10/26/2019 – Michigan 45, Notre Dame 14 – 6-2, 3-2 Big Ten

There are two kinds of K-Pop bathtubs. One is full of bubbles and girls who are trying their very best to embody bubbles, to become bubbles, to float away on mountains of kawaii. Often there is fruit. Or… crunchberries? Probably petals. But maybe crunchberries!

Sometimes there are donuts?

This is a nice bathtub full of nice people having a nice time and maybe there is the chance someone will have sex, or at least positive feelings about another human being, later. Breakfast has been provided for the aftermath of either.

The other kind of K-pop bathtub is a suicide bathtub. A black, wet suicide bathtub. Water drips suggestively from fingers.

The bathtub is a dichotomy. It is a font of strong emotions, positive and negative. There is no middle ground. It is shaped like a bowl, and it is wet. Michigan Stadium was both kinds of K-Pop bathtub on Saturday night, depending on who you were rooting for. Today in Mudville there are donuts and Snoop Dogg. Today in South Mudville:

The brilliant video I culled the above shots from oscillates as wildly as possible between the two states of K-Pop bathtub and is as good of a sports fandom analogy as has yet been produced.

[After THE JUMP: man hotwires floating hamburgers into existence]

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Speaking of oscillating as wildly as a K-Pop bathtub: Michigan's run game. Michigan entered Saturday night's game against Notre Dame with a rushing offense that virtually defined the word "moribund." They had a total of four runs of 20+ yards all year, all of which came against Middle Tennessee or Illinois. Michigan has also played Rutgers and Army. Against neither of those schools, which have vast personnel deficiencies for diametrically opposed reasons, did Michigan put up a 20 yard run. Penn State, Wisconsin, Iowa? Forget it.

A game against Notre Dame, which may not have an elite defense but is not Rutgers or Army, didn't seem like a great opportunity to get healthy. That was especially clear since most of this game was played in a driving rainstorm that more or less told the defense the general shape of what was coming.

303 yards and 6 20+ yard runs later, Notre Dame fans on the internet are as purple as Brian Kelly used to be. These days Kelly is more a K-pop ballad singer kind of guy:

this is a different gif from the other brian kelly gif pic.twitter.com/psq7Sz7AfG

— Ace Anbender (@AceAnbender) October 28, 2019

[soaring chorus in Korean]

Michigan's rush offense roared to life in the immediate aftermath of two things. One was a blizzard of WR screens against Penn State, an expression of Gattis's Speed In Space™ philosophy. The second was the reassertion of Harbaugh Stuff™ in the run game. They both worked, and maaaan it felt like this was the offense we were all hoping for in the offseason.

Three chunk runs set the tone. The first, by Charbonnet, was a pin and pull where Michigan drew Sainristil from the slot to a spot just outside of Charbonnet, then ran him on a flare. This was new, flashy, and used an obvious small slot person. It drew the attention of four ND players. This is well after the handoff; make sure you note the safety with his eyes on Sainristil just poking his head in on the left:

Bredeson wanders downfield and has nobody to block; he eventually decides to go after the CB to the top of the screen running outside. This fake deleted a linebacker; the other ILB funneled to help that was not there. It also turned this into a giant play by holding the safety—he actually takes  couple steps to the fake screen. That's the difference between 12 yards and almost 40. Speed in space. Threaten both edges.

The second, by Haskins, is a trap. Michigan traps so far this year: one, I think? This is an excellent point by twitter person Manuel Excel:

Both LBs fire over the top of the releasing OL bc they’ve been getting pin and pull all day. Bredeson traps, OL seals, huge run.

Great call. https://t.co/V7IHljxLZg

— Manuel Excel (@colintj) October 27, 2019

This is classic Harbaugh Stuff that makes people wrong and wins you gaps. This has been damn near absent this year as Michigan's run a lot of zone that only makes people wrong on infrequent arc keepers.

The third: one of those infrequent arc keepers. This time Eubanks got to do something after ripping into infinite space.

Those three chunks are about 60% of 17-0 in a first half where throwing was all but impossible.

