Michigan State 27, Michigan 24
"Disconcerting signals," indeed.
That was a penalty drawn by Cam McGrone before he exited this cursed game with an injury. It fairly describes the entire contest for Michigan.
Michigan State's offense could do one thing with any consistency: chuck the ball long against press man coverage. The Wolverines had no answers in terms of personnel and seemingly didn't try to come up with any schematically. The five Spartan scoring drives featured long passes covering 30, 53, 50, 19, and 31 yards. The coaches pulled starting corner Vincent Gray for Jalen Perry in the second half; Perry managed to stay closer to MSU's receivers but couldn't do any better at playing the ball.
Michigan's offense, meanwhile, failed to come up with a downfield passing game of their own, and much of their success on the ground came outside the tackles. State piled up six tackles for loss and held M to 4.7 yards per carry (sacks removed). Joe Milton's accuracy waxed and waned as he mustered 300 scoreless yards on 51 attempts. Jalen Mayfield went down late and, while he walked off the field, he was taken into the tunnel by the cart.
The coaches will come under heavy, deserved criticism for the most surprising—and perhaps most bitterly disappointing—defeat of the Jim Harbaugh era. The Wolverines were poised to tie the game at 14 heading into halftime before Josh Gattis dialed up second and third-and-goal plays with Hassan Haskins as a wildcat quarterback; the run was stuffed, the surprise pass underthrown and tipped incomplete by Ann Arbor native Antjuan Simmons, who had a standout game at linebacker for MSU.
Don Brown rarely deviated from calling press man coverage even though the defense was getting eviscerated by the vaunted Rocky Lombardi to Ricky White connection, which tallied eight completions on ten targets for 196 yards and a touchdown. Lombardi averaged 19 yards on his 17 completions and his total was deflated by numerous flags on the Michigan secondary.
In other Big Ten games, Minnesota lost to Maryland, which got pasted last week by Northwestern, which is losing by two scores early against Iowa, which lost last week against Purdue. I guess the silver lining is that this is an incredibly stupid year.
October 31st, 2020 at 11:20 PM ^
But he's not just a CEO coach. His hands were all over that game plan today. Last week, he knew that he had to let Gattis take the gloves off, because he assumed Minn was really good.
This week, he didn't see the threat, so he said, oh, we can win my way. Just like he did last year against Army.
He needs to let Gattis run things and focus on his chew.
October 31st, 2020 at 7:50 PM ^
Harbaugh is squandering a recruiting advantage he has had routinely for all but 1, sometimes maybe 2 games a season.
predictable, boring. Speed in space, my ass.
October 31st, 2020 at 8:12 PM ^
Any silver lining short of (at least) Don Brown being let go, isn’t enough. That or this program will never get past third in the division.
October 31st, 2020 at 11:10 PM ^
(They've already gotten past third in the division)
October 31st, 2020 at 8:41 PM ^
I’m a loyal supporter of this program and these kids fought hard, but it’s impossible to overlook the coaching and execution miscues, so many negative yardage plays, and we got blistered on the outside. Totally exposed. Losing faith (I know it’s way overdue) in the direction. Everything about 2020 sucks.
October 31st, 2020 at 8:50 PM ^
y’all need to grow the fuck up and being stop such whining manbabies. just once, try to not live up to everything people say about this fan base.
November 1st, 2020 at 12:08 AM ^
To grow into?
Today was bad no matter how you draw the line. It’s not a matter of a loss but MSU is bad ... really bad. The ire is rightfully pointed at JH unless we accept this shitshow as part of UM football.
October 31st, 2020 at 8:56 PM ^
2020 .... ?
October 31st, 2020 at 9:12 PM ^
Honestly, reminds me of the game I decided to no longer watch the Lions. That was about 5 years ago and haven't missed it. I think my entire fandom of U of M is in danger. Its just not fun anymore. I would rather rake leaves.
October 31st, 2020 at 9:19 PM ^
Leading up to this game felt exactly like 2017. Michigan looked good against a team that turned out to be bad (Florida and Purdue) and MSU turned the ball over a bunch of times and lost even though they actually didn’t play that terrible (ND.) Even before Minnesota shit the bed against Maryland there was some things in that game that were cause for concern but everyone wanted to gloss over them. The whole week was everyone predicting a blowout win for Michigan and apparently Michigan spent the whole week enjoying the smell of their own farts. This loss didn’t surprise me at all and honestly I saw it coming. Just glad I didn’t waste my time watching. Didn’t even turn it on.
October 31st, 2020 at 9:23 PM ^
The thing that is most shocking to me is that MSU looked pretty good. I don't think they had an amazing gameplan, in fact it seemed pretty dumb; they kept going away from the deep ball even though it continually worked when they tried. But they outplayed us on the line of scrimmage and their WRs owned our corners. Meanwhile, we got a bunch of first downs but it seemed like a huge struggle every time. Frankly. we didn't look like the favorite, much less 21 points.
Who are the 10 best players on our team? It feels like we've had a huge dropoff from last year. Maybe we're just young, I don't know...
October 31st, 2020 at 9:26 PM ^
Tom Allen, PJ fleck. Come on down
October 31st, 2020 at 11:12 PM ^
Who are two coaches that have never gotten close to beating Michigan?
October 31st, 2020 at 9:39 PM ^
Or stupid coaches
October 31st, 2020 at 9:44 PM ^
Frames Janklin will probably get rolled but at least he seems to make adjustments coming out of halftime.
October 31st, 2020 at 9:44 PM ^
Harbaugh is the most over rated coach in America. Show me otherwise
October 31st, 2020 at 10:54 PM ^
Is Oakland still in play? Asking for a friend.
