MSU fans have no idea what to think about this team

Welcome to SB Nation Reacts, a survey of fans across the NCAA. Each week, we send out questions to the most plugged in Michigan State Spartans fans, and fans across the country. Sign up here to join Reacts.

Three games into the season and Michigan State fans have almost no idea what to make of this year’s team. Coming off of the biggest win in years, the Spartans laid an egg against Iowa in ugly fashion.

The game was seemingly over before halftime, with MSU eventually losing to the previously-winless Hawkeyes 49-7. The Spartans looked much more like the team that lost to Rutgers than the one that beat Michigan.

With that as the backdrop the latest SB Nation Reacts results should not come as a surprise. This week, 67 percent of MSU fans believe the program is headed in the right direction. That’s down from 98 percent last week, but up from from 38 percent the week before.

Unfortunately, things may get uglier for Michigan State before they get better, unless the Spartans have another upset planned. This Saturday, MSU hosts the red-hot Indiana Hoosiers. Even after Indiana, MSU looks at a grueling schedule where no games can be pre-counted as a win.

For now, the confidence most fans have in this team must come from a bigger picture. Mel Tucker’s team isn’t going to rack up wins this year, but building up the program can create confidence heading into next season.

While it’s next to impossible to predict which Michigan State team will show up this year, the Spartans are far from the most surprising feature of the Big Ten this year. After last week, fans around the country consider two Big Ten events among the most surprising in the country, lead by Penn State remaining winless on the season.

Because of the failures so far on the part of Penn State and Michigan, it’s not a surprise that nationally fans think the Big Ten still sits behind the SEC and ACC in conference power rankings.

On the other end of the Big Ten spectrum comfortably sits Ohio State. The Buckeyes once again dispatched an opponent without much of a scare. Fans around the country believe Ohio State is a near shoe-in for a College Football Playoffs bid. They are among four teams that, in the minds of fans, have separated from the rest of the country.

The results show a 50 percent voting gap between Notre Dame and the No. 5 Florida Gators. Only four percent of fans believe either Wisconsin or Iowa will make the playoffs.

Notre Dame beat Clemson last week, but still sits behind the Tigers in the fan vote. That may be in part due to the belief held by more than 80 percent of fans that the two teams will face each other one more time this season, giving Clemson a chance at revenge.

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