ND does not have a great rush defense but this was an offense that got Charbonnet 100 yards against Army only by running him 33 times. For the first time all season Michigan consistently screwed with opponent keys. Delete 27 yards for the two ND sacks and the backwards pass and this was a 6.1 YPC paving. And the YPC stats do not do this justice, as Michigan ran 57 times(!) to 14 passes(!), give or take some scrambles. 

This came from almost out of nowhere; there were blips and blops but other than a couple of ten-yard-plus bites late against Penn State, Michigan had given no indication it could do anything like this. It was as if a man sitting in a bathtub had touched two ends of a wire together and been rewarded his heart's desire: giant floating hamburgers.

Makes as much sense as anything about college football.

AWARDS

[Fuller]

Known Friends And Trusted Agents Of The Week

you're the man now, dog

#1 The whole dang OL. I am not capable of grading a whole dang OL in detail by the time this column goes up, but here are the facts: 303 rushing yards against a good-ish P5 defense when Notre Dame knew it was 90% going to be a run for about two thirds of the game.

#2 Cam McGrone. 12 tackles, six of them solo, as Michigan faced the same equation on defense. Did not just make the tackles but also made other plays; once he memorably blew through an OL on a run play to draw two guys and allow Glasgow to tackle unblocked.

#3 Hassan Haskins. 7.5 YPC; granted a fair bit of that was the Whole Dang OL, but on his 49-yarder he shifted past and then authoritatively stiffarmed one of ND's very good safeties to the ground. Had a patient third down conversion, too.

Honorable mention: Zach Charbonnet and Tru Wilson both had impressive chunk runs; Wilson also had the spinniest dang two yard run ever. Carlo Kemp seemed to consistently win on the ground; Josh Uche and Khaleke Hudson both had impressive 2 v 1 plays vs pullers. Aidan Hutchinson had a PBU and terrorized Book, albeit without statistical reward. Hawkins had an INT ripped away by a terrible call; Lavert Hill had two excellent PBUs.

KFaTAotW Standings

NOTE: New scoring! HM: 1 point. #3: 3 points. #2: 5 points. #1: 8 points. Split winners awarded points at the sole discretion of a pygmy marmoset named Luke.

15: Josh Uche (#3 MTSU, #3 Army, T2 Rutgers, #2 Illinois, HM ND), Aidan Hutchinson(#1 Army, HM Rutgers, T1 Iowa, HM Illinois, HM ND)
13: Whole Dang OL(#2 PSU, #1 ND).
12: Zach Charbonnet (#2 MTSU, #2 Army, HM PSU, HM ND), Cam McGrone(HM Rutgers, T3 Iowa, HM Illinois, #3 PSU, #2 ND)
11: Jordan Glasgow (HM MTSU, T3 Iowa, #1 Illinois),
10:  Ambry Thomas (#1 MTSU, HM Rutgers, HM Illinois), Shea Patterson(HM MTSU, #1 Rutgers. HM PSU)
9: Nico Collins (HM Rutgers, HM Iowa, #1 PSU)
8: Kwity Paye (T2 Rutgers, T1 Iowa, HM PSU)
7: Khaleke Hudson (#2 Iowa, HM Illinois, HM ND)
6: Hassan Haskins (#3 Illinois, #3 ND)
4: Ronnie Bell (HM Army, T3 Rutgers, HM Illinois)
3: Lavert Hill (HM Army, HM Iowa, HM ND)
2: DPJ (T3 Rutgers), Dax Hill(HM Rutgers, HM Iowa), Josh Metellus (HM Army, HM Iowa),
1: Will Hart (HM MTSU), Josh Ross (HM, MTSU), Sean McKeon (HM, MTSU),Brad Hawkins (HM Army), Christian Turner (HM Rutgers), Christian Turner (HM Rutgers), Nick Eubanks (HM Illinois), Tru Wilson (HM ND), Carlo Kemp(HM ND), Brad Hawkins (HM ND).

Who's Got It Better Than Us(?) Of The Week

Back-to-back chunk plays to Sainristil and Collins put Michigan up 31-7 to put the rout officially on.

 

Honorable mention: Early chunks for Charbonnet, Haskins, and Patterson set the tone. ND dorfs a blocked punt to give it back to Michigan. Michigan Stadium publicly forgives Ronnie Bell. The PA system is mostly broken so the volume level inside the stadium is not piercing.

