The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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SEPTEMBER 2024 ❱ THE WOLVERINE 61 ❱ MICHIGAN HISTORY giving Michigan its first national title since 1948. Carr would win four more Big Ten titles at Michigan en route to a 122-40 record in 13 seasons on the job. He capped off his career with a 41-35 win over Urban Meyer and the Florida Gators in the Capital One Bowl. Carr's retirement after the 2007 season felt like the true closing of the Schembechler-inspired era of the pro- gram, and that was applied a thou- sandfold with the athletic department's next direction. The physical, bruising style the program was known for was replaced by the promise of the flash and sizzle of Rich Rodriguez, who had built West Virginia into a force and turned down the Alabama job in 2007, giving way to the Nick Saban era in Tuscaloosa. "Rich Rod" and the transition to his spread offense and 3-3-5 defense with a cleared-out roster dug a hole that some might argue was ultimately too big to climb out of. The team went 3-9, the worst season in school history, and snapped a 33-year bowl game streak, which had been the longest in the na- tion. Player criticisms, NCAA rules vio- lations and further tumult saw his time come to an end in 2010 after a 7-6 sea- son, his best in Ann Arbor, and a 15-22 record on the job. Looking to get back to a familiar brand of football, Michigan handed the keys to Brady Hoke, a former Carr assistant from 1997-2001 who had successful head coaching stints at Ball State and San Diego State. Hoke took a team full of Rodriguez pledges and got the program back on track in a big way, finishing his first year with an 11-2 record and second- place finish in the now-defunct Legends Division of the Big Ten in addition to a Sugar Bowl victory over West Virginia. Michigan's win total decreased from 11 to eight in 2012 under Hoke, down to seven in 2013, down to five in 2014, making for another bowl-less season for the second time in six years. Facing an identity crisis and another low point in program history, U-M aligned all ships in the same direction in the pursuit of Jim Harbaugh, who had turned around the San Diego and Stanford programs before developing the San Fran- cisco 49ers into an annual Super Bowl contender. Things broke right for the pro- gram to land its big fish after two dalli- ances in 2007 and 2010, and Harbaugh returned home ahead of the 2015 season. He immediately returned U-M to a physical and calculated style of play, and the attention to detail helped take a pro- gram that had lost its way into instant success, winning 10 games in his first season on the job, ending with a 41-7 blowout Citrus Bowl win over Florida. The Wolverines won at least eight games in all eight of the full seasons played under Harbaugh with double- digit wins six times. It would go on to win three Big Ten championships, make three trips to the College Football Playoff and win the Rose Bowl and CFP national championship in 2023. With Michigan back on the mountaintop, Harbaugh re- turned to the NFL with the Los Angeles Chargers in January, passing the baton to Moore ahead of the 2024 season. What does this look back at history tell us? For one, almost every time Michigan has had to make a change over the last 55 years, success and an upholding of the standard has followed. The one time the situation went awry was when the Maize and Blue dipped their toes into unfamil- iar territory in the Rodriguez era. The move to Moore was made with a strong degree of conviction and was almost universally lauded. He brings in- terim head coaching experience forged under pressure last season and has been set up to succeed almost as well as any of his predecessors. To project a similar career path to Schembechler or Har- baugh would be lofty, but Michigan football has a remarkably consistent tradition of success in finding the right men to lead the program. Schembechler famously once said, "If you want to be a truly great leader, you'll develop other great leaders below you." The success of this philosophy is evident at Michigan over the past five decades. The only exception to Michi- gan's first-year coaching success was Rodriguez, who came from outside the U-M/Schembechler coaching tree. Moore, a former Oklahoma offensive lineman who developed "Smash!" as his mantra as the Wolverines offensive line coach under Harbaugh, undoubtedly will put his own unique stamp on the pro- gram. But only time will tell how tall the task will be for him to replicate Michigan's storied success. History is on his side in the near term, but it is up to Moore, his staff and his players to determine which direction the story goes from here. ❑ Bo Schembechler's first sea- son at Michigan in 1969 was magical. The Wolverines went 8-3, won the Big Ten Championship and pulled off one of the signature victories in program history, a 24-12 win over the top-ranked Ohio State Buckeyes. PHOTO COURTESY BENTLEY HISTORICAL LIBRARY FIRST-YEAR U-M HEAD COACHING RECORDS SINCE BO SCHEMBECHLER Coach Year Record Big Ten Bo Schembechler 1969 8-3 T-1st Gary Moeller 1990 9-3 T-1st Lloyd Carr 1995 9-4 T-3rd Rich Rodriguez 2008 3-9 T-9th Brady Hoke 2011 11-2 2nd (Legends) Jim Harbaugh 2015 10-3 3rd (East) Sherrone Moore 2024 ❱ Bo Schembechler, U-M head coach from 1969-89 "If you want to be a truly great leader, you'll develop other great leaders below you."