anthony thomas

via the Michigan Daily archives

Previously: Krushed By Stauskas (Illinois 2014), Introducing #ChaosTeam (Indiana 2009), Revenge is Terrifying (Colorado 1996), Four Games In September I (Boston College 1991), Four Games In September II (Boston College 1994), Four Games In September III (Boston College 1995), Four Games In September IV (Boston College 1996), Pac Ten After Dark Parts One and Two (UCLA 1989), Harbaugh's Grand Return Parts One and Two (Notre Dame 1985)

This Game: Slightly abridged full gameWH highlightsbox score

Part One: Click here.

Is Joe Tiller ready for the second half?

He is now. While he chews, sideline reporter Dave Ryan relays some of his choice words from halftime: he's "very upset" about the "inexcusable" drops by Purdue's receivers.

While Michigan holds a 21-6 lead at the break, their 272-199 edge in total yardage is largely explained by Purdue's sudden inability to catch the football, and while the Boilermakers' late-half field goal may have been a disappointment given the starting field position, it gives them a chance to cut the game to one possession to open the second stanza.

Instead, the same issues that plagued Purdue in the first half remain present. After a confused Michigan defense allowed a 27-yard slant out to midfield, leading receiver Chris Daniels lets a deep shot slip through his fingertips before Todd Howard rakes it out completely—the third or fourth drop by Daniels alone today and, according to the broadcast, the team's seventh. Brees has completed 12 passes. Daniels is wearing his frustration:

Brees wings the next one high, then—for the third time in the game—gets caught not expecting the snap on third down:

That can't be a fun feeling. Brees gets a handle on the ball but can only heave it out of play. Another promising drive ends in disappointment.

[Hit THE JUMP for more of this, plus multiple savage postgame quotes.]

Marcus Knight slipped two tackles for a big first-half gain [Robert Kalmbach/Bentley]

Previously: Krushed By Stauskas (Illinois 2014), Introducing #ChaosTeam (Indiana 2009), Revenge is Terrifying (Colorado 1996), Four Games In September I (Boston College 1991), Four Games In September II (Boston College 1994), Four Games In September III (Boston College 1995), Four Games In September IV (Boston College 1996), Pac Ten After Dark Parts One and Two (UCLA 1989), Harbaugh's Grand Return Parts One and Two (Notre Dame 1985)

This Game: Slightly abridged full gameWH highlightsbox score

It's time to travel back to the Golden Age of modern Purdue football. It's 1999. Joe Tiller's mustache roams the sideline; its owner has led the Boilermakers to back-to-back nine-win seasons for the first time since 1980, each capped off by an Alamo Bowl victory—the most recent a comeback triumph over #4 Kansas State. A junior Drew Brees pilots one of the early iterations of a passing spread offense; he's in the thick of the Heisman Trophy race.

All of this is still quite novel. This is from the Daily's pregame coverage:

They cite Ryan Leaf's Washington State team, which Michigan beat in the 1998 Rose Bowl, as the last spread offense to play Michigan. In other words, they went over a full season without seeing it.

Meanwhile, the focus on the home side is the team's inability to run the ball as Michigan does. The talented offensive line hasn't been able to stay healthy, and in turn they haven't opened many holes for Anthony Thomas, who enters the game averaging a mere 3.6 yards per carry. Thomas is the totality of the M running game in 1999; he'd finish the season with 301 carries while #2 was backup Walter Cross with 30. 3-0. Three-zero. Thirty. The backup quarterback, Drew Henson, nearly caught Cross with 27 rushing attempts.

The lack of a consistent running game has led Lloyd Carr and Mike DeBord to emphasize the passing game, which comes as a shock to those who've watched Michigan play football before:

Last week against Wisconsin, the Badgers stacked the line to stop running back Anthony Thomas. Michigan coach Lloyd Carr stuck to his guns in the beginning, running Thomas on three of the first four plays of the game.

But when Thomas gained just two yards on those three carries, Carr switched gears immediately. Michigan turned to its passing attack, even - are you ready for this? - throwing on first down. Neglecting the ground game, quarterback Tom Brady threw two first-quarter touchdowns and completed nine of his 13 passes in the game's first 15 minutes. Some Michigan quarterbacks of years past didn't throw 13 times in the entire game.

So, when does Michigan join the SEC?

That said, Lloyd goes out of his way to emphasize that he'd much prefer doing it the old way:

the dream of every Michigan Man™

We know, Lloyd, we know.

Despite the concerns about the offense, Michigan is 4-0 with wins over ranked Notre Dame and Wisconsin squads, and they enter this game ranked fourth in both polls. Purdue, meanwhile, is 4-0 for the first time since 1967 and their rankings of #10/11 in the polls are the program's highest since the preseason of 1980. They defeated ND one week after the Wolverines.

As you may have heard whether or not you paid attention to this season, Tom Brady and Drew Henson were in a quarterback competition that carried into the season. At this point, Brady gets the first quarter, Henson gets the second, and the coaches ride the hot hand from there. That's been Brady, who had the best game of his career the week prior at Wisconsin only for it to end early in the fourth quarter on a hard hit:

no flag, nor any cry for one; today's NFL would have #16 arrested on the field

Brady is cleared and starting against the Boilermakers.

ESPN carries the game. Dave Barnett and Bill Curry are on the call. Curry—who coached Georgia Tech, Alabama, and Kentucky in the '80s and '90s, then later returned to coach Georgia State—does wonderful work in this game. (He's also a fascinating football character if you're looking for a wormhole to fall down.)

