By By SCOTT NOVAK / Niles Daily Star
NOTRE DAME, Ind. – History was made Saturday night at Notre Dame Stadium, but not the type of history that the Fighting Irish want to be associated with.
Michigan State made it six straight victories at Notre Dame as it handed the Fighting Irish a 31-14 setback before a packed house and a national television audience.
The loss dropped Notre Dame to 0-4 on the season, the first time that has ever happened in the 119-year history of the Fighting Irish football program.
While six straight losses at home to the Spartans and four consecutive defeats to begin the season aren't something to write home about, Notre Dame can take heart in the fact that it did play better.
The Fighting Irish, who began the game as the second worst rushing team in the country, finished with 117 yards rushing.
Notre Dame, which had not scored an offensive touchdown in 2007, the last Division I school to hold that distinction, scored in the opening moments of the game following a Spartan turnover.
Travis Thomas scored on a 1-yard run around the left end and the Irish were on top 7-0.
Notre Dame wouldn't hold the lead for long as the Spartans marched down the field on its second possession and scored on a 7-yard pass from Brian Hoyer to Devin Thomas.
Hoyer, who ended the day with four touchdown passes, made it 14-7 before the first quarter was complete when he connected with tight end Kellen Davis on a 3-yard pass.
Michigan State (4-0) upped its advantage to 17-7 on a Brett Swenson 27-yard field goal in the second quarter and silenced the Notre Dame crowd, which had begun to sense perhaps another blowout loss for the Fighting Irish.
But Notre Dame responded and cut the lead to 17-14 when Robert Hughes capped a five play, 80-yard drive with a 3-yard run with 10:41 remaining in the opening half.
Both teams failed to move the ball effectively the remainder of the first half, but when the Irish headed to the locker room at halftime, they had to be feeling pretty good about themselves.
Hoyer and the Michigan State running game made sure that feeling didn't last for long.
The Spartans came out in the second half and ran the ball right down Notre Dame's throat.
Hoyer completed two of those drives with touchdown passes.
His third scoring strike went to Mark Dell, a 16-yard laser that came with 12:05 remaining in the third quarter.
Hoyer's final touchdown toss went to Davis, this time a 30-yard strike, which started with a simulated fumble by the MSU quarterback.
In the end, it was too much Jevon Ringer and Jehuu Caulcrick. The Spartan running back tandem helped Michigan State run up 354 yards in total offense compared to just 203 yards by the Fighting Irish.
Michigan State finished with 219 yards on the ground, led by Ringer's 144 yards on 26 carries. Caulcrick finished with 83 yards on 20 totes.
Notre Dame freshmen quarterback Jimmy Clausen struggled again in his second career start as he was just 7-of-13 for 53 yards. Clausen was sacked three times by the Spartan defense.
Evan Sharpley came on in relief of Clausen in the fourth quarter and went 4-of-7 for 33 yards.
The Fighting Irish can build upon James Aldridge's big day running the football. Aldridge ran for 104 yards on 18 carries, including a 43-yard scamper.
Hughes added 33 yards on six carries.
"Outstanding job by our football team today," first-year Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio said. "We talked about it all week long about how this really started for us last year at this time when Notre Dame came to our stadium and had a great comeback and won. I think our guys have been suffering ever since then. We talked about it a lot. We've spent a year dealing with this, and our guys have been mocked, and our guys have been made fun of, and we lost coaches; there was a coaching change, and a lot of things happened.
"So we internalized this and turned it to our favor today, and we came in here prepared to play and we were very, very emotional. We knew we had to weather the storm, and we knew we had to weather the storm early. We knew it would be an emotional time down here and we talked about it all week that we would have to weather the storm and push through that storm and our guys did that," he added.
Third-year Notre Dame coach Charlie Weis noted that his team did have a few bright spots, but in the end, it was another disappointing loss.
"The one thing I was encouraged with was the play of our running backs," he said. "We went into this game saying regardless of what was going to happen in this game, we were going to try to run the ball and run the ball with some power. So I think the play of the running back, if I want to pick one bright spot in the game, that would definitely have been the play of the running backs in the game because there was some semblance of a running game. And I think that that's, you know, that's a start.
"A loss is a loss no matter what. I have to my perspective is a pretty simple one. My responsibility and my job is to get this team to improve, okay. I do know this. I do know that after last week's game, the guys could have done one of two things, okay. They could have come in and thrown in the towel, or they could have come in slugging it out and they came out slugging it out, and you could see that from the start of the game. This wasn't a team that was anywhere close to packing it in …"
The road doesn't get any easier for either team.
The Spartans head to Madison on Saturday to face the Wisconsin Badgers at 3:30 p.m., while the fighting Irish make the short trip to West Lafeyette, Ind. to take on Purdue.
Kickoff for the Notre Dame-Purdue game is scheduled for noon.
Michigan State 14 3 14 0 – 31
Notre Dame 7 7 0 0 – 14
ND – THOMAS, Travis 1 run (WALKER, Brandon kick)
MSU – Thomas, Devin 7 pass from Hoyer, Brian (Swenson, Brett kick)
MSU – Davis, Kellen 3 pass from Hoyer, Brian (Swenson kick)
MSU – Swenson 27 field goal
ND – HUGHES, Robert 3 run (WALKER kick)
MSU – Dell, Mark 16 pass from Hoyer (Swenson kick)
MSU – Davis 30 pass from Hoyer (Swenson kick)