Everyone knew this was coming, right?
I've spent nine weeks hedging at life, wondering if maybe, just maybe, this was the season where I'd finally have to eat my words and proclaim the Michigan Wolverines as an Actually Good football team. Maybe I'd have to start speculating on potential Ohio State matchups or even anxiously wonder at what the Wolverine fanbase would look like after huffing their own College Football Playoff-scented farts for a month or so.
Luckily I can put those fears to bed, because on Saturday Jim Harbaugh did what he always does: lose when it matters the most.
Your updated Jim Harbaugh stat lines:
— Stewart Mandel (@slmandel) October 30, 2021
2-13 vs. Top 10 (54-10 vs. everyone else.)
3-9 vs. OSU/MSU (35-8 vs. rest of the Big Ten)
Michigan didn't look terrible for most of their 37-33 loss to Michigan State. Cade McNamara played the best game of his life and the defense did everything except shut down the best running back in America (and if that's a sin, Ohio State had better start counting rosaries). They seemed motivated and prepared and still ended up blowing a huge lead against a team that in the end was flat-out better than they were. A team named Michigan State!
THE OFFENSE
Last week I said that Cade McNamara was eternally consigned to be the football version of a cinnamon flavored rice cake, so of course the dude went out and threw for 383 yards just to make me look stupid. 93 of those yards came on a little slant route touchdown to wideout Andrel Anthony, who you've never heard of because that was literally the first catch of his college career.
That slant pattern and little flares to the flats were there all game for McNamara, in part because Michigan State was focused on shutting down the Wolverine run game, which they mostly did. Hasan Haskins and Blake Corum combined for just 104 yards on the ground after 27 attempts.
Of course, the focus here will be on the mistakes. J.J. McCarthy's fumbles, Blake Corum's critical dropped pass early in the game, McNamara missing on three consecutive passes to end Michigan's last hope of winning. Michigan had over 550 yards of offense, but they were just too one-dimensional (albeit in a way that most wouldn't have expected), and simply couldn't score when it mattered.
Hahah I'm just kidding, the focus will be on the refs! Damn you, refs!
THE DEFENSE
Kenneth Walker III is a dude and I don't know that many teams are equipped to deal with what he brings to the table. That Michigan failed to slow the guy down (23 carries, 197 yards, five freaking touchdowns) isn't some great criticism of the Wolverine defense, it's more a testament that Walker III is probably the best running back in the country.
Quarterback Payton Thorne was ineffective, sacked several times, picked off twice, and it just didn't matter because, again, the fix was in and Michigan was denied a defensive touchdown and therefore the win by crooked officiating. Sort of. I can kind of understand some of the litany of Wolverine complaints about the refs but this isn't some kind of 5th Down situation.
The real MVP for the Spartans against the Michigan defense was the concept of "going slightly faster than normal." Tempo frequently put the Wolverine defense on their heels, and yes, while I'm sure there will be much wailing and gnashing of teeth about what Sparty did or did not get away with offensively, the larger problem for Michigan is that they simply couldn't stop the most obvious, caveman rushing offense on the planet as it went up-tempo.
THE CORE (2003)
The Core is a very silly movie with really terrible premise (gotta nuke Earth's core before it stops spinning and we all electromagnetically blow up), but the real sin it commits is being over two hours long when 95% of the action takes place in the cockpit of a turd-shaped drilling machine as it bobs and weaves its way through CGI magma. An hour and twenty minutes of Hilary Swank and Aaron Eckhart yelling at each other while sitting in a very obvious set would've been more than enough, but then the movie decides to pad this thing out with 40 extra minutes of DJ Qualls wearing a bucket hat.
Anyway, watch the whole thing for free on YouTube if you're bored, but I recommend just skipping to the part where the Golden Gate Bridge gets melted by ultraviolet rays.
THREAT LEVEL
After the game, I got blocked on Twitter by Brian Cook over at MGoBlog for retweeting him making fun of the Mel Tucker hire back in February of 2020.
I'm not salty (or surprised, and frankly I'm a little disappointed that I hadn't been blocked earlier), but I mention it because Michigan football as a fanbase/institution/whatever seems increasingly desperate to play the hits ("Sparty no!" "The team the team the team" "lol cooler poopers"). Their problem is that this rings more and more hollow with every subsequent loss in a game that actually matters. At this point Brian and the rest of the Michigan football ecosystem has absolutely no room to trash any program with higher aspirations than the Gator Bowl, at least until they wake up and realize that Harbaugh is turning them into Northwestern East. Michigan State was better than Michigan on Saturday, and despite the similar records it doesn't feel like the Wolverines are keeping up with little brother, to say nothing of Ohio State.
Simply put: if you wanna pretend to be superior to the cooler poopers, you gotta actually beat the cooler poopers first.
The Threat Level is GUARDED.
