Following a melee in the tunnel at Michigan Stadium two weeks ago, several players from Michigan State we suspended for this past week’s game against Illinois. For Rutgers football, it creates some uncertainty in terms of the personnel that will be available for Saturday’s opponent.
With several players from Michigan State (4-5, 2-4 Big Ten) suspended for last week’s win at No. 16 Illinois, there is no way of knowing who will be available for the Spartans this week against Rutgers (4-5, 1-5 Big Ten).
Rutgers head coach Greg Schiano said that in terms of the impact on his team’s game prep and scheming, it is negligible. A Big Ten player, he says, is a Big Ten player.
“I think sometimes that gets overblown, right? Yes, if he was the starter, he is the best player, otherwise, he wouldn’t be starting, right? That’s usually the way it works,” Schiano told reporters on Monday.
“But it’s not like the next guy is like a dud. Those are Big Ten scholarship football players and we are going to prepare because I am pretty sure they are going to have 11 out there and we have to go do what we do against 11 guys and they are all good players.”
The win on Saturday was an impressive response from Michigan State. Going on the road and beating a Big Ten opponent is not easy. But taking down a ranked opponent and having several key contributors suspended for the game is impressive.
[lawrence-related id=20653]
In terms of how the suspensions could impact Rutgers, assuming the players are suspended for this game, isn’t something that concerns Schiano very much.
“Now, when you have a guy that is a ‘disrupt-the-game-type player’ yeah, then if he’s playing, you’d better know he’s in the game whether it’s in the offense, defense or kicking game. There are certain guys in the Big Ten Conference that can single-handedly disrupt plays, and if they are out there, you’d better know about it,” Schiano said.
“We are going to be aware of their personnel; we always are. And again, how do I know? I can’t predict that stuff. I don’t even try to worry about that.”
[listicle id=20411]
[mm-video type=playlist id=01fc3gzhz7qrm49z6q player_id=none image=https://rutgerswire.usatoday.com/wp-content/plugins/mm-video/images/playlist-icon.png]