​MARCUS HALL EPIC DOUBLE BIRD OF THE WEEK.

This is probably going to be the second-worst call in the Harbaugh era, in which an interception turned into a first down because of [citation needed] [opens envelope] ….yuuuuuup

Honorable mention: Michigan's first two drives of the second half give ND some life, particularly the backwards pass. ND's annoying second TD drive that just made all the stats significantly less beautiful. Michigan stoops to ND's pettiness by not allowing the ND band to march pregame.

OFFENSE

Keeps: almost. Michigan almost had two more very successful keeps from Patterson. One near the goal line got five yards because Black didn't block a corner; a second arc keeper coulda shoulda converted on third and five towards the end of the first half but Eubanks was just a hair late realizing he needed to stop and cut off inside pursuit.

Quarterback grading: incomplete. Patterson was extremely rocky in the rain section of the game but if there's one thing watching college football has taught me it's that rain makes quarterbacks short-circuit. I still wish he hadn't thrown the ball backwards. I don't even know if I'm going to bother grading the first 6-8 pass plays, half of which turned into scrambles anyway.

I did wince at one play on which Patterson kept for an RPO that no one else thought was an RPO; this was a Mason iso that looked like it was at least 8 yards and could have gone to the safety if one particular guy didn't get off a block.

the slot who was promised? [Fuller]

A slot, a palpable slot. Mike Sainristil actually led Michigan in catches and receiving yards, the latter by a wide margin, thanks to two late receptions. One was a corner route on which ND busted and he was wide open. The other was an RPO slant on which he took a hit right after the catch, spun off it, and outran a couple of guys to score. He was also a flashy decoy, as described above.

It's understandable that it took some time for Sainristil to break through even though he came in with a bunch of offseason hype—Michigan's got a hell of a WR corps and he is a true freshman. Hopefully this is an indication that offseason talk was more than just talk.

[Fuller]

Okay, all aboard the Haskins train. Prior Hassan Haskins carries had mostly gotten what was blocked plus some yards after contact; here he was able to run through some tackles, spike a ND safety into the ground, and leap over a second one. That hurdle may have been a foolish risk but it was also awesome, and did pick up some bonus yards.

Haskins has an uncanny ability to stay upright amongst a pile of tacklers; more than once he's turned a two-yard TFL into a yard despite having little momentum. It's not that hard to grab some YAC when you're hammering at full speed four yards downfield. Being able to do so before you've even gotten started is unusual, and Haskins appears to have it.

This is a shared OL/RB stat but: Michigan only got tackled behind the line once on 46 RB carries.

Michigan's other backs all performed well. Charbonnet was able to dodge some guys and get to the second level; Wilson had a slicing touchdown; I was glad to see Christian Turner return and rack up 31 yards on 4 carries. The RB depth suddenly looks excellent.

panic-inducing [Barron]

No faith. Nico Collins didn't have a lot of opportunities in a game where throwing was a rumor, but his box score (1 catch, 16 yards) doesn't reflect his impact. He drew two pass interference calls, one of which converted a third and ten on Michigan's first scoring drive. The above put Michigan at the two on a TD drive. Both of these incidents were blindingly obvious as the defensive backs in question panicked at the idea of Collins making yet another contested catch. The number of flags he draws, and the catch rate he manages even without accounting for the flags… 200 targets! Do it!

Collins did have a catch overturned as a DB grabbing him—legally this time—resulted in a ball over the middle grazing the turf before he could recover it. FWIW. 250 targets.

Obligatory Spam. They call him Spam.

Stephen Spanellis eats a stack of pancakes while riding a donkey.

Let this be the lasting impression Irish fans have to live with until the year 2033!

To hell with Notre Dame pic.twitter.com/Rg0bS53DaI

— Due# (@JDue51) October 27, 2019

He's living it up in his newfound viral fame.

Circle K hot dog and slurpee and hot dog for dinner cause I earned it #celebrateallwins pic.twitter.com/5HmeesuxNl

— Stephen Spanellis (@Big_Spanellis78) October 27, 2019

Someone put this person on TV when his Michigan career is done. He can be the whole radio booth.

