What Mel Tucker is emphasizing after watching Michigan State football game film

EAST LANSING – Mel Tucker’s time with the tape of Michigan State football’s humbling home loss to Minnesota pointed to some obvious problems.

The solutions? He’s not saying.

“For me, it's not difficult to block out the noise. I think it's more difficult for the players, just because of experience,” Tucker said Monday. “We talked about it — we talked about it immediately after the game in the locker room, and then we talked about it again today. We'll continue to talk about that. But it's facing forward now. What exactly we say and how to do that, I'll just have to keep that in-house.”

The Spartans, who fell out of the USA TODAY Coaches Poll this week after climbing to No. 9 two weeks ago, head to Maryland on Saturday at a critical point of their season after allowing 72 combined points and 500-plus yards in each of the losses to Washington and Minnesota.

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“Good teams and teams are families that come together during tough times and they move forward together,” quarterback Payton Thorne said Saturday. “So that's what our plan is.”

After citing the need to rewatch Saturday’s 34-7 loss to the Gophers to see specifically what went awry, what issues did Tucker see?

∎ “Ball security is critically important. The turnover margin is the biggest indicator of winning or losing, and at least at the present time, we're on the negative side of the turnover margin for the season. So that also is reflected in our record.”

The Spartans (2-2, 0-1 Big Ten) have committed eight turnovers through four games, including six interceptions from Thorne.

∎ “We need to create more explosive plays on offense, we need to sustain drives, and we need to score points. We're really close in the run game.”

MSU had no runs of 10 or more yards Saturday, and Thorne completed one throw longer than 15 yards. Neither Jalen Berger nor Jarek Broussard have a carry longer than 9 yards the past two weeks, and the two running backs have combined for 80 yards on 33 attempts against Minnesota and Washington. The Spartans have been outscored 60-14 in the first three quarters of those losses, and the Gophers had a 42:30/17:30 advantage in time of possession and ran 74 plays to MSU’s 45.

Let’s start on offense:

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On defense:

∎ “Our pre-snap alignments need to improve. We need to do a much better job of stopping the run on a consistent basis. Our tackling needs to improve.”

MSU allowed 240 rushing yards to the Gophers, with Mohamed Ibrahim running for 103.

∎ “We need to be tighter in coverage, man and zone.”

The Spartans have given up 591 yards and six touchdowns passing the past two weeks, with large areas of the field left uncovered either by design in zone situations or with softer coverage in man with defensive backs 5 to 10 yards off the line of scrimmage.

∎ “We need to get pressure on the quarterback on all downs. We need to get off the field on third down. And we need to take the ball away — that's turnover margin.”

MSU doesn’t have a sack the past two games after registering 12 in wins over Western Michigan and Akron, and the Spartans are one of four teams in the 131-team Football Bowl Subdivision without an interception. They are tied for first with Coastal Carolina, Duke and Virginia with seven fumble recoveries. The Spartans allowed the Gophers to convert 10 of 12 third-down opportunities and rank 107th in the nation and next-to-last in the Big Ten in giving up a 43.3% conversion rate.

“I believe that we're better defense than we went out there and played as,” defensive end Jacoby Windmon said Saturday.

Added Tucker: “We need to make some scheme adjustments, and we're always evaluating personnel. We'll do that when necessary. So we'll have to see what that looks like once we get out there (to Maryland).”

Tucker did specify MSU’s issues are fixable, and said he has confidence in the staff and players. The buzz words he is using are “optimistic and determined.”

“It's an all-hands-on-deck, 24-7 challenge. I mean, that's what we do as coaches,” he said. “It's a lot easier to coach guys when everything's going well. But when adversity hits, that's really where the rubber meets the road.

“It's about how you respond to adversity. And I'm determined and optimistic because of the response that I've seen from our staff and from the players.”

OSU time set

MSU's next home game with Ohio State on Oct. 8 will be a 4 p.m. kickoff broadcast on ABC.

Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @chrissolari. Read more on the Michigan State Spartans and sign up for our Spartans newsletter.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: What Mel Tucker is emphasizing after watching MSU football film