The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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of the most emotion-wracked. The Sugar Bowl Most Outstanding Player could barely express what he felt af- terwards. He noted, in an MGoBlue.com on- field video: "We wrote our chapter in history today. We wrote our chapter in this new book. All the seniors gave Michigan a place to stand. We gave the underclassmen after us a place to stand. We let them know that Michi- gan's back." The man who said he'd have walked to Ann Arbor to be head reasons for future optimism, but this marked the seniors' last chance. They'd knocked off Ohio State, the first group of Michigan seniors able to make that boast since 2003. They'd pummeled Nebraska in the first meeting between those schools as Big Ten squads. They'd maintained the three-year hex over Notre Dame, pulling out an almost unfathomable 35-31 win in The Big House's first- ever game under the lights. They'd won 10 games, and played themselves into the Bowl Champion- Fifth-year senior center David Molk "Your last game at Michigan is the game you will remember forever. It's the end of college football. It's the end of all your friends and all you know. It is special to go out with a win." coach insists that Michigan never really left. He's consistently made it clear the Wolverines didn't reach their annual goal of winning the Big Ten championship. That said, there wasn't a happier man in the Superdome the night of Jan. 3 than Brady Hoke. His greatest joy involved the seniors who have been through an experience very dif- ferent than most Michigan football seniors over the past four decades. Hoke charged them with taking control of this team, from the mo- ment he walked through the doors of Schembechler Hall. When Michigan enjoyed its biggest spotlight in years, and first BCS bowl victory since the 2000 Orange Bowl versus Alabama, Hoke's thoughts centered on the se- niors. "These guys have left a mark," Nose tackle Mike Martin (left) and the rest of the U-M senior class experienced a tumultuous four years, but the Sugar Bowl victory made for a satisfying final game. PHOTO BY PER KJELDSEN never won a championship on a football team. High School, middle school, college … this is my first ring. Sugar Bowl champions. They can never take it away from us." Over and over the theme echoed: I've never felt like this before. Fifth-year senior wideout Junior Hemingway — whose two leaping touchdown catches carried an offense accounting for only 184 total yards in Michigan's 23-20 overtime thriller against Virginia Tech — proved one Hoke pointed out. "We'll always re- member them and always be proud to say that we had the privilege and the opportunity to coach them." As the hugs, the joyful tears, and the shouts of jubilation echoed late into the night in New Orleans, all of them reflected on the final game as a fitting capper to a landmine-lined journey. A GRITTY VICTORY It wouldn't have felt the same for the seniors, had redshirt sopho- more Brendan Gibbons not banged through the 37-yard field goal in overtime that set off the explosive celebration. Without question, the first year featuring Hoke in charge of the program brought about plenty of ship Series. That wasn't enough, they all agreed, in the days leading up to the Sugar Bowl. "Your last game at Michigan is the game you will remember forever," fifth-year senior center David Molk assured, days before the Wolverines took on the Hokies. "It's the end of college football. It's the end of all your friends and all you know. It is special to go out with a win." Were it not for a level of toughness immediately ushered into Michigan legend, Molk's end would have ar- rived early. The veteran of 41 starts in his ca- reer, including 25 straight heading into the bowl, felt a pop in his foot during Sugar Bowl warm-ups. The same foot that required surgery to re- pair in 2009 had betrayed him again, at the worst moment possible. It seemed like fate stood laughing on the sides, over someone who had endured so much in his five years at Michigan. Word drifted up to the press box and around the stadium that, shockingly, the Rimington Tro- phy winner as college's best center would likely not play a snap. Three snaps later, he decided he would. Denard Robinson barely snagged one errant shotgun snap to open the game. He fumbled another, racing to fall on it for a three-yard loss. The series proved a disaster, like much of the first 29 minutes and 11 seconds of scoreless football for the Wolverines. Molk wasn't going to be himself, but he could get the ball into Robin- son's hands. The first-team All-Big FEBRUARY 2012 THE WOLVERINE 21