DEFENSE

Wally Pippin' folks out here [Barron]

Injury, then insult to injury. It was an extremely bad sign for ND that Michigan got a number of their early run stuffs in their 3-3-5, which has been a horrible run defense for them ever since that game against Florida ended. Here it played almost no differently than Michigan's more conventional 4-2-5, with a number of blitzes that got through and other incidents where guys who probably shouldn't have been able to stand up blocking (Uche, McGrone, Hudson) did so. This was particularly apparent when ND pulled guys to the perimeter; both Hudson and Uche had plays were they occupied two guys in the backfield, with the resulting stuffs cleaned up by someone else.

Often this was Cam McGrone, who got a lot of opportunities to run sideline to sideline without having to dip under OL and displayed a Bush-like range we're all about three games from taking for granted. Also in the sideline-to-sideline club was Jordan Glasgow, who shut down a fourth down RB flat. He, too, benefited from not getting picked.

Michigan seems to have solved a lot of their run issues by playing everything to spill and letting their rangy linebacker corps clean up. Probably still wouldn't work against Wisconsin but there aren't many Wisconsins out there.

It wasn't crazy. There has been a lot of dumping on Brian Kelly after this game because Notre Dame threw the ball about half the time in the first half. I submit that this was rational behavior because ND gained 20 yards on 15 first-half runs. The two main running backs combined for 29 yards on 13 carries. It was completely rational to try to throw the ball in a driving rainstorm, because the alternative was 2 YPC.

"Maybe don't have a running game where you gain 2 YPC," I hear you say. And yeah… okay. That's a good criticism.

Did you watch any of the games? It was striking that ND came out with a gameplan that was close to identical to last year's: run a bunch of man beaters. Third and nine? Drag route time. For the second straight game the opponent's first third down saw them run mesh, which got crushed at the line of scrimmage. Michigan ran mostly zone and kept running mostly zone because Ian Book would get done with his drop and panic because no one was open.

Meanwhile Herbstreit was going on and on about how Michigan's defense is pure man to man for the second straight week. This feels like that period during Beilein's tenure when everyone would talk up his 1-3-1 zone and Michigan would play virtually all man to man. It took about four years for color guys to catch up there.

Freshman Jourdan Lewis'd [Barron]

This guy. Chase Claypool only had two catches for 42 yards but this made him 40% of the Notre Dame offense before their Defeat With Dignity drive. Both of those catches were leaping fades on the sideline that got reviewed because it was surprising he was able to stab down a foot before leaving play. One of these was over Ambry Thomas; Thomas later had another Freshman Jourdan Lewis incident where a circus catch on the sideline beat him. He's getting positives in UFR for them because anything other than a perfect throw and a circus catch wasn't getting yards.

Meanwhile, Lavert Hill got a PBU on his Claypool target because the ball wasn't impeccably placed; Vincent Gray had more trouble. He left Claypool on a play where Book exited the pocket and had four guys running at him; guy #4 was unnecessary and potentially very bad. He also committed an obvious PI on another target that Claypool still caught.

someone owes Hawkins an interception [Fuller]

Obligatory "WTF" section. The PI on Khaleke Hudson slots in just below the holding call on Karan Higdon in last year's Northwestern game as the worst in Harbaugh's tenure. At least in this incident the football was in the area and there was a infinitesimally plausible rationale—Hudson reached out and touched the WR. Higdon didn't get the ball on an arc read and then got tackled by a DE.

In the end this was probably worth it thanks to Towelfest, but if I'm Brad Hawkins this morning I'm shaking anyone in a striped shirt in case an interception falls out.

Dax Hill coming. It was his stick on ND's first drive, and he flashed his ability on a couple of other coverage instances. He looks under control even while moving at massive speeds.

SPECIAL TEAMS

meh? [Fuller]

Field goal decisions I'm ambivalent about. One of the fallacies that a lot of game theory talk has is an excessive certainty—something I've no doubt perpetrated from time to time. Some decisions are wrong, but only kind of wrong. Some decisions are maybe-probably wrong. And some decisions are ¯\_(ツ)_/¯.

I felt Michigan kicking a field goal from the opponent 2 very early was the latter. I have no strong opinions about it.

