Iowa 14, Michigan 13
A Murphy's Law game.
Any number of individual plays could've changed the outcome. Most of the ones that come to mind involve Wilton Speight, who had his worst game of the year, then had injury added to insult at the end.
Speight wasn't alone in his struggles, however. Jehu Chesson missed a chance to bail his quarterback out, instead getting a third-down pass ripped from his hands by Manny Rugamba, costing the Wolverines a chance to put the game away. Khalid Hill missed an assignment that led to an early safety and lost a fumble returning the opening kickoff of the second half. Chris Evans was the only running back who could consistently get anything going. The playcalling, personnel usage, and late-game clock management will be nitpicked to death this week, and not without justification.
While the defense played well on the whole, they couldn't contain Akrum Wadley, who accounted for 167 yards on 28 touches. And, yes, there were multiple questionable calls by the notorious officiating crew led by John O'Neill.
"Not every little thing is going to go our team's way," said Jim Harbaugh. "To win, you've got to make it go your way. We didn't."
Michigan still has everything to play for, but they've lost all margin for error if they want to keep their Big Ten title and playoff dreams alive. Before they even get that far, though, they have to figure out what went wrong tonight. This game should not have been close, let alone a loss, but a number of underwhelming performances occurred in conjunction at the wrong time. There's no sugarcoating tonight.
November 13th, 2016 at 2:33 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 2:32 AM ^
I will be in the minority on this, but I felt the playcalling was fine. Play calls always look bad when you don't score many points. But when your QB can't connect deep it limits your options. Maybe the playcalls weren't perfect but ultimately your dudes have to be dudes and our dudes weren't dudes tonight. Dude.
November 13th, 2016 at 8:47 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 9:56 AM ^
Yeah, it felt like too much grab-bagging and trying to be cute (flea flicker, Pepcat, McDoom package). Isaac and Evans looked good but didn't get many carries. The midrange passing game seemed to be ignored (maybe that's on Speight, I don't know).
I do agree though that there just seemed to be a lot of minor execution errors - Speight's deep balls were just a hair too long or too short, the WRs just couldn't reel in passes that were in their hands, one guy whiffed on a key pass block, etc.
November 13th, 2016 at 10:28 AM ^
Speight's throws were more than a hair long or short - they were well underthrown often, and also he has tendency to throw behind the receiver instead of leading him. Been a problem all year. I just don't get why he doesn't have the arm strength to make those throws when he is such a big guy.
yes he does also overthrow too, but usually a result of not being able to put enough air under the throw, which again seems like an arm strength issue.
November 13th, 2016 at 2:41 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 2:41 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 9:21 AM ^
Let's be happy he got it out of the way. Now we can move on to his best ones.
November 13th, 2016 at 2:52 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 3:23 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 4:08 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 8:49 AM ^
Sounds like you started being a Michigan fan last year
November 13th, 2016 at 10:01 AM ^
Why do people think Ferentz is so terrible? We're always making fun of him but I don't really get it.
Ferentz's record at Iowa is 133-91, not bad for a guy at a school without that much of a recruiting base. To put that in perspective, his record is only a little worse than Hayden Fry's (143-89-6), and everyone agrees that Fry was really good.
Ferentz's teams aren't real exciting to watch and he does seem to have a couple of WTF bad games a year, but in general they seem pretty sound fundamentally and solid on the lines, and that's a big part of winning.
November 13th, 2016 at 2:55 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 3:13 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 5:29 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 7:22 AM ^
Step back from the cliff people. We lost a game.
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November 13th, 2016 at 3:16 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 6:29 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 6:42 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 8:43 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 6:34 PM ^
Get some human consciousness you racist neanderthal.
November 13th, 2016 at 10:41 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 3:42 PM ^
True, but he only approved the transfer because he thought Rudddock sucked. He didn't expect Harbaugh to transform him into a solid starter.
November 13th, 2016 at 6:36 PM ^
Yes, you got negged by the ugly underbelly of UM football fans.
The leaders and the best? Not them.
November 13th, 2016 at 4:38 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 5:41 AM ^
The late game clock management was, I think, an effort to give the D as much rest as possible. They were huffing and puffing early in the 3rd quarter.
November 13th, 2016 at 10:17 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 6:27 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 6:42 AM ^
Going to be hearing about this for 10+ years.
Especially since we barely ever play them any more.
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November 13th, 2016 at 7:19 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 7:35 AM ^
We haven't been tested by a good team or away. One of the two happened last night (away.. average team) and we had no answer.
Th
We got a bit of a lucky call to keep a drive alive but had a couple of calls go against us too so I'm not sure I'm ready to blame any referees.
People are figuring Don Brown out. I'm not sure what the answer is on D. Better athletes at LB?
On offense it was a battle. Seemed like we never had the ball. We never did anything with it. Couldn't sustain drives. And what really sucks is our two most reliable receivers dropped two very catchable passes last night that more than likely could've changed the outcome of the game.
Wilt was bound to have a bad game. Hope he continues to progress. I'd rather he play poorly against Iowa than against someone in our division. We are going to need him to play at 100% if we have any chance at all to be OSU in the show for THEIR seniors last game.
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November 13th, 2016 at 8:13 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 11:04 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 12:08 PM ^
Chesson did not make any plays - a senior WR separated from balls that hit his hands multiple times by a freshman DB who managed steal the ball on the last one to boot.
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November 13th, 2016 at 7:46 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 7:46 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 7:56 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 10:46 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 8:55 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 10:11 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 9:19 AM ^
The Man has Michigan back in form. A great team to root for, fun to watch, win almost all home games, blow people out fairly often..........and lose an unexplainable game on the road about once a year. This IS Michigan for God's sake. GO BLUE!!!!
November 13th, 2016 at 9:22 AM ^
I will say I have had enough of the cute plays. They don't work almost ALL the time.
November 13th, 2016 at 9:34 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 9:37 AM ^
November 13th, 2016 at 10:06 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 10:15 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 10:54 AM ^
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November 13th, 2016 at 10:56 AM ^
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