Ohio State 42, Michigan 13
Bryan Fuller/MGoBlog
One team came prepared.
Ohio State's coaches prepared for Michigan's soft edges with an attack heavy on the power read. The Buckeye defense prepared for every wrinkle the Wolverines could conceive to utilize Jabrill Peppers and stopped them.
Michigan looked unprepared to deal with the Buckeye running game. The scheme was too passive and the adjustments ineffective, especially a move to a 3-man line. The linebackers weren't prepared to tackle Ezekiel Elliott in the gap or track JT Barrett in space. Nobody was prepared to block Joey Bosa.
For the tenth time in eleven years, Ohio State won The Game. The Buckeyes ran at will; Michigan couldn't trust its run game enough to even use it without ample trickery. While Michigan's 9-3 record and obvious team-wide improvement stand as a testament to the remarkable work of Jim Harbaugh, today's game showed just how much ground the program must make up on their chief rival.
Unlike last year, Michigan will get a full slate of bowl practices to work on their issues, and they'll face a quality opponent in a decent bowl game. Much like two years ago, there's a good chance they'll have to play that game with their backup quarterback, as Jake Rudock exited the game with an apparent shoulder or collarbone injury after taking a huge hit from Bosa.
Ohio State looked like a playoff team today. Michigan looked a long way off. That's exactly what we expected heading into the season; it's still hard not to be disappointed after seeing how the last few months have played out.
November 28th, 2015 at 6:35 PM ^
On offense our athletic guys out played OSU's athletic guys. We lost the game on the offensive and defensive lines, not on being out "athleticed".
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November 28th, 2015 at 5:50 PM ^
Unfortunately we had back to back coaches that set the team back for years. OSU went from Tressel and had one bad year with Fickle and replaced him immediately with Urban. They have simply done a better job managing their football program over the past 10 years which is the reason we have struggled against them over this time period. We finally got serious last year and hired Harbaugh which was a great move. However, he can't over come 10 years of mediocrity in this first year against a very talented team. We just don't have enough overall team speed and athleticism to compete against a team like OSU right now. Harbaugh understand this and will most defnitely address this shortcoming. Yes, it would have been great to beat OSU but I'm very pleased we are 9-3 in his first year with the opportunity to play in a good bowl game. I suspect we will be even better next year with the following year being a year we compete for a national championship. Keep the faith.
November 28th, 2015 at 5:56 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:15 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:38 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:40 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 6:52 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:03 PM ^
Why are you ignoring this fact?
November 28th, 2015 at 7:35 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 7:36 PM ^
November 29th, 2015 at 10:05 AM ^
you really shouldn't be posted on the board, Brady
November 28th, 2015 at 6:53 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:56 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:16 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:22 PM ^
There is absolutely no doubt about that. Denard, Gardner, Gallon, Hemingway, Roundtree, and Toussaint all had the ability to create big plays. Who can do that on this team? Peppers and Cheeson. That's it.
Hoke's teams got worse and worse. He left Harbaugh with a paucity of speed on both sides of the ball. His teams could not run the ball either. Defensively they did improve, but as we saw last year and today still no where to being elite.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:47 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:59 PM ^
Mike Martin, Ryan Van Bergan, and Junior Hemingway.They were the reason Michigan went 11-2.Hoke proceeded to get worse and worse as the team took on more of the talented he recruited. That says something about Hoke's coaching ability and "great recruiting".
Hoke's recruiting has proven to be less than what the rankers said it was. Bolden and the OL in particular have not panned out.
Hoke was a good recruiter, but far from a great recruiter. The results show that.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:06 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:06 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:22 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:38 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 7:52 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 9:08 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 6:51 PM ^
Oh calm down... The past three years this game has been decided by one score 2/3 times.. last year was REAL close until elliot ran in a TD after barret went out. We lost this game by 1 point last time it was in ann arbor.
Shit happened. We lost our best defensive players with thin depth this season. Add depth and we have a good safety net (this defense was elite before that happened)
We lost our QB who has been making up for the very obvious decline in defensive ability. The run game hasn't been great all year against great defenses. Once Ruddock went out this game was going to be tough. Elliot was on a mission from last week.
Sky is not falling. It sucks, it sucks to see the disparity, but we were playing all season on a house of cards where every injury hurt way worse than it normally would on a team with any depth.
The only thing I'm concerned with is how much this hurts the recruiting class. Hopefully not too much. I am sure the recruits have been talked to about the lack of depth, the opportunities to get on the field, and have seen how much players that weren't any good turned into great players in the course of 1 year. This was the worst michigan has played against OSU in a while, but who was going to stop elliot? who would have stopped him last week if they would have used him?