October 31st, 2020 at 11:07 PM ^
I truly do not understand Harbaugh's tenure at Michigan. It seemed like all the teams he had at Stanford and even the 49ers were so fired up and ready for the games, and since he's been here, it's been the opposite. The entire tone/mood of this game seemed to be Michigan just being nonchalant like "we got this, we are the better team, no worries". Good teams don't just play bullshit football for 3 quarters then flip a switch at the end and win, they blow out teams from start to finish. Like, I keep hearing people say "we'll If Harbaugh can't turn the program around who can?" or "who could they get that is better?" My answer to that would be someone who legitimately wants the job and prepares week in and week out like his job depended on it. Harbaugh came here with a massive contract and the University has given him a looooot of free rein since he's been here. It honestly feels like Harbaugh knows this is more or less his job until he doesn't want it and the teams have been playing like it. Instead of wanting to justify his huge contract, he seems complacent, like he has nothing to prove anymore. This was a job he came into where he had really high expectations and he has not come close to delivering.
October 31st, 2020 at 11:16 PM ^
The Michigan I know died when Bo died, the soul of the program is gone. We've been flapping around aimlessly for 14 years. This is what we are now, good every 3 or 4 years, mediocre in between and vulnerable to losses to utterly terrible teams. Lombardi is the worst QB to ever beat a Michigan team in my life and its by several country miles.
State's one game season comes through for them again, garbage offensive line plays perfect, arm punt prayers answered, and a Michigan coaching staff puckering up yet again to the team from East Lansing.
PS quit talking about Michigan's team speed, they are fast against shit teams.
October 31st, 2020 at 11:39 PM ^
You know we lost to teams like Toledo and Northwestern under RR, right?
November 1st, 2020 at 12:32 AM ^
Yes I do, they both had better QB's than Lombardi and Bo was dead then, what's your point.
November 1st, 2020 at 3:30 AM ^
My point is they were not better QBs than Lombardi
Say what you want about our defense, but he made multiple excellent throws that would be tough to defend with a competent defender. Replace that with Gray, and that's your result
November 1st, 2020 at 1:06 AM ^
I've had better Halloween's
November 1st, 2020 at 10:09 AM ^
I've seen better use of apostrophes
November 1st, 2020 at 6:20 AM ^
Get Don Brown the fuck out of here
November 1st, 2020 at 7:32 AM ^
My thoughts exactly. Continue to press with an incredibly inexperienced secondary and they get torched? How about some zone or bracket coverage? Also, the front 7 was extremely vanilla after McGrone left the game.
November 1st, 2020 at 6:43 AM ^
Time to fire Harbaugh..
We were badly outcoached in this game. 6 years and 42 million dollars for this?
And quit bringing up Bo. He coached basically in a weak ass conference and never won an NC and blew many Rose Bowls. When the conference got better he got worse.
November 1st, 2020 at 7:31 AM ^
Mel Tucker can retire from MSU with dignity. Going .500 overall and .1000 vs Michigan.
November 1st, 2020 at 8:24 AM ^
First of all, other than losing, that game was an interesting game to watch. Would have preferred a beat down of Sparty however.
As for the coaching, it is painfully apparent that we have very good coaches who can win most of the time, but are not good enough. Jim, Don Brown, Gattis - if they can’t get it done against this Sparty team, they are not going to contend for a B1G championship ever.
Of course that begs the question, we’ll then who?
November 1st, 2020 at 8:45 AM ^
I'm done! Almost fifty years of fandom, good bye. Celebrated when Harbaugh was brought in, but time to turn the page. Love Don Brown, but time to go. 20 years of poor coaching, recruiting and execution. Clean out the entire football staff and hopefully this time bring in the 21st century Bo to turn the program around. Hell, at this point, I'd swallow hard, wash my hands, and quietly smile if they brought in Pope Urban. Can't believe I thought or typed that!
November 2nd, 2020 at 8:57 AM ^
I was with you 100 % until the second to the last sentence..... phuck that...... phuck urban
November 1st, 2020 at 9:34 AM ^
An absolute total team loss... deserved to be beaten and embarrassed.
November 1st, 2020 at 1:29 PM ^
It’s going to be an interesting MGoGiggle podcast.
November 1st, 2020 at 4:07 PM ^
Info links SUCK
November 1st, 2020 at 10:11 PM ^
May be worth seeing how Partridge does this year then bring him back as DC next year.
November 2nd, 2020 at 6:38 AM ^
Michigan played like they were sick or hung over. Refs sucked. Replay booth refs sucked really bad. Michigan was getting moved off the line of scrimmage on both offense and defense. They play like that again this Saturday and Indiana will hand them their spanked ass.
November 2nd, 2020 at 8:56 AM ^
I've supported and defended Coach Harbaugh year after year..... I'm done. This staff has to go. Losing to the team that got drubbed by Rutgers is unacceptable.
losing to the ohio state penitentiary is, sadly expected. they recruit better, they have 2 deeps at every position that are ready to start (for the most part) we continually fret over a starter going down because our 2 deep, at 3/4 of the roster, is questionable.
when we can't beat teams that we're far and away better than, at home, in the second game of the season that starts in Oct, giving us an extra 2 months of pre-season practice.... TOTAL BULLSHIT
November 2nd, 2020 at 9:21 AM ^
There it is again. We are NOT 'far and away better' than MSU. We got spanked. We are worse.
November 2nd, 2020 at 1:14 PM ^
right on todd....that's why we were favored by more than three scores and picked to win the game by every single person who gets paid to do that....
but you're probably more knowledgeable than them all, right?
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:09 AM ^
I guess with the effort on the field, not feeling much like putting much into the game write up.
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