Sept. 17, 2005

SOUTH BEND, Ind. (AP) - Jason Teague took an option pitch 19 yards for a touchdown in overtime to give Michigan State a 44-41 victory over No. 10 Notre Dame on Saturday, the Spartans' fifth straight win at Notre Dame Stadium.

The Fighting Irish (2-1) rallied from 21 points down in the third quarter to tie the score, but had to settle for a 44-yard field goal by D.J. Fitzpatrick on their OT possession and couldn't make it stand up.

The Spartans (3-0) spoiled the home debut of coach Charlie Weis, who became just the third Notre Dame coach to lose his home opener since 1913.

The other two were Elmer Layden in 1934, losing 7-6 to Texas and Lou Holtz in 1986, losing 24-23 to No. 3 Michigan.

Michigan State joins Purdue (1954-62) as the only opponent to win five straight at Notre Dame Stadium and its 12 wins at Notre Dame are the most by an Irish opponent.

Brady Quinn passed for a school-record five touchdowns and a career-high 487 yards, the second highest total in Notre Dame history. But it wasn't enough against quarterback Drew Stanton and the high-scoring Spartans.

Stanton threw for three touchdowns and ran for another as the Spartans amassed 488 yards total offense against the Irish. Stanton was 16-of-27 for 327 yards.

It appeared for a while Michigan State would win easily when they went ahead 38-17 in the third quarter on a 65-yard TD screen pass from Stanton to Matt Trannon, who had 126 yards on five catches.

The Spartan defense, while it gave up some big plays and a 594 yards total offense, came up big when it had to. On the second play of the second half, Sir Darean Adams picked off a pass from Quinn and returned it 30 yards for a TD to give the Spartans a 31-17 lead.

The Irish appeared ready to close to within a touchdown on first-and-goal from the 1. Notre Dame fullback Asaph Schwapp attempted to lunge across the middle with the ball ahead of him, but Domata Peko knocked the ball out and Scott Smith recovered for the Spartans on the 7.

Soon after Trannon scored to spread the lead to 21 points.

The Irish managed to close to 38-31 when Darius Walker scored on a 6-yard TD pass and Maurice Stovall, who had eight catches for 176 yards, scored on a 7-yard pass. The Irish had a chance to tie it earlier in the fourth quarter, but on fourth-and-1 from the Michigan State 20, linebacker David Herron Jr. stuffed Schwapp in a run up the middle.

The Irish finally tied the score at 38 with 2:31 left on a TD catch by Jeff Samardzija, his third TD of the game.

Quinn became the first Irish quarterback to have two 400-yard passing games. Joe Theismann hold the school record with 576 yards at Southern California in 1970.

The Spartans improved to 9-1 against Top 10 teams since 1997. Their most recent previous win was 49-14 over No. 4 Wisconsin 49-14 last November. But it was only their second road win against a top 10 team in that time. The other was a 45-23 victory over No. 1 Ohio State in Columbus on Nov. 7, 1987.