In sharp contrast to how future battles between Brees- and Brady-led teams would be billed, the broadcast sets this up with Brees and the Michigan defense as the leads:

Evidently ESPN's special effects in 1999 were mostly limited to "let's make the video look glitchy."

[Hit THE JUMP for the first half, featuring maybe the harshest burn Tom Brady has ever suffered.]

[John Gilman via Bentley Image Bank]

Previously: Part 1, Part 2

Third Quarter

Both coaching staffs may have made adjustments at halftime, but one thing remained consistent between halves: penalties. Michigan had six in the first half for 67 yards, while Alabama had eight for 56 yards. The second half opened with a Michigan penalty on the kickoff return. Then on Alabama’s first offensive snap of the half Michigan nose tackle Rob Renes jumped offsides. Alabama offensive lineman Dante Ellington got flagged for a false start on the very next play and the crowd began to boo.

Marcus Knight, wide receiver: As a player you don’t necessarily think about [penalties]. You just know you’ve got to clean it up. You don’t want to have a sloppy game and beat yourself. Things happen. It’s a big game. It was hot. It was muggy. I know the big boys were getting exhausted because of the humidity that was on the field at that time, so mentally we just had to lock in and I think both teams were feeling it at that time so that’s kind of why you got that happening at the beginning of the second half.

Fumbles and the sideline were the two key ingredients in the early third quarter stew. Albama quarterback Andrew Zow executed a jet action fake before pitching the ball to Shaun Alexander. Michigan had a corner blitz on, and James Whitley was already behind the line of scrimmage when the ball was pitched. It hit Alexander in the shoulder, then Whitley bounced off Alexander and dove at the loose ball. He collided with an Alabama player as he was about to land on the ball, which hit his knee instead of nestling into his stomach. Alexander scratched the ball out and threw it five yards further behind the line, at which point Michigan defenders Jake Frysinger and James Hall converged on the ball. Frysinger dove at the ball only to see if bounce off his facemask and out of bounds.

Alabama faced 2nd and 29, lost two yards on an Alexander carry, then ended up punting after an overthrow on a 3rd and 31 bomb. Michigan quarterback Tom Brady hit fullback Aaron Shea in the flat on the first play of the drive. Shea turned the corner and was met by Alabama defensive back Marcus Spencer, who got low and dove at Shea. His helmet knocked the ball loose as Shea went heels over head, the ball hitting the turf and bouncing once, then slowing and bouncing a second time before skittering past the sideline.

Michigan went back to the air on second down…kind of. Alabama had called a perfectly timed blitz for outside linebacker Saleem Rasheed, who got a free shot at Brady thanks to Michigan’s waggle call. Rasheed came in too high, which allowed Brady to step out of the hit. He avoided an arm tackle and heaved a downfield one-hopper in the general direction of David Terrell just as Rasheed had circled back and crushed Brady.

The ball made it to Terrell without hitting the turf on the next play. On 3rd and 8 from Michigan’s 42-yard line Brady found Terrell breaking in about 15 yards downfield. Terrell jumped to make the catch, then spun downfield as the corner lunged and missed. Terrell had no one within five yards of him from Alabama’s 40 to their 5-yard line. Terrell then slowed suddenly to get safety Marcus Spencer, who Marcus Knight almost blocked in the back before pulling his hands back at the last second, to time his tackle incorrectly. Spencer grabbed Terrell’s ankles, but Terrell but his left hand in the ground and stretched the ball past the line with his right.

Michigan 14 Alabama 14, 13:05

Knight: The second touchdown he ended up catching I want to say it was another post or a glance and the DB took a bad angle and he ended up taking it to the house and tying it up 14-14.

David Terrell, wide receiver: There’s no big egos. It’s not like Dave Terrell feels he’s about to come in here, like he’s so selfish—nah. We all got one common goal and we’re just trying to get to the end of it. If this is what it takes, then this is what it takes. If A-Train was rolling, believe me, we would have been handing the ball off and I would have been downfield blocking. Period. But the Train wasn’t rolling, so now y’all got to show off your pass protection. Aaron Shea, you’ve got to go dual because Aaron Shea was one of the best dual tight end/fullbacks I’ve seen. Aaron Shea was very big in this game as well, for real. Shea was like ‘DT, let’s go, baby. It’s me and you. We about to win this motherfucker right now, me and you.’ But then Shea is Tom Brady’s best man. It’s like one hand feeds the next.

Knight: One thing about that group that I played with in the wide receiver room: we were all there for each other. David had a great game but if you really study the film a lot of us were doing the extra [things] once he got the ball in his hands to make sure that he got an opportunity to do what he did with the ball. Not taking anything away from David because he was a great athlete and he did a lot of big things for the program and in that game in particular being the MVP, but you would see DiAllo [Johnson], Marquise [Walker], myself, KB [Kevin Bryant], once the ball was in the air and caught, we were working our butts off to find the secondary and third block to give him as much leeway as possible.

I didn’t have the best game; I dropped a number of balls in that game and I was frustrated with myself not being able to produce the way I thought I should but I found another way to contribute and I said, Okay, if it’s going to be that type of game I’m gonna block my butt off and that was what I was focused on.

Shawn Thompson, tight end: What an awesome play. There’s certain plays over the years that kind of get engraved in your mind but yeah, I can still picture that play. I think that was another one where it was an out route or a comeback route where he caught it and kind of shook him off. What an awesome play. And the fact that at that point it ties it up for us at 14-14, yeah, a play that I’ll always remember is that play.

[After THE JUMP: Alexander answers, Shea circles, and Terrell...I mean, you see the title]