It's pretty obvious now why harbaugh stuck by ruddock through entire games, speight is not ready to play at this level at all.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:13 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:21 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 7:29 PM ^
Jim Harbaugh now owns the worst home loss in The Game in 54 years.
The talent disparity is undeniable but there's no excuse for that stat. He had almost 11 months to get ready for this game.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:35 PM ^
This is essentially the same team that was blown out by MSU and ND last year. Clearly this team is still a work-in-progress.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:45 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 9:10 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 9:11 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:31 PM ^
No I didn't enjoy it either but it just exposes what is wrong and what Coach Harbaugh, good as he is, can't fix without recruiting. No big uglies up front, no speedy, fierce LBs and no power running game. We have about 6 RB's and not one is a power guy who can break it wide open, Whatever, nobody like's losing to these clowns but until we beef up with big uglies we're not going to be where we want to be.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:32 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 8:14 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 9:36 PM ^
whom were 5 stars and none of them can make it happen, it sucks, the luck of the draw and Mike Weber chose the Buckeyes over Michigan when Tyrone Wheatley himself was promising him he would play day one. Whatever, luck of the draw, I think we get the top RB in the nation this year (( hope) and with coach Wheat and Coach Harbaugh evaluating him I'm sure he actually IS a 5 star and if he's smart he signs with Michigan because with our RB sitaution he starts on day 1.
If anyone wonders where our big uglies and skill players are they only have to look at Sparty who has recruited and taken basically the talent in Ohio and Michigan the last 5 or 6 years that the Buckeyes didn't . If Dantonio can just kindly move on to South Carolina we can take back those guys.
November 29th, 2015 at 2:58 AM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 7:41 PM ^
Hoke was a horrible coach and I can't believe a UM fan would defend his record. Yes, he did an ok job recruiting, mainly lineman, but he definitely didn't recruit enough play makers. Hoke was simply in over his head coaching at Michigan. His game day coaching was horrific, all the way from clock management to play calling. Furthermore, he didn't develop talent and his teams rarely seemed prepared to play which is the reason we struggled to beat bad teams like Akron and UConn. I will give you the best barometer to determine if he's a good coach. There are at least 10 D1 head coaching jobs either available or soon to be available and I have not heard Hoke's name mentioned once for any of these openings. If he was remotely a good coach his name would be in the mix for one of these openings.
November 28th, 2015 at 7:57 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 9:32 PM ^
Not the blowout part but when Sparty beat them and the internal issues with guys complaining I thought oh boy, now thye're going to do exactly what they were criticized for not doing (giving the ball to Elliot). Bottom line, we've been recruiting far, far behind these guys for years with regards to the linemen, the RB situation is what it is, who knew 4 and 5 stars wouldn't pan out, happens.
And, look at the bright side, with that performance we probably get to keep Durkin for another year (great for recruiting continuity, bad if he leaves now) and most guys will return. We just need to seriously address the offensive and defensive lines yesterday, if we don't get some beefy dudes up there it will just be the same result next season.
November 28th, 2015 at 8:00 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 8:05 PM ^
OSU does not ten Jebrill Peppers. They have two NFL talents(Thomas, Elliott) , a good system QB in Barrett, and some good role player(Marshall). But that does not equate to ten Jebrill Peppers.
MSU and OSU lose a lot next year. Wisky is fading and who knows what Iowa will do.
This is Harbaugh's first season. Outside of Meyer--who we bequeathed a roster with athletes that fit his system--most of the elite coaches today had so-so first seasons. 9-3 is perfectly fine for a first season.
There is far too much doom and gloom today. They lost badly. It happens. That has no bearing on what happens in the future other than to serve as excellent motivation for the coaches and players to improve.
November 28th, 2015 at 9:08 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 11:12 PM ^
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November 28th, 2015 at 8:23 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 9:32 PM ^
You think that 9-3 next year would be impressive? Have you looked at our schedule and what our rivals have coming back? We have three non-conference tomato cans. 6-3 in conference would be a huge, huge disappointment considering how many seniors we will have. Have some standards, man.
November 28th, 2015 at 8:07 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 8:17 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 8:21 PM ^
This is far from what a vintage Harbaugh Michigan team will look like. I think people's expectations got raised way too far with the three straight shutouts. This is a team that will get better as Harbaugh fills the roster with his recruits.
November 28th, 2015 at 8:28 PM ^
November 28th, 2015 at 8:57 PM ^
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