Alessio Milivojevic Is Being Severely Overlooked — Can he be a Top-Five Quarterback in the Big Ten

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It’s no secret the Spartans are entering the 2026 season with some of the lowest expectations in the Big Ten. Those expectations are coming from outside talking heads, but don’t tell the people in East Lansing that.

New head coach Pat Fitzgerald has injected some newfound life back into a program that has been starving to return to relevancy. Now, it's simply waiting for someone to step up and finally push Michigan State over the hump.

At one point, it was transfer running back Kenneth Walker who gave the Spartans a season back near the top and a chance at the College Football Playoff. Before that, it was head coach Mark Dantonio, who consistently had Michigan State looking like one of the top teams in the Big Ten.

But now, the Spartans are looked at like they're riddled with cooties and the rest of the Big Ten wants nothing to do with them. The lack of competent coaching that left Michigan State without a true identity also led to some of the worst roster decisions seen in East Lansing.

That all came to a climax when former head coach Jonathan Smith stuck with his guy, Aidan Chiles, for almost the entire season despite the less-than-mediocre play he was getting in return. Finally, with four games to go and the writing on the wall, Smith pulled the trigger and started Alessio Milivojevic. Sure enough, Milivojevic was lightning in a bottle, keeping Michigan State competitive in games and helping the Spartans secure their first and only Big Ten win of the season.

Now, because of the roster turnover, a new head coach, and a relatively small sample size, Milivojevic is suddenly being treated like no one wants anything to do with him.

But I'm here to tell you this: Milivojevic was the biggest reason the Spartans won even one Big Ten game, and it looked like he was doing it in spite of the coaching around him. Pat Fitzgerald will get the absolute most out of Milivojevic and push him harder and further than ever before.

Before we speculate about what Fitzgerald can do for Milivojevic, though, let's stick to the facts. Let's look at what Milivojevic accomplished last season in just four starts under arguably the most vanilla offensive approach Michigan State has had in years, and see just how good he already was.

Looking across the Big Ten, Milivojevic finished with 1,267 passing yards in four starts, in addition to a handful of late-game appearances and a game against UCLA after Chiles exited early with an injury. Those numbers may not jump off the page, but compared to Michigan State's starter for nine games, Aidan Chiles, they become much more impressive. Chiles finished with just over double Milivojevic's passing yards despite starting more than twice as many games.

So how did Milivojevic produce those numbers? It started with his pinpoint accuracy. He finished ninth in the Big Ten with a 64.2% completion percentage. For comparison, Michigan quarterback Bryce Underwood completed 60% of his passes, while Chiles finished at 63%.

Milivojevic also threw 10 touchdown passes in just four starts, ranking 14th in the conference. That's just one fewer touchdown than Underwood, who started every game for Michigan, and the same total as Chiles despite Chiles making nine starts.

Milivojevic also led all Big Ten quarterbacks with at least 1,000 passing yards by throwing just three interceptions. Ironically, Chiles also finished with only three interceptions, which speaks more to Jonathan Smith's conservative, take-no-chances offensive philosophy than anything else. Fitzgerald won't coach that way. He'll still emphasize protecting the football, but he'll also trust Milivojevic to make plays down the field and allow the offense to attack defenses rather than simply avoid mistakes.

If Milivojevic had maintained his pace over a full 12-game season, he would have finished with roughly 3,600 passing yards, 30 touchdowns, and nine interceptions. Those numbers would have placed him among the very best quarterbacks in the Big Ten in 2025.

On top of that, Fitzgerald has made rebuilding the offensive line one of his biggest priorities after the unit struggled throughout last season. If Michigan State's offensive line becomes as dominant as Fitzgerald expects, Milivojevic will have significantly more time to dissect defenses and work through his progressions instead of being forced to get rid of the football almost immediately like he often had to last season.

I'm not saying Milivojevic is guaranteed to be the best quarterback in the Big Ten. But nobody was talking about Fernando Mendoza before last season either, and he ended up becoming the No. 1 overall pick. Milivojevic has the talent to become one of the conference's biggest breakout stars, and Michigan State has every opportunity to shock the college football world.

It all starts with Milivojevic proving he's one of the top five quarterbacks in the Big Ten.

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