Michigan State football coach Pat Fitzgerald is working on piecing together his coaching staff, but he also has to work on getting some key players back for the 2026 season.
Fitzgerald probably doesn’t expect to compete for a Big Ten title in year one, but he’s seen what Curt Cignetti has done at Indiana so he can’t completely count that out — it’s possible, but also an extreme outlier. In the transfer portal era, you can turn a program around much quicker.
But Fitzgerald knew that he needed to retain some key players in order to have success in 2026.