East Lansing — The doctor is in.

No, Pat Fitzgerald doesn’t have a medical degree, but Michigan State’s new football coach says he’s gotten a Ph.D. in the ways of modern college football since Northwestern fired him in 2023 . For a Michigan State football program desperate for him to turn things around, he made it clear in his first public comments that he has a plan to turn around one of the Big Ten’s maligned programs.

"We've got to get better," Fitzgerald said Tuesday in his introductory press conference. "We've got to improve. We've got to get stronger."

Fitzgerald, 51, signed a five-year contract to take over Michigan State’s football program Monday afternoon. The move comes as Michigan State has muddled through four straight losing seasons, the past two under Jonathan Smith — w

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