Writing this column is always a bit tough after a late game, but doubly so given the fact it's a work week and I wound up watching most of the other semi-final.  And this is the 14th one I've written this year, so if this feels short consider it me running a bit on fumes.  But I'm incredibly excited to write one more. 

 

Worst:  Priors Commitment

While I deeply value the quality and quantity of content this site puts out related to the football team and believe it is the most accurate, thoughtful content out there about the Wolverines, I still do seek out alternative ideas and takes in the greater college sports universe.  Part of my reasoning is that every fandom creates a bubble around it, where die-hards become too attached to the team they follow, becoming blind to its weaknesses and failings.  Getting an outside perspective, both on Michigan but also on the ebbs and flows of college football more generally, help to highlight these distinctions and, as best as possible, rectify my innate partisanship with the larger sports ecosystem.  For example, while I believe that SignGate was always grounded in bad faith and gross mischaracterizations fueled by some of the worst characters in sports media, I get how it would appear far more hypocritical to outsiders especially given UM's (somewhat overhyped) perception of moral superiority.  And so I wasn't surprised that largely impartial fans and pundits took Michigan to task, and I sort of doubt that changes much outside of the passage of time dulling people's initial outrage.

But that's mostly based on opinion of a non-essential (in football terms) controversy; teams claiming months later they somehow couldn't change a couple of signs were mostly covering for the fact Manny Diaz...dah I mean Unnamed Opponent Coach didn't have a good gameplan.  But in the lead-up to this game, and really for the past month or so, I consistently saw people like the writers at ESPN, the Athletic, Split Zone Duo, etc. talk about Michigan and Alabama in ways that simply didn't match what I saw on the field.  People questioned if Michigan "trusted" McCarthy in tough spots, treating him like some game manager because they only threw the ball 8 times against PSU.  Or acted like Michigan's defense was fraudulent even after they largely shut down PSU's and OSU's offenses because they hadn't faced a player like Jalen Milroe.  And at every turn there was some veiled dig at Michigan's perceived lack of athleticism compared to their competition, that somehow Michigan was fielding a roster of 1970's farm boys and not, you know, a modern assemblage of high-level D1 athletes.  

College football, moreso than the NFL, is still pretty regional in its perception.  I "get" that football in the Southeast, the West Coast, Texas, and the Midwest are all the same on the field, that the major teams recruit nationally and employ the same formations and strategies to maximize their talent.  But the Big 10 has perceived as a different style of football compared to, say, the ACC or the SEC, that the Midwest is full of smash-mouth gritty lunchpail dudes while the SEC is full of uber-elite athletes and programs that are on the cutting edge of the sport.  It's why we've heard for years that Michigan's offense is "limited" because they run the ball a bunch versus throw it 40 times a game, and so regardless of the fact they have a top-10 offense per SP+ and averaged 36 points a game despite playing the nation's #2, #3, #4, and #16 scoring defenses 4 of the past 5 games there was a lot of chatter about how they'd struggle to move the ball against the Tide.  McCarthy may have completed 74% of his passes for 9 ypa and thrown 22 TDs against only 4 picks, and led the team on long scoring drives while converting on 3rd and 4th-down plays all year, but because he didn't throw bombs up 30 against MSU to pad his stats he was perceived as lesser than his peers.  And somehow in the year 2023 it was still assumed that Michigan wouldn't possibly be able to hold up against an athletically gifted but inaccurate passing QB because, I don't know, Ron English was just wearing a Jesse Minter mask?

Anyway, all of these priors proved to be untrue.  Michigan moved the ball pretty consistently against the Tide, more often than not costing themselves on drives due to dropped passes or slightly mistimed throws than Alabama's elite secondary.  McCarthy wasn't at his best but he still had one of the best games against the Tide throwing the ball all year, and that 4th quarter drive to tie was all him guiding the offense and making huge plays with his arm and feet.  The defense largely held Milroe in check even when he started the run the ball more in the 2nd half, as they still struggled to throw the ball and every hit slowed Milroe a bit.  They never looked out-classed on the lines, and given Alabama's first rounders at defensive ends and right tackle it was Michigan that kept the Tide's pass rush at bay while collapsing the pocket around Milroe all game.  In fact, Alabama's one sack came on the mishandled flea flicker; otherwise you rarely heard the names of Dallas Turner or Chris Braswell all night.  And on the last play of the game, it was Josiah Stewart, the up-transfer from Coastal Carolina, who deposited Lantham into Milroe's lap and blew up the play. 

