EAST LANSING, Mich. -- By the time Michigan State plays at Notre Dame, the Spartans will have had two weeks to prepare for the test.It looks like theyll need it.No. 12 Michigan State must improve after a lackluster, season-opening 28-13 win against Furman to beat the Fighting Irish Sept. 17 on the road.The Spartans, though, did do enough to keep their ranking Tuesday in The Associated Press college football poll after avoiding an upset to the Southern Conference team.After the football game, you wish you wouldve won going away a little bit easier, Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio said. But the reality of the situation, everybody comes in with a plan. Congratulate Furman for that. We made some mistakes penalty-wise and turnover-wise that kept the game close.The Spartans were on defense, leading by just eight, early in the fourth quarter when Tyler OConnor threw an interception in his second career start. They got the ball right back with a pick of their own and OConnor later sealed the win with a touchdown pass with 4:55 left.Michigan State had two turnovers, forced only one turnover, and had 10 penalties for 120 yards to extend a lot of Furmans drives Friday night.Dantonio left Spartan Stadium unhappy.The next day, he felt a little better.On Saturday as Im watching all these other games, Dantonio said, and Im seeing all these close games, you start to get an understanding that they all count one as coach (George) Perles would always tell me and that you go onto the next thing. But were 1-0 right now. Well count that. And, well take this week to get ready and then to look forward to Notre Dame next week.Notre Dame was ranked No. 10 when it lost at Texas 50-47 in two overtimes Sunday night, a game Dantonio watched live on TV and scouted the next day.The Irish dropped to No. 18 in the AP poll and will likely have a chance to bounce back at home Saturday against Nevada before hosting Michigan State the following week.Its crucial that we get better because we obviously have a lot of areas that we need to improve, OConnor said Tuesday night after a full-padded practice. Usually teams make their greatest improvement from Week 1 to Week 2. We get a chance to make that improvement with an extra week in between. Its different. We were actually talking about how strange it is to open on a Friday night and then have two full weeks off between games.The extra time will allow the Spartans to spend a lot of time studying what Notre Dame did against Texas, which shot up to No. 11 in the AP poll. They will also have an opportunity to see adjustments Notre Dame makes for its second game against Nevada.Were going to really be able to dig in deep on Notre Dame, OConnor said. Even though some of the schemes may be different, well get to see a lot of what their players can do.---Online: AP College football website: www.collegefootball.ap.org and www.twitter.com/AP-Top25---Follow Larry Lage at www.twitter.com/larrylage and follow his work at www.bigstory.ap.org/content/larry-lage Cheap Jordan 12 Gym Red . Carey Price didnt, but he still came out on top against one of his rivals for the No. 1 job at the Sochi Games. The Anahim Lake, B.C., native was stellar in making 39 saves in his home province and Lars Eller got credit for a bizarre short-handed winner as the Canadiens defeated the Canucks 4-1. Cheap Air Jordan 12 Retro . Fernandez, coached in Toronto by former two-time Olympic silver medallist Brian Orser, scored 267.11 points and is the first champion to successfully defend since Russias Evgeny Plushenko in 2005 and 2006. http://www.wholesalejordan12.com/ . Louis Blues teammates who would also be participating in the Olympics, Alex Pietrangelo felt right at home, no different in some ways to the travel experience of any old road trip – save for the length of the journey, that is. Cheap Air Jordan 4 China . Anthony Calvillo, through 20 CFL seasons, was frequently invincible and largely stoic in the heat of competition. But underneath the professional exterior he was, and is, compellingly human. Cheap Jordan 12 Mens . -- Lou Brocks shoulder-to-shoulder collision with Bill Freehan during the 1968 World Series and Pete Roses bruising hit on Ray Fosse in the 1970 All-Star game could become relics of baseball history, like the dead-ball era. ST. SIMONS ISLAND, Ga. -- It would be a little too clichéd to open a column about changing times by quoting Bob Dylan, but hey, those words helped win him a Nobel Peace in literature, which I believe is like a FedEx Cup trophy to the rest of the non-golf world.And sure, if were really going to discuss how the times are a-changin, we might want to start with the presidential election. Or at the very least, the Chicago Cubs.By comparison, the golf industry is moving at a leisurely pace. But the better point to be made here is that it is indeed moving forward, which hasnt always been the case.For years, industry leaders have cited declines in both the number of people playing the game and the number of people watching the game at its highest level, so much so that the grassroots movement to grow the game has become synonymous with the rhetoric of these leaders.Too often this has just been lip service. Sure, efforts to increase the amount of people playing golf shouldnt go unrecognized, but the worlds biggest tours have largely remained stagnant. The popular takeaway has been that these tours are all in favor of growing the game, just as long as they dont have to veer too far from the status quo.Three announcements in the past week alone, though, have already triggered the changing times in golf.The PGA Tour revealed that next years edition of the Zurich Classic will be a team event, featuring 80 two-man pairings competing alongside each other in the only officially sanctioned non-individual tournament on the schedule.The Web.com Tour, the largest developmental tour of the PGA circuit, announced that its season will begin with two events in the Bahamas that are played in consecutive rounds starting on Sunday and finishing on Wednesday in an effort to maximize interest on otherwise golf-less days.The European Tour, fresh off a few non-competitive nighttime challenges before tournaments, is looking into the potential of contesting an entire competitive event under a dark sky and bright lights.These are brilliant ideas, all of them, for the simple reason that theyre not the status quo. That doesnt mean theyll all be endlessly successful or grow the game, but they will break the mold. Theyll move outside a box that has too frequently confined professional events to the usual conformist standards.ddddddddddddIt can be argued that golf doesnt need such tweaks at its highest levels, at least not in the most literal sense, but it can more easily be argued that new ideas can be beneficial to helping the overall cause.Is it needed? I dont have any idea. I would probably say no, Zach Johnson explained. But can it be a positive in the long run? Absolutely. To add something to a product thats already tremendous and make it better -- whether its lights, dates, formats -- Im all for it. If it can help the game, if it helps fans of the game and makes us players hungrier to play more, sure. I see no issues with it.Its a trial and error process, added Jim Furyk. If its good and the fans like it and the sponsor likes it and the players like it, heck yeah, lets go. Lets keep doing it. If it doesnt work, well come up with some new ideas. Theres nothing wrong with trying.Therein lies an inherent issue with outside the box thinking: It cant only serve one master. These new ideas have to fit the desires of fans, sponsors and players, which is a more difficult concept than it might seem.Each of these ideas proposed in the past week meets all of the criteria. Each should help grow the game -- or at least enhance the entertainment factor -- without failing to fulfill the needs of one of these parties.Obviously, the tried and true traditional fan is always going to watch golf, Brandt Snedeker said. But how do we get the casual fan involved? How do we get people who dont think golf is cool to watch an event? We saw that at the Ryder Cup; people who traditionally dont watch golf watched it. How can we use that to our advantage? Its good to try it, see how it goes, see the fan response and go from there.For too long, golf has remained reluctant to stray from the status quo at professional tournaments. Finally the industry is starting to listen to its own grow the game implorations. Some of the ideas might be instant hits, others might prove to be flops.But thats beside the point. The games leaders are becoming more open to ideas. At least theyre now starting to try some ideas and see what works. ' ' '