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Michigan State football is starting to experience some attrition as the offseason begins with new coach Jonathan Smith in place.
Including two promising young midfielders.
Redshirt freshman quarterback Katyn Houser, who started the Spartans’ final seven games this season, and true freshman Sam Leavitt are reportedly planning to enter the NCAA transfer portal. They were among six players who announced their intention to explore potential transfer options on Monday.
Starting right tackle Spencer Brown also announced via Twitter on Monday that he plans to enter the transfer portal with one year of eligibility remaining. Two offensive linemen, sophomores Kevin Wigginton II and Ethan Boyd, also announced their intentions to test the portal.
Linebacker Darius Snow also entered the portal with two years of eligibility remaining, and the redshirt junior said on social media he could appeal for a third season.
Brown and Snow are in the portal immediately with graduate exceptions. Houser, Leavitt, Boyd and Wigenton, along with any other college students, cannot officially enter until the gate window reopens on Dec. 4. Any or all of them could withdraw their names from the portal and remain as part of Smith’s first roster.
These decisions come three days after the Spartans’ 4-8 season ended with a 42-0 loss to current No. 10 Penn State at Ford Field.
Common:Jonathan Smith’s mission in Michigan State football is clear
Smith, whose appointment was announced Saturday, said Monday Big Ten Network He plans to focus the Spartans’ rebuilding efforts on the No. 1 ranked high school.
“There’s no doubt that we’re going to start developing. Developing the program and being able to develop year after year, especially for a younger player to be in the program, I want him to lead better as a player,” he said. , person, student – everything. So we want to be about development. I want to develop the top-rated players as well. So, they come to the place, two, three, four, five stars, and they grow and get better.
“The roster, yeah, there are different ways to build a roster. We’ll use every avenue, but we want to start with a player from high school that comes in here and develops and gets better. That’s going to be hopefully the core of the roster.
Houser arrived from California in 2022 as coach Mel Tucker’s first starting quarterback, earning a redshirt after playing six snaps in one game against Akron. After two-year starter Payton Thorne left the program for Auburn in the spring, Houser lost the battle to replace him on the team with junior Noah Kim.
Kim started the first five games before the 6-foot-3, 213-pound Houser took over as the starter against Rutgers, a game in which MSU blew an 18-point lead in the fourth quarter and lost 24-21. The Spartans went on a six-game losing streak after Tucker was fired on September 10.
Houser won two games as a starter, but Leavitt eventually threw the winning touchdown pass in a 20-17 win over Nebraska on November 4. Leavitt elected to keep his redshirt after that game, the fourth game he played in this fall. Houser has continued to start with Kim injured and out since the end of September, leaving only two walks on the depth chart.
Hoosier’s best performance came in leading a 24-21 win at Indiana on November 18. He went 25-for-39 for 279 yards with three touchdown passes, including The game-winner was on a 36-yard run by Maliq Carr with 1:19 to play. Houser finished his season 112-for-191 for 1,132 yards with six touchdowns and five interceptions.
Leavitt played an entire fourth quarter against Michigan and Minnesota, along with two drives against the Cornhuskers and one against Maryland. The 6-2, 200-pound Oregon native was 15-for-24 passing for 139 yards with two touchdowns and two interceptions and ran 13 times for 67 yards, finishing fourth on the team in rushing.
Michigan State University Stock Watch:A few players finished the season on a high note
Brown is a Walled Lake Western product who initially signed with coach Mark Dantonio in 2019. Brown, 6-6, 315, a redshirt senior, started 23 of 32 games as a Spartan, including all 12 in 2022 and 10 of 12 this year. season. Two of those starts this year came at left tackle.
His sixth year of graduate transfer eligibility is available due to the NCAA’s coronavirus waiver for the 2020 season; Brown earned a degree in advertising management in May 2022 and was pursuing a second degree in interdisciplinary studies in the social sciences.
Wigginton has played in all 12 games this season, and the 6-5, 320-pound guard has also started six times. The 6-7, 320-pound Boyd, who graduated from East Lansing High School, also played in every game this fall and started the first three games of his career. Both arrived as part of Tucker’s 2021 recruiting class.
Snow suffered a major leg injury in the 2022 opener against Western Michigan and missed the remainder of the season. Snow, 6-1, 230, was part of Dantonio’s final recruiting class in 2020 and remained despite the coach’s departure before his freshman season. He moved from defensive back to fullback before the 2022 season.
After missing the first two games this fall, Snow returned and played in four games before being sidelined with another undisclosed injury in the last six games. He finished with six tackles on 55 snaps.
Snow is the son of a former MSU/NBA guard Eric Snowand nephew of former All-America/NFL linebacker Percy Snow (the only Spartan to win both the Butkus and Lombardi Awards in 1989 and the first in college football history to win them in the same season).
The six players who announced their intentions on Monday are the first defections in the one-month period following Tucker’s dismissal on October 27. Under interim coach Harlon Barnett, MSU had four players enter the portal — long snapper Hank Bieber, offensive lineman Keshawn Blackstock, running back Gordon Simmons and defensive back Justin White — and another defensive end, Tonmis Adeleye, leaving the program.
Contact Chris Solari:[email protected]. follow him @chrysolari.
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