The college football world is abuzz with how crazy Sunday's coaching carousel was after the biggest domino finally fell. Most of the talk is about the messy hire of Lane Kiffin to LSU or the plethora of American Conference coaches moving up to the SEC, but the real winner of today may very well be the Michigan State Spartans.
The Spartans quietly fired Jonathan Smith Sunday afternoon and have replaced him with former Northwestern coach Pat Fitzgerald. Before the hazing scandal rocked Evanston, Fitzgerald had the program rolling, and now that his name has been cleared in the court system, for the Spartans to hire him as their next coach is the best hire of the weekend.
SOURCE: Michigan State is now finalizing the deal to hire Pat Fitzgerald as its new head coach, @TheAthletic has learned.
— Chris Vannini (@ChrisVannini) December 1, 2025
He went 110-101 at Northwestern. @chrissolari and @Graham_Couch first reported the news.
Since Mark Dantonio retired, outside of the one year where Kenneth Walker ran wild, football in East Lansing has turned into more of an afterthought. It will always be a basketball-first school, but there is no reason why Michigan State cannot at least have a winning record each season.
The end of the Mel Tucker era was a nightmare, and the Smith tenure really never got off the ground, so bringing in Fitzgerald to right the ship seems like the closest thing to a homerun hire other than James Franklin to Virginia Tech. I truly believe that if you can make Northwestern a consistent winner that you can win anywhere.
Pat Fitzgerald, of course, played in the Big Ten, has head coaching experience in the Big Ten, and I would be shocked if he isn't the head coach of the Spartans for as long as he wants. There are expectations for the football program, but we all know they are not nearly as crazy as the likes of Ohio State, Michigan, or Oregon.
Just making the conference championship game from time to time will be enough for the fanbase, and if Pat finds a way to get them to the College Football Playoff, he could easily have a statue built for him outside of the stadium one day. This was a bold move by the decision makers and one that will fix what has been missing from Michigan State football as of late.