The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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came clear as Michigan moved into the final season for the three captains and their fellow seniors. "You do what you have to do," Molk said. "You say what needs to be said. You motivate the team when they're down. You keep them moving when they're up. It's helping out the coaches." The spearhead of an offensive line that paved the way for a pair of 1,000- yard rushers wasn't particularly con- cerned about sensitivity training, his cohorts noted. "Molk is going to step up and tell you how he feels," Koger assured. "It doesn't matter how you feel about it, or how you like him. That's how it's going to be." "That's something not a lot of peo- ple do," Martin said. "He's a guy who is going to say what he feels, because it's the right thing to do. In all the situations where he spoke his mind, it needed to be said. He was the guy who was going to step up to say it." A couple of those times, Molk took Senior tight end Kevin Koger, who hauled in a team-best four touchdowns, used his effer- vescent personality to fire up teammates. PHOTO BY LON HORWEDEL sure they're leaders. Sometimes, they don't really realize how much influ- ence they have on the team. Kevin does a great job of getting into those guys' heads and letting them know what they have to do to make sure we're successful." Martin himself lets his play do most of the talking. That's not a bad way to go, for someone voted Michi- gan's top defensive lineman the past three seasons. "Mike is like a show-me guy," Molk said. "He'll play his heart out. He doesn't talk much. That's not one of his things to do. But he'll lead by ex- ample, there's no doubt about it." "Mike Martin leads more by ac- tion, by his play on the field," Koger agreed. "People follow him because of what he does on the field." Molk, meanwhile, projected him- self as the irascible, reluctant spokes- man during Monday meetings with the media. He'd say things like, "You know I hate you guys," to the assem- bled scribes, always with a glint in his eye. He wasn't afraid to speak up to his teammates, in any situation. That be- 26 THE WOLVERINE JANUARY 2012 Buckeyes could have ganged up to deliver a 7-5 mark identical to last year's regular season. So while the Wolverines prepared to face the Illini, Molk's straight talk came into play. "We had a horrible warm-up," Molk recalled. "It was awful, espe- cially as an offense. Everyone was just kind of lumbering around. Coach [Al] Borges pulled me, Koger and De- nard [Robinson] aside and said, 'Hey, go talk to them.' "I sent everyone inside, brought the whole offense in and talked to them. Built them up, brought them back to reality, took their heads out of the clouds, and we got it done." A month earlier, Michigan endured its most difficult defeat of the season, the 28-14 loss at Michigan State. The days following that setback provided another time of testing. "We weren't happy after the Michi- gan State loss," Martin assured. "We talked about a few things, regard- ing the way the team reacted. We all Head coach Brady Hoke on David Molk, Kevin Koger and Mike Martin "I really believe each and every one of them had an effect, when you look at the work ethic of the team, the integrity, the character and the decisions that were made. We've had three captains who have done a tremendous job." charge immediately before a contest, Martin recalled. "David was the offensive voice," he said. "Before a few games, in warm- ups, even, he wasn't happy about the energy of the offense. He called it up in the locker room right before the game, and got in those guys' face. He made sure we didn't come out flat. "That was something impressive on his side of the ball, speaking to those guys. It really showed on the field, the way they came out." LEADERSHIP MOMENTS One such incident occurred right before Michigan's road game at Il- linois. The Wolverines were coming off a crushing, 24-16 loss at Iowa, in which a furious comeback got un- dercut by some intensely debated of- ficiating. The Wolverines stood at 7-2 — cer- tainly a solid enough start, but two losses in three games could have led to some serious doubt. The Illini on the road, the Cornhuskers and the agreed. We were disappointed in our- selves. From that point on, we made sure we went about things in practice a certain way, so it would never hap- pen again. That's something I felt we did a good job of fixing." Martin's defensive coordinator, Greg Mattison, has garnered all sorts of credit for fixing a side of the foot- ball broken at Michigan for a while now. Mattison, though, throws the recognition right back onto those vet- erans who wanted to leave with more than they had. "I was maybe as proud as I've ever been, for this team," Mattison said. "Seeing how hard they've worked … I keep going back to the first day out there on the indoor field, and hearing Coach Wellman saying, 'Do it again. Do it again. Do it again.' "Then in spring ball: 'That's not good enough. You've got to do it again.' They just kept coming. They just kept doing it. There have been a lot of guys that probably would have tapped out.