East Lansing, MICH — EAST LANSING — Mark Dantonio did not need anyone to bring it up.
Five sentences into his press briefing after Michigan State’s first preseason practice Thursday, Dantonio offered what many around the college football world are wondering after the biggest turnaround in school history.
“Can we sustain?” Dantonio said. “That’s the big question you ask yourself as you go through it.”
Maintaining success and overcoming failure are things the Spartans have done for much of Dantonio’s first 11 seasons, including capturing two Big Ten titles in three years, winning the Rose Bowl and Cotton Bowl Classic in back-to-back years and making an appearance in the 2015 College Football Playoff semifinals.
And then 2016 happened, with the 3-9 season the first time the Spartans did not go to a bowl game under Dantonio. And then came the off-field turmoil in 2017 that resulted in four players being dismissed in two separate sexual assault cases, along with a number of other players leaving the program.
MSU entered last year’s preseason camp devoid of significant external expectations and without many returning starters but with a focus on improving team chemistry. Dantonio and his players rediscovered the formula to what allowed the Spartans to put together a 36-5 record over the three previous seasons from 2013-15.
The result was a 10-3 turnaround that included contention for a Big Ten title until a blowout loss at Ohio State. MSU closed the season ranked No. 16 after defeating Washington State in the Holiday Bowl.
“We’re going to continue to hunt, that’s what we’re going to do,” senior safety Khari Willis said. “We’re not going to get complacent with a good season that we had last year and a great turnaround for our program. We’re going to hunt and continue to find and reach for our goals.”
From that team, the Spartans return 19 starters and 41 of their 44 players atop their depth chart. Expectations once again are elevated to where they were after winning the 2015 Big Ten title and eventually losing to Alabama in the CFP semifinals.
“There’s a lot of players back with experience and I think we’re a hungry football team,” Dantonio said, “but time’s going to tell.”
In the preseason Amway/USA Today Coaches Poll released Thursday, Michigan State is ranked No. 12.
The optimism and expectations have made arriving at this year’s preseason camp more normal than a year ago, with the opener less than a month away on Aug. 31 at home against Utah State.
“Everyone is just more positive, the coaches are just more positive,” junior quarterback Brian Lewerke said. “It’s not like, ‘Just get me to the first game.’ Obviously you want to play. But last year was more like, ‘OK, let me get this taste out of my mouth — we gotta get to the first game.’ This time, it’s more excitement.”
Despite its rankings revival, MSU sits third among its loaded Big Ten East Division foes. Ohio State is ranked No. 3 in the coaches poll, with Penn State No. 9 and Michigan No. 14. Wisconsin, at No. 7, is the only Big Ten West team in the preseason rankings.
The Spartans defeated the Nittany Lions and Wolverines to challenge the Buckeyes for the division title last year.
When MSU traveled to Columbus, Ohio, it looked looked like a young, unproven team. The result was a 48-3 pounding by the Buckeyes that left the Spartans in a second-place tie in the final division standings.
It was their last loss. But it also was last season.
They will not be taking anyone by surprise this year.
“That’s why you do it — you want the bull’s-eye on your back,” junior defensive tackle Raequan Williams said. “You want to be the one. That’s why we play the game.”
Dantonio is preaching to his players not to “get caught up in the hoopla” of the return to glory from a year ago. The memories from two years ago remain fresh to a veteran group that loses three starters from last season.
“I think our message here has always been how do you handle success and again how you handle failure,” Dantonio said. “What you do immediately after that sort of epitomizes your team. … But you know the bottom can drop out on you at any point in time. The message that our players I think understand and need to continue to understand is do the work — do the work up front.”