The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/848029
8 THE WOLVERINE AUGUST 2017 Y ou see Jim Harbaugh handing off shoes and a helmet to the Pope, fully expecting he won't fumble. You hear about John Beilein taking command in an airline evacu- ation, decisively overseeing his most important sideline huddle. These men and their high-profile programs find the headlines every week, whether it's November or July. It's a fishbowl, and they're the big fish. What you don't hear about, unless you're keenly attuned to a particular sport, involves distance man Felix Aubock swimming in the Rio Olym- pics before he even shows up as a Michigan freshman. You might not realize Mike McGuire's cross country team churned to within a single point of a national title. It might be news that sophomore Brienne Minor nailed down that extra point, and powered through a half- dozen seeded opponents to Michi- gan's first women's tennis national championship. That's what this issue is all about — focusing on exceptional achievements in Michigan athletics over the past year, often in sports that don't draw the intense spotlight. Yes, Beilein's crew earned team of the year honors and his captain, Der- rick Walton Jr., garnered male athlete of the year notice. But beyond them stand a host of athletes and stories that deserve to be presented in greater depth. McGuire entered the national meet well-armed, led by a senior in Erin Finn whom he considers the best distance runner in Michigan's storied history of them. Others overachieved to draw the Wolverines tantalizingly close to a title, but this was no Cinder- ella surge. McGuire has run a high-level pro- gram for decades, and recruits know that coming in. "You had the personnel to make that kind of thing happen," McGuire assured. "It wasn't like you're going in there wishing and hoping it's going to happen." Aubock, the national runner-up in the 1,650-yard freestyle and Big Ten Swimmer of the Year as a true fresh- man, wasn't wishing and hoping for Michigan to be good when he showed up. It was already there, and he just had to dive in. "If you're following swimming, you get to know where people train," he said. "When I got recruited, I knew this was the school where I was going to end up going." Walton found himself in the story of the year in Michigan athletics, the near tragedy in which U-M's team plane slid off the runway, forcing an evacuation prior to the Big Ten Tournament. The senior, like many of Michigan's athletes, insisted the people — beyond the competition — are what he'll remember. "I always had a really good bond with everybody in the program," he said. "What happened before the Big Ten Tournament, in it and in the NCAA Tournament just made the whole thing more special. "Everybody was pretty close in the first place. Everybody enjoyed each other's company. But you experience something with someone that you can only relate to if you went through it, that makes your bond that much tighter." Michigan athletes experience some- thing every year that will stay with them throughout their lives. Some draw intense national attention. Some excel in relative obscurity. All dem- onstrate the very foundation of sport — pushing oneself to the limit, and joining with others to succeed. Accounts of these efforts shouldn't be skipped or skimmed over. These Wolverines put everything into be- coming Leaders and Best, whether on camera or during a grueling 6 a.m. workout with nobody watching. *** Meanwhile, back near The Big House, preparations continue for a season some discount because of Michigan's extremely youthful roster. Former All-American Jon Jansen cau- tions not to be too quick to dismiss young talent. The Wolverines of 1997 featured some as well. For all of their well- established veterans, they played a pair of redshirt freshmen on the offen- sive line — Steve Hutchinson and Jeff Backus — who could have torpedoed a 12-0 record had they not held up. "One of the things Jeff and Hutch talked about at the ['97] reunion was, they knew at that point in their career, they weren't going to go out there and be world-beaters," Jansen recalled. "They just wanted to make sure they did enough to not let [fifth-year senior center] Zach [Adami] and I down. "That's the camaraderie that's so important. It wasn't necessarily that we went out there and thought, 'I have to win this game.' It was more, 'I don't want to make a mistake because I love these guys, and I don't want to let them down.'" This isn't '97, but talent and com- petitiveness hasn't disappeared. ❏ Editor John Borton has been with The Wolverine since 1991. Contact him at jborton@thewolverine.com and follow him on Twitter @JB _ Wolverine. WOLVERINE WATCH JOHN BORTON The Power Of Michigan Reaches Deep Michigan attracts elite athletes across the world to Ann Arbor, such as freshman swimmer Felix Aubock, who swam in the Olympics before even starting college. PHOTO COURTESY MICHIGAN ATHLETIC MEDIA RELATIONS