The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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free entry to the stadium, along with seating, while the cheerleaders and dance team are also allowed in free of charge. ESPN didn't instantly jump at Brandon's requirements. "Their first reaction was, 'No The Michigan Marching Band gets way,'" Brandon noted. "I said, I thought you were going to say that. Thank you very much. End of discus- sion. About 10 days later, they called back and said they'd do the deal. "The guarantee they pay for this game, according to my understand- ing, is the highest guarantee they've ever paid for a regular-season game. They love the fact that Michigan and Alabama are matching up. Having it hosted in that terrific facility down in Dallas just adds more sparkle to the whole event." It could also add 20 or more degrees to the heat Michigan might reason- ably anticipate playing in on Sept. 1, even at night. That's why discussion of the game went well beyond the numbers with dollar signs attached. "That stadium, you can open it up and make it an outdoor facility," Brandon said. "The last thing we wanted to be doing the first weekend in September was playing in Dallas in 100-degree heat. We talked about everything from having the roof closed and having the facility air- conditioned, to getting access to the stadium for workouts, to getting ad- justed to having this massive video board that we hear so much about, to how are we going to split locker rooms, tickets, all of the behind-the- scenes stuff to make sure we were comfortable. "It came pretty easily. Alabama was great to work with. We just agreed that whatever happened, both programs got equal treatment. We got the same amount of tickets, the same amount of access. It was done in a way that neither team was given any kind of advantage." That is, unless the home locker room counts as any sort of edge. Michigan secured the Cowboys' own digs for the Sept. 1 showdown. Brandon also needed to quell a While the atmosphere for the matchup may resemble a bowl game in some respects, the different — and significantly more expensive — proposal. "We went through a period of time where we were unwilling to budge and they were unwilling to budge, then all of a sudden, everybody got into a position where we started talk- ing more reasonably about how we could solve some of the problems, and we resolved it," Brandon said. "That kind of stuff happens every day around here, and in most enter- prises. "But with the social media, and our members of the band out there mobi- lizing and thinking they could lobby this, it became big news that we had this little hitch in how we were going to make this work." Potentially bigger hitches await, mini-furor when reports arose that the Michigan Marching Band, in fact, wasn't making the trip to Dallas. The AD noted an agreement was reached, in terms of the band's travel, but that at some point, the band put forth a ones involving the on-field Wolver- ines. They'll be facing a program that months earlier humiliated SEC cham- pion LSU, 21-0, in the national cham- pionship game. The Crimson Tide out-gained LSU, 384-92, racking up 21 first downs to Michigan coaches will emphasize to the players that it is a regular-season game. PHOTO BY JAMES D. SMITH LSU's five. It out-rushed the Tigers, 150-39, and out-passed them 234-53. The Alabama team Michigan faces will be significantly different from the crew that so demolished and demor- alized Les Miles' LSU squad. A host of Bama's key players graduated or left the school early to seek their fortunes in the NFL. At the same time, Saban has enjoyed the opportunity to build in a rich talent base in Tuscaloosa. Hoke stands ready to see where the Wolverines stack up. "We're going to learn about us," he said. "We're going to be a young football team, but we're going to learn where we're at, from how we pre- pare from the summer through the fall. We'll learn how we handle any of the distractions that come along with opening up in a game with a national scale like that. "We'll see if we're a team that can be focused on what the job is at hand, and not be distracted, and we'll find out our maturity level as a team. I think it's going to be fun." ❑ AUGUST 2012 THE WOLVERINE 61