I do suspect we'll keep hearing in the leadup to Washington that Michigan's secondary and defense hasn't played an offense like Washington's, that they'll struggle to keep up athletically with their 3 NFL-level WRs.  And that's true to an extent; that's about as scary a passing attack as we've seen in college football since at least LSU in 2019.  But its time for the last holdouts to come around to the fact that this is an elite team, not just an elite-for-Michigan, or elite-for-the-Big-10, and update their assumptions.

Best:  Gears

Piggybacking a bit on the above, I'd like to point out that all year fans and pundits wondered if Michigan could turn it on, had another gear in the event they ran into a comparable opponent and needed to come back.  For most of the season Michigan so outclassed their opponents it didn't really matter how they played, and so it wasn't until they played PSU that we saw them have to push back against a quality opponent and deal with some adversity on the field.  They cleared that hurdle, then overcame a sluggish 2nd half at Maryland before again showing grit against OSU to pull that game out. 

Alabama admittedly posed a different test, as they've got a level of talent that few teams possess, but what struck me as weird is that certain media types just assumed that Alabama also had gears left unexplored and would be able to draw upon them in this game.  That the team which needed a miraculous 4th-down conversion to beat Auburn, who got thoroughly handled by Texas at home and who was in 1-score games against teams like A&M, Arkansas, etc. had been playing opossum to an extent and was a sleeping giant.  The reality was far more likely that the Alabama team that scratched and clawed its way to the playoffs was at its peak, that they were already in 5th gear and the clutch was burning a bit.  Michigan maybe didn't have the top-end speed of some other teams but they also had barely gone into 4th all year, and as this game played out you could tell that when called upon Michigan had answers that Alabama didn't.  In that 4th quarter it was Michigan who marched down the field to score a TD, then forced Alabama to punt and possibly would have had a chance to go for the win in regulation without the bobbled fair catch.  In OT Michigan just plowed into the endzone and then systematically squeezed the life out of a frantic Alabama offense.  They played like the team that had something left in the tank.  Put another way, Alabama got the maximum number of points one could expect from their performance, while Michigan likely left 7-10 more on the field due to missteps and bad luck.

So we'll see what a short week of preparation  does for Michigan against an opponent with more than enough firepower to win a championship.  But Michigan showed they've got the ability to hang with anyone and still have some tricks up their sleeves.  

Best:  Blake The Great and Mikey

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oWwytT5JAdM

We often talk about good vs. great players not so much in terms of their individual performances as much as their impact on everyone around them, how the difference between small-c championship teams and capital-C Championship squads are the latter have a handful of players that not only make the exact right plays when you most need them, but make the players around them that much better.  The great players have this innate MacGyver in them, capable of taking a bad situation and not just survive, but thrive and lift those around him to their level.  Most teams are lucky if they have one of those guys, and if he's at just the right spot - see Cam Newton in 2010, Charles Woodson in 1997 - that maybe is enough to win it all.  But more often than not those guys have frustratingly-close seasons like Jayden Daniels this year at LSU or pick-your-recent-Michigan-phenom like Denard or Peppers, guys who ability to morph the field to their advantage by simply stepping foot on it was undeniable but unfortunately ran into the inevitable limitations of 1 guy out of 11.

