EAST LANSING – It took two snaps for Michigan State football to dictate the tone against Iowa.

Nate Carter for 8 yards to start the game, following a strong surge from center Tanner Miller and right guard Brandon Baldwin.

Then it was Kay’Ron Lynch-Adams off the left side for 8 more on the second play, hitting a hole created by a powerful push from Miller and left guard Luke Newman.

Suddenly, after six games of backfield penetration handcuffing their running backs, the Spartans’ run game became unshackled and dominant Saturday night.

“They were very, very physical,” Carter assessed Tuesday.

If ever there was a time for MSU to get its run game going, it’s with Michigan up next, a 7:30 p.m. kickoff Saturday in Ann Arbor (BTN). Whether the momentum the Spartans built with a season-best 212-yard rushing performance in a 32-20 win over the Hawkeyes is real or a mirage will be put to the test this week against the Wolverines.

As it always is.

“I think the last game helped with confidence as a group,” Miller said Tuesday. “That we can do it, we can hang with anybody. We just got to do it ourselves. It ain't gonna be handed to us.”

Offensive coordinator Brian Lindgren, along with coach Jonathan Smith, both gushed over the balance MSU showed Saturday against Iowa, with quarterback Aidan Chiles throwing for 256 yards and running for another 51 as part of a breakout 468-yard total offensive performance.

Lindgren said Chiles benefitted from having a productive rushing attack, and vice versa. Lynch-Adams led the Spartans with 86 yards on 15 carries and Carter had 49 yards on nine carries and the lone rushing touchdown.

“The offensive line did a nice job. I think they got a little bit more vertical with some of our wide zone stuff,” Lindgren said Tuesday. “It's tribute to the offensive line and their ability to come off the ball and get some create some movement.

“And then I always think it's pretty good for us to be able to have that good mix and balance. We were kind of mixing in some of the play-action, some pass game stuff, to where we were able to keep those guys a little bit off balance, where they couldn't just sell out against the run.”

It is a blend Lindgren knows will be critical to have against the Wolverines.

Consider this the annual rivalry reminder: the team with the most productive day on the ground has won 48 of the last 54 meetings between MSU (4-3, 2-2 Big Ten) and U-M (4-3, 2-2). The Wolverines won the past two years by owning the Spartans in the run game, outrushing MSU 287-86 en route to winning by a combined 78-7 score. Michigan coasted to a 49-0 victory last year and grinded out a 29-7 win in 2022 in Ann Arbor, allowing just 37 rushing yards.

It continued a trend of the Spartans’ run game struggling against the Wolverines and others that started in the final two years of Mark Dantonio’s 13-year tenure.

MSU hasn’t run for a touchdown against U-M since Kenneth Walker III’s 23-yard game-breaker knocked out the Wolverines, 37-33, in an epic 2021 battle at Spartan Stadium. Take out Walker’s five TDs that day, however, and the Spartans have not had a running back find the end zone on the ground since LJ Scott’s 5-yard, first-quarter score opened their 2016 loss. Former quarterback Brian Lewerke, in MSU’s 2017 win in Ann Arbor, has the Spartans’ last non-Walker TD run against U-M.

It's no secret that the lack of production from the running backs is tied to a downturn along the offensive line since the halcyon point of Dantonio’s reign in the rivalry. The Mel Tucker era produced the two worst rushing averages in program history, 91.7 yards in 2020 and a meager 89.5 per game a year ago. Even in Walker’s magical 2021 campaign, 1,154 of the current Seattle Seahawks star’s 1,636 rushing yards came after contact.

Saturday’s performance against Iowa was just the fifth time since 2017 that MSU had 200-or-more rushing yards in a game, two of those coming with Walker in 2021. And the push from the offensive line looked much closer to what fans have seen over the decades for the first time since the Spartan road-graders up front paved the path for Scott, Jeremy Langford, Le’Veon Bell and others in the 2010s.

“I think it's just energy and execution,” Miller said. “You might have a play where it's not going to go your way, but they're going to spot the ball, we gotta line back up, and we gotta do again. So if you can go out there and execute that play, then there's gonna be a lot of plays.”

The challenge now is to replicate that blocking on the road in a hostile environment against a Wolverines run defense that ranks ninth in the nation at 92.1 yards allowed per game. In the past three seasons, U-M's defense has only allowed more than 200 yards once, giving up 263 to TCU in a 2022 College Football Playoff loss. The Spartans’ 199 team rushing yards in 2021 are the second-most in that span.

Lindgren and Miller said the offensive line, which lost two starting right guards early in the season, spent the bye week working on fundamentals and techniques as well as trying to develop better cohesion with footwork. Baldwin spent the majority of his MSU career at left tackle but moved to right guard after injuries to Kristian Phillips and Gavin Broscious. Newman played left tackle at Holy Cross before moving inside after transferring to MSU in the summer. And Miller was an All-Pac-12 guard last year before arriving with Smith, Lindgren and Chiles in the winter.

Lindgren also called it “an attitude thing” for the improvement in blocking from the first six games to Saturday.

“We challenged our guys to really come off the ball and be more aggressive and try to create movement,” he said. “That’s something that was a big focus over the over the bye week.”

The only times since 1970 that the winner of the Paul Bunyan Trophy did not win the rushing battle were in 2020 (MSU), 2016 (U-M), 2015 (MSU), 2007 (U-M), 2004 (U-M) and 1995 (MSU).

Contact Chris Solari: csolari@freepress.com. Follow him @chrissolari.

Subscribe to the "Spartan Speak" podcast for new episodes weekly on Apple Podcasts, Spotify or anywhere you listen to podcasts. And catch all of our podcasts and daily voice briefing at freep.com/podcasts.

Next up: A short trip down the road

Matchup: Michigan State (4-3, 2-2) at Michigan (4-3, 2-2 Big Ten).

Kickoff: 7:30 p.m. Saturday; Michigan Stadium, Ann Arbor.

TV/radio: Big Ten Network; WXYT-FM (97.1), WJR-AM (760).

Line: Wolverines by 4.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan State football revived run game in time for rivalry renewal