PASADENA, Calif. — For all the analysis that precedes a contest like the Rose Bowl, for the hundreds of hours of scrutiny, Michigan State's season hinged Wednesday on a quarterback who started the season as a backup and a linebacker who arrived on campus as a walk-on.
The quarterback is Connor Cook. He threw for 332 yards and 2 touchdowns against a stout Stanford defense, and played his best game in the final contest of his sophomore season.
The linebacker is Kyler Elsworth. He earned a scholarship before the 2011 season. He started in place of the suspended captain Max Bullough at middle linebacker, and on the game's most critical play, he leapt over a pile of bodies late in the fourth quarter and smacked into the opposing ball carrier the way a hammer pounds into a nail.
Here they were, two relatively unheralded players, one largely unknown, with two essential contributions in Michigan State's 24-20 victory. Here was Cook, most valuable offensive player of both the Rose Bowl and the Big Ten championship game. Here was Elsworth, who skipped the more enjoyable events this week to watch more film. And here was No. 4 Michigan State and a whole bunch of roses and a glitter cannon, all made possible by the improbable twists that took place.
Cook seemed least enthused of all. As Coach Mark Dantonio conducted his postgame news conference, Cook leaned forward, his expression blank, his eyes trained straight ahead. Someone asked him about rubbing his eyes, perhaps to wipe away the emotion of the moment.
"I was just rubbing my eyes because I'm really tired," he said.
Sometimes, Cook looked like a Heisman Trophy contender at the Rose Bowl. Sometimes, he looked lost. Sometimes, he looked like a sophomore at the end of an uneven season, one that concluded on Wednesday night.
Mostly, Cook turned a perceived weakness (Michigan State's passing offense) into the most unlikely of strengths. He threw short passes and intermediate passes, comebacks and slant routes and long fades. He surpassed 300 passing yards for the second time this season — and the second time in the past two games, against a pair of top five opponents, no less.
Cook made sure that No. 5 Stanford lost the 100th Rose Bowl the same way the Cardinal had lost the first. After the parade and the pageantry and the overload of nostalgia, this game, like so many football games, came down to a quarterback.
And a stop. It happened late in the fourth quarter, fourth-and-1, the ball at the Stanford 34-yardline, less than two minutes remaining. Stanford running back Tyler Gaffney said afterward that everyone in the stadium knew what was coming: a handoff, a push forward, a runner headed straight ahead.
The Cardinal called timeout and lined up for the play. Michigan State countered with a timeout of its own.
When play resumed, Stanford sent fullback Ryan Hewitt into the line. Bodies met bodies until they formed an indistinguishable mash, with one body flying above the rest. It was, Gaffney later said, "a test of wills."
Or, as Stanford Coach David Shaw put it after Elsworth and others stopped the play for no gain, "They're that good up front."
Still, the Cardinal have sustained a run of college football excellence. This was Stanford's fourth straight appearance in the Bowl Championship Series and its second straight Rose Bowl trip. This one ended in defeat, although Shaw said that the seniors should be regarded as the most successful class in program history.
The first Rose Bowl took place in 1902, and Stanford participated, although "participated" is a loose term in that case, given that Michigan trounced the Cardinal, 49-0.
Fans arrived at that contest on horses and buggies. Few stayed for the end. The game was so bad that organizers did not hold another one until 1916.
The latest edition of the Rose Bowl hardly resembled the first, although it was also expected to lack style points. Both teams earned reputations this season as defensive juggernauts. Michigan State (13-1) allowed teams 2.70 yards a carry, best in the nation; Stanford (11-3) allowed 2.98. Neither team struck fear into opposing offenses with its passing attack.
As Cook went, so went the Spartans, a theme that worked for this season as well as this game. Michigan State's lone stumble came at Notre Dame in September, when the Spartans managed only 13 points. The better Cook played, the less burden he left on the Spartans' defense.
Cook made some really bad throws Wednesday and some really questionable decisions. Stanford took a 17-7 lead in the second quarter when linebacker Kevin Anderson received an errant throw from Cook and returned it 40 yards, untouched, into the end zone.
Cook threw another interception that was voided by a defensive penalty. He had at least two other interceptions dropped. One hit a Stanford cornerback in the stomach.
After the touchdown return, Dantonio found Cook on the sideline.
"You good?" the coach asked his quarterback.
"Yeah, I'm fine," the quarterback responded.
They bumped fists, and Cook hustled back onto the field.
Cook led Michigan State on a scoring drive near the end of the first half. He completed passes of 24, 11 and 37 yards, before evading pressure and finding fullback Trevon Pendleton for a 2-yard touchdown. He made plays like that all night. Enough of them, anyway.
Afterward, Dantonio and Cook found each other amid the din of the celebration. Confetti fell in the background. Glitter, too.
Dantonio kept saying that Michigan State could play with anybody, that the Spartans would play with anybody, including Florida State and Auburn, the two national championship combatants next Monday night. But first, he looked over at his quarterback. He patted Cook on the shoulder.
"We found the inches," he said.
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Michigan State 24, Stanford 20: After Pageantry, Tough Stop and Timely Passes Lift Spartans in Rose Bowl
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