The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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8 THE WOLVERINE JANUARY 2023 T he greatest coaches in Michigan football history broadened and changed the game on the field, while playing the big-picture hand they were dealt. Fielding H. Yost dominated the sport from 1901-05, going 55-1-1 with four national and four conference cham- pionships. Sweeping changes dra- matically altered football in 1906, and Michigan left the Western Conference for a decade. Yost and his Wolverines adapted, returned and won more titles. Fritz Crisler helped introduce two- platoon football to the college game. Crisler's "Mad Magicians" of 1947 al- lowed him to go out on top, winning the national championship. Bo Schembechler wouldn't budge in some ways ("Those who cheat have al- ready lost") but adapted substantially in others. His teams went from throw when absolutely necessary to making Anthony Carter a household name. Schembechler also piled up 13 Big Ten titles in 21 sea- sons, won the 10-Year War (5-4-1) and got the overall best of Ohio State, 11-9-1. Jim Harbaugh faces an era where players are again paid above the table (like they were at the turn of the last century) and enjoy free agent flow be- tween schools. He returned to Michigan at a time when Ohio State looked for- ever invincible, and put a hard stop to it. Consider … • Michigan has never in history won 13 games in a football season, or 25 over a two-year span — until now. • The Wolverines' 15-game Big Ten winning streak is its best since a 16- game skein from 1996-98. • Michigan has its first back-to-back Big Ten titles since 2003-04. • The Wolverines enjoy a legitimate shot at a national championship over the next three weeks, in their second straight College Football Playoff appearance. • Michigan plunged the state of Ohio into shell-shocked depression, despite the Buckeyes' attrition-fueled sneak into the CFP. The Wolverines' 45-23 win at Columbus put a sledgehammer to the notion that their breakthrough victory last year represented an aberration, a miracle in the snowflakes that would be met with a flamethrower 12 months later. Privately, OSU coach Ryan Day sneer- ingly boasted the Buckeyes would "hang a hundred" on the Wolverines in the offseason before the 2020 campaign. Nobody knew he meant he'd do it over the course of four years. To his credit, he's halfway there. Jim Harbaugh plays the game the way it's presented now — adding his own fiercely determined, physicality-driven, throwback-offense twists to the mix. And he's playing it very, very well. The Wolverines perform like an ana- conda with a deer in its coils — con- stricting, crushing and collapsing the will and the life right out of opponents. It may have taken a period to put the pieces in place, but now the Wolverines are positioned to take on the biggest of the big boys once again. The last two times Michigan faced Ohio State prior to the present two-game re- surgence — and prior to tapping into the Baltimore Ravens' coaching brain trust — the Wolverines surrendered a combined 118 points. It's half-a-hundred combined in 2021 and '22, with Jesse Minter's crew No. 5 in the nation in scoring defense (13.38 points allowed per game), No. 3 in total defense (277.1 yards given up per outing) and No. 3 in rushing defense (85.2 yards surrendered a contest). Offensively, the Wolverines put up 40.1 points per game, No. 7 in the na- tion. They rush for 243 yards per con- test (No. 5), stampeding the notion that the only way to win involves an air raid (Ohio State has thrown for a combined 743 yards against Michigan the past two years, for those keeping loser statistics). "[Sophomore quarterback] J.J. Mc- Carthy could have been a guy like, 'I'm J.J. McCarthy. I'm a five-star quarter- back. I'm not here to hand the ball off.' And he never did," Harbaugh beamed. "He'll do anything for the team. He'll run 50 yards down the field and block for a running back. He'll put his shoul- der down and score a touchdown at the goal line. Now he's a legend." It's a locker room full of legends, Har- baugh insists, and the numbers won't argue. The Wolverines' MVP, All-Amer- ica junior running back Blake Corum, became reduced by injury to rooting for a national championship. But he's doing it, and continuing to inspire. The future? Harbaugh's playing the free agent game masterfully. Grad cen- ter import Olu Oluwatimi earned the Rimington Award as the best center in the nation and the Outland Trophy as the country's best interior lineman. Grad edge import Eyabi Okie became a season-long pass-rushing terror. Michigan's imports for 2023 so far? Standout Nebraska linebacker Ernest Hausmann, Coastal Carolina edge Josa- iah Stewart, three offensive line heavies in Arizona State's LaDarius Henderson, and Stanford's Myles Hinton and Drake Nu- gent, and a quarterback/tight end tandem from Indiana in Jack Tuttle and AJ Barner. The Wolverines need to strengthen their NIL game, but they know it. And with U-M president Santa Ono coming to town, it's going to happen. Nobody knows how Michigan will finish this remarkable season. But where it's going under Harbaugh — there's little doubt. ❏ WOLVERINE WATCH JOHN BORTON Jim Harbaugh Reaches New Heights Harbaugh is the first head coach in U-M history to win 13 games in a season and 25 over a two-year span. PHOTO BY CHAD WEAVER Editor John Borton has been with The Wolverine since 1991. Contact him at jborton@thewolverine.com and follow him on Twitter @JB_Wolverine.