The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/362774
up. Or the way we get woken up by the coaches." EARLY RISERS AVOID COACHES' WAKE-UP CALL Devin Gardner cannot sleep the night before a football game. Restless from the moment his head hits the pillow at night, he is up early, often out of bed by 6 a.m., though he tries to force himself into another hour of sleep. Sometimes it works, often it does not, so he's wide awake when he hears the thunder of head coach Brady Hoke storming through the hall at the Campus Inn, or hears de- fensive coordinator Greg Mattison rousing the Wolverines to rise with his deep bellow. "Even if he's not at your door, you can hear Coach Mattison screaming to wake up," Ryan said. "He's the alarm." Mattison is docile compared to Hoke, however, who unfurls an array of measures to make sure his players' eyes are wide open. "I'm up usually only after Coach Hoke comes in our room, pulls back the curtains and lets the sun shine in," redshirt sophomore defensive tackle Chris Wormley said. "Everyone that is sleeping late gets those shades opened," Clark added, admitting this happens to him quite regularly. "You just see this big light come flashing in. Either way you have to get up." However, Clark admits the over- whelming brightness is a preferred method to Hoke's sibling roughhous- ing. "Coach Hoke comes in jumping on people — he will jump on me and he will pat me on my back and my neck and he'll mess with my hair," said Clark, riled but entertained. "He makes sure he wakes you up." "I'll land right on top of him, give him a little pop [with my forearm]," Hoke confirmed. "I always do that. I don't have to wake him up, but we have fun. It's just something I've done since I was an assistant coach." For a 3:30 p.m. start time, players are offered a few breakfast options — cereal, bagels or other pastries, juice and milk — and will have a bigger pregame meal later in the day. For a noon game, they will eat a full breakfast. Either way, the Wolverines cover the gamut from superstitiously loading their plate with the same fare every weekend to adapting to their mood. "It depends how I'm feeling in the morning; sometimes I do eat and sometimes I don't," Gardner said. Hoke doesn't eat on game day. He hasn't since he was a player at Ball State from 1977-80. Pointing to his stomach, Hoke jokes he's not starv- ing for food, enjoying a sumptuous postgame meal, but he will not eat whether a game is at noon, 3:30 or even 8 p.m. He's a rather lone exception, though. "French toast, chicken, spaghetti and eggs. Some orange juice. A glass of milk. Same thing every week," Wormley said. "I know that combina- tion sounds weird, but it's that ritual you stick with." "Eggs, sausage, biscuit, some grits