Michigan State's Dantonio facing Irish a year after heart scare

EAST LANSING, Mich. — Mark Dantonio feels strange looking back.

It's been a year since the Michigan State coach was hospitalized because of a mild heart attack after calling a memorable fake field goal to beat Notre Dame. Now, only days from a rematch with the Irish, Dantonio can't avoid the memories from that whirlwind of a night.

"I can reflect on the game. It's a little bit surreal watching it, because you know what happened at the end of the game, but I'm completely healthy," he said. "I feel great. In terms of 12 months, there's a lot of good that's happened in 12 months, and there's some things that were negative. I think that goes along with life in general. You take the good with the bad."

Dantonio barely had a chance to enjoy last September's big victory over Notre Dame. Shortly after midnight, he began to feel a squeezing in his chest. He had surgery to put a stent in a blocked blood vessel leading to the heart, and although the procedure was a fairly common one, the jarring ordeal shed additional light on the health hazards coaches can face.

A year later, not much has changed. Dantonio missed two games, but came back to lead the Spartans to a share of the conference title. Now one of his Big Ten colleagues is dealing with his own unsettling concerns: Minnesota coach Jerry Kill collapsed during a seizure during his team's game last weekend, though he could be back on the sideline this weekend.

As he prepares for Saturday's game at Notre Dame, Dantonio is not especially eager to dwell on the anniversary.

"I haven't really thought about that too much — what it feels like," the 55-year-old Dantonio said. "There's a lot of people out there that have problems and suffer right now. My thoughts and prayers go out to coach Kill in Minnesota right now, what he's going through. But you get yourself fixed up, you get back out, you get ready to go. That's the way we do it."

Players say Dantonio is just as businesslike behind the scenes, at least where his health is concerned.

"He doesn't talk about that to us, but he emphasizes the importance of taking advantage of your opportunities and enjoying life," safety Trenton Robinson said. "That's what you've got to do. You don't know what's going to happen the next day."

Dantonio's last 12 months have been filled with highs and lows. After beating Notre Dame last Sept. 18 on that thrilling fake in overtime, the Spartans ended up starting 8-0. They tied for the Big Ten title and finished with 11 wins.

In the offseason, Dantonio was shaken when his former boss, Ohio State coach Jim Tressel, was ousted amid scandal. Then, less than a week before Michigan State's season opener, Dantonio's father died.

Dantonio was asked if it feels like a year since his own health scare, and there was no easy answer.

"It feels like about two months really or a month or a week sometimes, and other times it feels like two years," he said. "Depends what kind of frame of mind I'm in, I guess."

Sometimes, Dantonio's dry sense of humor shows through. On Tuesday, he talked about how his 15th-ranked Spartans (2-0) are still figuring out their identity. When someone asked what he wants that identity to be, Dantonio responded with a checklist of fairly obvious objectives and then added a quip.

"Identity is to have a great defense that is very tough to run on, to throw on, creates turnovers; have an offense that has balance, big play perspective, doesn't turn the ball over; special teams that can dominate," Dantonio said. "All the good things. Everything that's good in football — that's what I want our identity to be. Christmas every day."

As demanding as he is, Dantonio's players relate to him on a personal level.

"He's always done a good job of keeping things in perspective," quarterback Kirk Cousins said. "I think any time you have a heart attack, you're going to look at some things and reevaluate and start to see the bigger picture more often, but he always has been very good at that, so I don't think the heart attack suddenly woke him up in that regard. We just want to make sure we're supporting him and helping him any way we can."

Last year, the Spartans supported their coach by staying focused and winning while he was recovering. This weekend, if they beat Notre Dame again, maybe Dantonio and his team can resume the celebration that was cut short so frighteningly a season ago.

"I think this whole season's especially emotional for him — the first season his dad hasn't been to a lot of the games," linebacker Max Bullough said. "Obviously, what happened to him last year, I don't know if he'll be thinking about that as much ... but I'm sure he'll be thinking about it a little bit, and it means as much to him as any game we're going to play."