Michigan, though, has been blessed with two such guys this year in the forms of Blake Corum and Mike Sainristil.  Yes, both of them played key roles last year but Corum missed the last couple of games due to injury and Sainristil was still in year 1 of his transition from wide receiver.  But at some point - for Corum maybe against PSU last year and for Sainristil probably his showing against OSU - they both entered that rarefied air of transcendent superstar, the retire-the-jersey-while-he's-still-playing type of guy.  Michigan's had a number of those guys over the years - an inexhaustive list features legends like Howard, Hart, and Woodson who were those guys almost immediately, Hutchinson becoming one of those guys by the end, and even players like Braylon Edwards and Brandon Graham making somewhat surprising leaps into the echelon in their final year.  

Corum set both the single-season and career rushing TD records this year, the prior coming against the Buckeyes and the latter against the Tide.  Those accomplishments alone are worth celebrating, but the context around both of those record-breaking runs tell so much more.  Against the Buckeyes second TD came the play after Zak Zinter was lost for the season, when the team was clearly reeling and the score was tied.  Against Alabama, Michigan has just clawed and scraped their way into overtime after mounting a 75-yard comeback drive to tie the game late in the 4th quarter and then surviving a harrowing last couple of seconds in regulation.  In that extra frame, the ball only went to Corum, who picked up all 25 yards necessary in 2 plays including an eerily-similar jump-cut through the far-side hole to score.  Rivals often mentioned this year that he "vultured" TDs to an extreme level, scoring when the ball got near the goalline but failing to ignite the offense as he had in 2022.  And there was some truth to that, as the offense's overall struggles generating explosive plays all year exemplified by Corum having 2 100-yard games all year compared to 8 from last season.  But all year, when Michigan needed to get those couple of yards, when they needed to score a TD, Corum was the player they called upon. 

In this game Corum scored the first TD on a beautiful mesh misdirection play that somehow led to both Johnson AND Corum being wide open, and on the final scoring drive of regulation it was Corum who McCarthy found open on 4th-and-2 that Corum converted into a huge pickup.  Along the way he also converted Michigan's other 4th-down attempt (on the aforementioned first TD drive) and consistently found openings in the Alabama front line and ground out yards where possible.  He's the lodestar all season for this offense, the reliable outlet to lean on when the going gets tough and they just need to keep the ball moving.  And despite the underwhelming numbers (relative to prior seasons), every time Corum gets the ball in his hands you know he's going to get the most yards possible on that play and set his team up for success.

And despite Corum's brilliance and all the records and accolades, it's hard to argue against the idea that Mike Sainristil has been the undisputed most valuable player on this team all year.  I wrote about him after the Iowa game but it bears repeating that he's had one of the best seasons ever for a Michigan defender.  He leads the team in picks with 5, PBUs with 6, and defensive TDs with 2, and is second on the team with 2 forced fumbles.  He's got 4 TFLs, a sack, and has allowed Michigan to play the type of bewildering defense that teams filled with 5* receivers, offensive linemen, and QBs have no earthly idea what to expect.  In this game he didn't have that spectacular moment like Corum and did get got by Jase McClellan on Alabama's first TD after being out of position, but he also took down Jalen Milroe twice by himself despite giving up 40+ pounds.  But most tellingly, Alabama had exactly 2 plays of more than 20 yards, one the aforementioned McClellan TD and the other just a dime by Milroe to Bond along the sideline between 2-3 defenders.  Sainristil was a key part of that lockdown, and as he has done all season could be seen vocally exhorting his teammates to not lose hope when the game was in doubt. 

I've said this a bunch of times over the past couple of years but fans need to cherish these players and the seasons they've had because they don't come by every year, and they've got 1 more game to add yet another line to their legacies at Michigan.

Best:  Like the Wind

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pZMGLhJT1M

When discussing the qualities of teams like Michigan and Alabama the discourse inevitably turns to discussing how these squads embody the characteristics of their head coaches, and with Jim Harbaugh and Nick Saban that shorthand becomes even more apt.  Harbaugh is the idiosyncratic former college and professional football star who then (rather seamlessly) transitioned into being one of the best college and pro coaches in the game.  It's infuriating at times as a Michigan fan to see his name come up for open NFL jobs (and him being both publicly and privately open to such overtures), but he's that unicorn who's been able to win at whatever level of coaching he currently occupies.  And Nick Saban is, at worst, one of the top-3 greatest college football coaches in history, with his sustained success across multiple programs that much more impressive in the current era where national recruiting, increased player movement and advocacy, and various external factors make sustaining dynasties nigh impossible.  The fact he's won more national titles than the rest of current college football coaches combined is a stupefying stat, and one I'm not sure we'll ever see again.

