Jonathan Smith’s inaugural year.

The Eagles emerged victorious, but the Spartans were the ones who defeated themselves. Michigan State football will now get to play host Ryan Day and Ohio State as the Buckeyes open their conference slate. Kickoff is set for 7 p.m., and the Spartans will also be inducting Mark Dantonio’s name into their “Ring of Honor” on Saturday.