CHICAGO -- Jeff Smoker is daring someone to try and stop him.

The junior quarterback is so confident no one can that he's giving away what will be the bread and butter of the Michigan State offense this fall.

"Every time I drop back I'm looking his way to see if he's open because most of the time he is," Smoker said. "He just finds a way to get open. He's the go-to guy."

	Charles Rogers is good enough to sneak on the Heisman short list by the end of the season.

He is Charles Rogers. If you don't know him yet, you soon will.

He has the size (6-foot-4, 205 pounds), the speed (4.34 in the 40-yard dash) and the game-breaking ability to carry a team on his back. Last season Rogers had 67 receptions for 1,470 yards and 14 touchdowns. In the Spartans' 44-35 win over Fresno State in the Silicon Valley Football Classic, the junior had 10 catches for 270 yards and two TDs.

"I came into my own faster than I thought I would," Rogers said. "I knew I was going to be at this point one day but I just didn't know it would be this quick."

No one did.

Rogers was a known commodity when he came to East Lansing in 2000 but he was forced to sit out the season an academic partial qualifier.

After a year away from game competition, all Rogers did in his first season of college football was shatter every Michigan State single-season receiving record -- an impressive accomplishment considering the Spartans' all-time receivers' list includes the likes of Andre Rison, Derrick Mason and Plaxico Burress.

"Charles is the complete package. He is arguably the best big-play receiver in the country," coach Bobby Williams said. "We have to continue to find ways to get the football in his hands and put him in a position to make plays because he can score from anywhere on the field."

Rogers was named preseason Offensive Player of the Year by conference media members, which wasn't a surprise to the players who will try and defend him.

"Rogers is one of those guys that's got the height, got the hands and got the speed," Michigan safety Charles Drake said. "He's a great a player, one of those guys that you really respect. It's going to be hard to stop him come game time."

As good as Rogers is, some of the credit also should go to the guy getting him the ball.

Smoker, who is 10-7 as a starter in two seasons at State, was 166 of 262 (63.4 percent) for 2,579 yards with 21 TDs and eight interceptions in 2001. Those numbers were good enough to finish sixth nationally in passing efficiency -- ahead of Tennessee's Casey Clausen, Miami's Ken Dorsey, Mississippi's Eli Manning and Oregon's Joey Harrington.

If Rogers' initial success was difficult to predict, Smoker's initial impression on college football was a mixed bag at best.

He suffered through growing pains in a true freshman campaign that saw him engineer three game-winning drives in the fourth quarter -- including a 68-yard TD to Herb Haygood on fourth-and-10 with 1:58 to play to beat Notre Dame. But Smoker ended up with more interceptions (7) than touchdowns (6) in 2000 and the Spartans ended up home for the holidays with a 5-6 record.

"I can't say enough about experience," Smoker said. "There's nothing like it, especially those situations you get in the game that you can't simulate in practice. I'm definitely a couple steps ahead because I was thrown into something when I wasn't ready as a freshman."

His coach saw him become a reliable quarterback in his second season and thanks to a late-season development, Smoker was named a captain for 2002.

"It wasn't really until the bowl game that we saw his leadership skills take over and now he's really assumed that role of being the leader," Williams said. "He's taking charge of the offense and taking charge in the huddle -- those things you like to see in a QB."

With the early departure of T.J. Duckett to the NFL leaving the Spartans full of questions at running back, Williams concedes that he will rely heavily on the dynamic duo of Smoker and Rogers this fall.

"It is important to have a good running game at times, but a team's running game doesn't have to be dominant to win a title," Williams said. "A team needs to have a significant offensive strength to win games and that will be our passing game."

Smoker and Rogers are clearly the best tandem the offensively challenged Big Ten has to offer, but they would be a force in any conference this season.

With eight home games -- including seven of their first eight at Spartan Stadium -- Michigan State has every intention of moving past conference favorites Michigan and Ohio State to earn a trip to the Rose Bowl for the first time since 1988.

"Our expectations are high year in and year out," Rogers said. "A championship is the first thing on our list this year. You win championships and everything else will come with it."

David Albright is a senior editor at ESPN.com and can be reached at david.j.albright@espnpub.com.