But just like how we use the head coaches as proxies for discussing their squads, we use these singular men to represent the massive staffs of coaches, GAs, and various other staff necessary to keep high-level college teams functioning at their peak.  Because at this point in college football you can't really be successful as a head coach without delegating huge swaths of gameplanning and player development to your staffs.  It's why when I heard a number of pundits and rival fans expound about how Michigan was in trouble because "Nick Saban's got a month to prepare" I scoffed a bit because it would be more apt to say that Tommy Rees and Kevin Steele (Alabama's offensive and defensive coordinators) had a month to try to out-prepare Sherrone Moore and Jesse Minter.  And yeah, I wasn't quite as worried about either of those Tide coaches (who are perfectly good coordinators) running laps around Michigan's guys.  People who remember those "oh shit, Alabama's pissed off and had weeks to get ready for you" had guys like Steve Sarkisian, Lane Kiffin, and Kirby Smart coming up with game plans, and we've yet to see similar dynamite gameplans out of the current staff.  By comparison, Sherrone Moore led Michigan through it's toughest stretch of the season as both HC and offensive coordinator with virtually no warning at times, while Minter also served as the head man for a game while consistently fielding probably the best defense in the country.

And in this game it was clear that Michigan's gameplans on both sides of the ball were up to the test.  Michigan consistently moved the ball in that first half while sacking the Crimson Tide 5 times, oftentimes on simulated pressures and delayed blitzes that submarined Alabama's usual approach of power running complemented by long-range bombing; I heard someone describe Alabama's offense as all dunks and threes and that felt about right.  But Michigan's offense doubled up the Tide in terms of yardage in that first half and nearly the same on the scoreboard, as Moore dialed up some huge tendency breakers and wrinkles on offense while the offensive line consistently got push up front.  On defense Alabama got basically all their points off 2 drives, one the TD following the muffed puny by Morgan and the other on a 52-yard FG to end the half.  But outside of those two drives Milroe was under near-constant fire, with 5 different Michigan defenders bringing him down behind the line, and never seemed comfortable.

In the third quarter the momentum turned and Alabama pivoted to a Milroe-heavy running game while Michigan couldn't quite execute some well-designed plays, but it still felt like Rees was getting desperate while Michigan just needed to stay the course.  In fact, the times when Michigan seemed most in trouble was when they tried to get tricky, whether it the throw-back pass that McCarthy had to sky to recover or the failed flea flicker.  Michigan's gameplan on offense otherwise remained much like it had all year, trying to maintain a consistent running game while relying on McCarthy to make plays in the passing game when necessary.  And for the most part they did so successfully, with some unfortunate drops and miscommunications prematurely ending drives that otherwise had some juice.  But as the second half wound down and Alabama held a 7-point lead Moore called a fantastic drive, mixing plays to Corum and Wilson while deploying McCarthy's legs and accuracy in the mid-range.  Alabama didn't really have an answer schematically for them, and while its perhaps hindsight it felt like once they got into overtime Michigan was going to have a better chance consistently moving the ball in compressed spaces compared to the Tide, as it bore out.

Now obviously, Harbaugh and Saban played a huge role in how good their teams played in this game and all season, but make no mistake that Michigan won this game in large part because their offensive and defensive coordinators had better gameplans, and set their sides up to execute them well, than their counterparts, and my guess is both of them will be the head men at programs in the near future because of their acummen.  

