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Michigan Falls to 6-1, Via Soon-to-be-Suspendeds
It’s a bad Saturday night when I’m in front of the TV and I put on the I.D. channel by Discovery. On those types of Saturdays, Michigan loses and I’m out man, no highlights or SportsCenter for me.
Typically after a loss – my mind is racing about all the missteps and things that Michigan could have done differently to win the ball game. Then, as time wears, I lose some of the clarity and opinions I had immediately following the game. The initial knee-jerk reaction was this tweet from me that said “Offensive game plan was bad. Can’t go with Devin before getting Denard dialed in. Al Borges failed today”.
My second knee-jerk thought was that Michigan State is a team of dirty m*ther f&#ckers. It’s 10 AM on Sunday morning and I’m opening up my laptop for the first time since yesterday morning. What’s the first thing I see? Gholston trying to break someones (Denard’s) neck. The Gholston dude from Michigan State that should be suspended for multiple games or for the rest of the season. Take a good look at both of his nearly criminal cheap shots on Denard and Taylor Lewan.
After games like that, where Michigan plays beneath their expectations as players and our expectations as fans, I don’t like jumping right into the box score and the specifics of the game tape. I like to go off of what I saw and my initial reactions to what happened yesterday and why Michigan lost this football game.
I’ll start out by saying this – you can’t let one loss to a rival on their home turf lead you down a path of over-criticizing Michigan’s coaching staff and more specifically, Michigan’s coordinators. More specifically – Al Borges. That’s my little disclaimer. Those guys know what their doing – regardless of what any blog (even if it’s Brian at mgoblog) claims to know or see via game tape – and you knew this is/was a flawed team still on the learn.
Given the fact that Michigan is seven games into a new group of coaches, seven games into a major transition, and the fact that this is a flawed team on the learn – there are some questions I look forward to hearing answers on this week during Mr. Borges’s press conference.
- Why bring in Devin Gardner into the game and put your best athlete on the sideline early in the game? I would think you’d bring in Devin once it’s clear that Denard is dialed in and he’s been given a legit number of opportunities to make something happen with the ball in his hands – that didn’t happen. (Umm, just a side note, Chris Speilman and Urban Meyer were very annoying in discussing this situation in their commentary. Basically inferring that Denard should address it with the coaches – not mentioning anything about Michigan’s emphasis relative to playing for THE TEAM. Whatevs.)
- Did you consider running any screen plays when MSU was rushing six and seven guys? I don’t think Michigan ran one screen play yesterday. In fact, I don’t recall seeing any offensive play that clearly counter-attacked all of the pressure that MSU dialed up.
- Can you walk me through the play on 4th and 1? It looked like Denard could fall forward and pick up that first down so why not take the higher percentage play? Michigan picks up that first down and scores we have a tie ball game. Michigan goes from 14 down to a tie ball game and Spartan Stadium collectively puckers up as they have so many times in the past.
- How much credit do you have to give to Michigan State? One thing I’ve liked about Borges so far is his candid nature in his weekly press conferences. I think it’s going to be interesting to see if he puts a lot of the blame and lack of adjustments on his shoulders or if we are going to hear responses along the lines of “give credit where credit is due” kind of thing.
The defense didn’t play a bad game. Michigan clearly wasn’t prepared for some of the sweeps that seemed to completely seal off Michigan’s contain players. Cousins didn’t kill Michigan through the air with play-action as many had suspected and predicted. Michigan also got their weekly quota of whoopsie-daisy fumbles. The opportunities were there for Michigan to win this game, but why are Michigan’s offensive and defensive lines being owned? It’s not like Michigan State’s lines vastly outweigh Michigan’s – not at all. Getting beat in the trenches is where Michigan ultimately lost this game.
Other general knee-jerk thoughts from yesterday as a whole:
- I’m happy we’re not dealing with a situation like they are facing at Illinois. They got beat by a team that completed one pass (!) for 17 yards. They got beat by a team that was running draw play after draw play – as if the vaunted passing game was keeping linebackers and safeties guessing. Not only that, Zook chose to go for it on 4th and one or two with less than two minutes left in the ball game when down ten points with two timeouts. You gotta kick the damb field goal and at least give your team an opportunity to get the game-tying possession.
- Does having the two split divisions in the B1G increase the dynamics of who can beat who to help your team out? I need to put a thought into that one, but Michigan fans will be rooting for Wisconsin next week and any other team playing Michigan State or Nebraska from this point on out. It will evolve as weeks pass if there are upsets, but if no upsets, root hard against Michigan State each week.
The 4th and 1 was the play of the game. Why Borges called a play designed to trick the defense and score a "cheap touchdown" when Denard could have probably snuck the ball over right guard and scored is beyond me. If Michigan scores there, I have no doubt they would have won the game. State could not move the ball into the wind at all. Denard would not have thrown his ridiculous interception and it would be 7 and 0 looking on to a matchup with Nebraska after a couple more victories. This is a RUNNING team with a RUNNER for a qb and I'm tired of seeing 1st and 10 passes sail 30 yards to no one in particular. They can pass all they want in 2 years when Shane Morris comes to town but until then just run Denard until he can't go anymore.