RESOLVING THE LEDGER
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Pat Fitzgerald wears an emerald tie these days and ends his press conferences with an enthusiastic "Go Green!"
But his long, often successful tenure as a player and coach at Northwestern — which ended in an abrupt and ugly manner — still casts a long shadow.
It's been three years since Fitzgerald was fired by the university amid a hazing scandal and a year after he settled a lawsuit with the school, which said its investigation did not find any evidence that he knew of or condoned any hazing.
On Wednesday, Fitzgerald was back at Big Ten Media Days at the Hilton Chicago as the first-year coach at Michigan State. He's energized by the challenge of rebuilding a program that faded from relevance since the 2020 retirement of Mark D'Antonio.
But Fitzgerald prefers the term "rebirth" to "rebuild," and the former is also an apt descriptor for this stage of his coaching career.
What did he miss about coaching during his hiatus from the college game? He pushed back politely but firmly against the idea that he went away at all.
"I never left the game, for sure," Fitzgerald said.
He worked as a volunteer assistant at Loyola Academy where one of his sons (Ryan) quarterbacked a pair of state-champion teams before walking on at Iowa and another (Brendan) will be a senior receiver this fall. Fitzgerald also spent time at Iowa with longtime Hawkeyes coach Kirk Ferentz.
"I learned a lot," Fitzgerald said of his time at Loyola. "I became a better teacher. When you're teaching a young guy how to run a curl route and he's like, 'What is a curl?' Like what about the freshman or sophomore coaches here, what are you guys doing? Wait, I'm a volunteer dad, here to help."
Jokes aside, Fitzgerald's silver lining in the dark cloud of his Northwestern departure was that extra family time. That, and finding out who had his back.
"It's funny when issues arise and people run to you, you really find out who your friends are," he said. "I'm just really thankful for a great group of people that really were supportive. ... I think it's hardened my resolve and I'm just very thankful and grateful to be back in this role."
Calling himself "a Big Ten guy," Fitzgerald said Michigan State was on his short list of potential landing spots for his comeback. He ticked off a few of the reasons: the Spartans' history of winning football, their big and enthusiastic fan base and better facilities than he could dream of in Evanston.
"I'm just excited to have a home-field advantage," Fitzgerald said. "Never lived that. It's going to be cool."
Fitzgerald had a few chances to talk about his former team and how things ended, but he mostly focused on the Spartans. One exception was when he was asked if he had a chip on his shoulder.
"I wouldn't say I have a chip on my shoulder," Fitzgerald said. "I wouldn't say our program has a chip on our shoulder. I'd say we have a bag of chips on our shoulder. I'll leave it at that."
He was more forthcoming about his quarterback, who is familiar to Chicago-area fans. St. Francis grad Alessio Milivojevic is a redshirt sophomore who started the last four games for the 4-8 Spartans last season.
"He's just got all the leadership skills you're looking for, that 'it' factor," Fitzgerald said.
Milivojevic was a junior at St. Francis in 2022, when he met Fitzgerald — then in his final season at Northwestern — for the first time.
"Coach Fitz is a legend," Milivojevic said. "Everyone has great things to say about him. ... It's wild how worlds collide."
The fact that they're both Spartans is clear proof of that.
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