Worst:  Not So Special Teams

As they have for the past handful of years, Michigan has sported one of the best special teams units in the country.  Jake Moody won the Lou Groza award and was a consensus All American in 2021, and both him and Brad Robbins are currently starting specialists in the NFL.  This year Tommy Doman stepped in at punter and earned 3rd-team all conference honors in a league featuring the #1 punter in the country (Taylor at Iowa) and another standout in Eckley at MSU.  James Turner was brought in from Louisville and while not quite the kicker Moody was has been more than adequate, earning second-team all conference honors and hitting 85% of his FGs including 3/4 on kicks of 50+.  The return game has been a bit wonkier but largely inconsequential in games that mattered, and if anything were trending up a bit after Morgan's electric punt return in the Big 10 title game.  The preview noted that Alabama was actually the one with the squirrelier returners, if anything.  At worst everyone sort of expected special teams to play out evenly, a non-factor beyond maybe some field position advantages at the margins.

But of course, the football gods demanded that Michigan's path to a title be as difficult as possible and thus decided the funniest way to make that manifest would be in bar-none the worst special teams performance I've seen in years, if ever, as a Michigan fan.  We all remember "trouble with the snap" but that was a singular event that just happened to occur at the maximally dong-bashing time.  But in this game Morgan fumbled the first punt he handled (which Alabama turned into 7 points), then nearly had another one bounce of his leg later on in the game, and then Jake Thaw disastrously mishandled a fair catch punt late in the game that nearly led to a safety or a TD.  Alabama, by comparison, didn't do much on returns but also recovered their one muffed punt, even though there were a couple Wolverines in the vicinity.  James Turner missed a field goal and UM failed to kick an extra point due to poor snaps, while Will Reichard nailed two 50+ yard FGs.  And Doman couldn't crack 40 yards per kick while Alabama's punter averaged 50, resulting in an 8-yard starting field position advantage for the Tide.  In a game that Michigan won by 7 that's close to 7-8 points of special teams misfortune going against the Wolverines, and is a big reason why the game was so close despite the down-to-down performance favoring Michigan.  

On the one hand, much like food poisoning it helps to just get it all out in one game if possible, to get all the nerves and missteps on the field a still survive and advance.  Last year against TCU Michigan similarly had unexpected missteps, from two pick-sixes to multiple close fumbles, that they couldn't quite overcome.  The fact they did have such disastrous special teams and still won is reassuring, displaying a resilience that portends even better performance if they have even an average special teams showing.  But I have to hope that this was just an aberration, a one-off manifestation of bad luck that has been expelled from their systems.  Because while the Tide let them off the hook a bit in this game, Washington is absolutely not a squad you want to give extra possessions to or leave points on the field.

Quick Hits:

• I don't have the stat handy but I saw that there were more minutes dedicated to commercials than actual in-game plays.  That's insane.  I get that ads are just part of college athletics at this point but just...put ads on jerseys or something and make these games somewhat watchable.  There were so many XP-ads-kickoff-ads sequences I lost count, and has to screw with the cadence of the teams.
• The referees were fine in this game but seemingly kept spotting balls off by a couple of yards.  There was one Alabama completion where the WR left the field at the 41 and yet the ball was spotted 4 yards up.  Just put some sensors in the ball and get little things like yardages correct.
• Semaj Morgan had a rough game but I do hope he still gets a chance to return punts against Washington.  He's a weapon in a game where Michigan will likely need to score more than 27 points to win this game.

Up Next:  Washington, for all the marbles

The Huskies are really good offensively (even if Dillon Johnson is out for injury), and are better defensively than their stats give them credit for.  It's still a far worse defense than Michigan has faced in over a month, but it feels a bit like TCU's from last season where they make key plays when they need them.  Of course, they got a lot of those breaks against Texas, including a couple of inexplicable fumbles, and still barely won.  If they get that TCU-type luck against Michigan it could be a rough night, but they might also have a TCU-vs.-Georgia type game where all the bullshit runs out and they're left trying to mount long scoring drives against this defense while trying to hold up against a stout Michigan running game.  My guess is it'll be a close game either way, but I like Michigan's chances of bringing home their first national title in decades and capping of a crazy season.  Go Blue!