In normal conditions it was kind of wrong. In what was projected to be three hours of rain, I was okay with it. Three points is more valuable in games that project to be low-scoring, and particularly in games where the weather makes it harder to match. In a world where a 40 yard field goal is <50%, getting a field goal is more valuable because there are more situations where it stands up.

On the other hand, failing from the two probably puts ND on the field at the one yard line. Arguments can be had. I wasn't going to complain either way.

Thanks, gods of stupid. Michigan's first punt was a near-disaster on which Will Hart had to field a snap high and right. His timing got botched and ND was able to partially block the punt. At the time I was absolutely willing to take a 20 yard punt, and then a Notre Dame player was possessed by the ghosts of Michigan-ND night games past. He tried to field it. The ball eluded him like so many aerosol squirrels, and Michigan recovered in the ensuing scrum.

A bonus from the world of stupid that didn't make the broadcast: two different officials signaled that Notre Dame had recovered, only for the referee to announce that Michigan had turned down a holding call because they'd recovered. Yeehaw.

Michigan avoided a similar catastrophe. There was a fumbled snap or two and the backwards pass but all told they got out of a Michigan-ND night game in the driving rain without shooting themselves in more than two or three toes. This was not skill, but temporary benevolence from the trickster gods. Curse them anyway, because they cannot be reasoned with, appeased, or mollified.

Not fielding punts: okay. Michigan's punt return strategy appeared to be "let it bounce and then see if you can field it." This morphed into "dude, let's go bowling" after DPJ dove at a rolling punt near the sidelines alarmingly. The rain pushed the risk/reward equation in such a way to make that right, especially once Michigan got up 17. It felt like the only way Notre Dame could win was if Michigan gave them short fields. Fielding punts felt like a major way to do that.

MISCELLANEOUS

Sign that kid up. Those kids. After Notre Dame's post-debacle touchdown, towels rained down from the crowd, nailing 1) the guy who scored

2) a cameraman

and 3) Patrick

[Barron]

Impressive work.

Should Michigan have gotten a flag? Probably, especially since handing someone a 15 yard penalty on a kickoff is about the least impactful penalty you can issue. I'll take that as a sign that the rest of the crew knew how bullcrap the penalty was.

Ladies and gentleman she is floating in space. I am conflicted about the fact that Michigan is the fanbase that most embodies this tweet.

White people when Mr. Brightside starts playing at a party pic.twitter.com/vekw84DnGY

— jose (@abitchua) December 3, 2017

It's a good song, it's weird that zoomers are into something I was listening to 15 years ago, mortality, etc. I'm much more positive about the fact that Michigan is also the place where there's going to be someone floating in space (or Beyonce, same difference) introducing the band:

This is not your typical @UmichFootball game. @Astro_Christina in the @ISS_Research just beamed the Big House a message from space!! #GOBLUE & BEYOND! @NASA pic.twitter.com/cYOGtD33OH

— Michigan Engineering (@UMengineering) October 27, 2019

She's in space!

They're good ponchos, at the In-and-Out Poncho. Sleeves, go down to your knees, you can sit on stuff, coherent surface presented to the wind.

[Barron]

Also I think Patterson just got down to the two?

HERE

Best and Worst:

Best: Underwater Trenches

A cottage industry centered around former players of varying levels of insight finding second life (and relevance) by providing "real talk" about teams has always existed to some extent, but with the advent of social media, a billion "content generator" sites, and the craven commercialization of the sport, it has proliferated to a degree that you couldn't load a podcatcher without snaring a couple. Most recently, former lineman Doug Skene provided "tremendous analysis" following the PSU game, mostly centering on such in-depth analysis as "the offensive line should run, not walk" and "players who I won't name (as he points at a depth chart of the WRs) are loafing". Admittedly, he did point out that Michigan's snap count was predictable for parts of the game (which seems to happen to lots of road teams in loud environments, but that's neither here nor there), so it wasn't all the usual bluster. Still, one of the issues I have with this type of commentary is that is imputes so much intentionality on the players and their motives that it's hard to parse what is a real issue and what is an imagined offense. DPJ runs toward the sidelines and it's suddenly "he's afraid of contact because he's a prima donna" and not, I don't know, trying to get past a defender. Or offensive linemen don't run to the line because they're quitting and not because running needlessly isn't a sign of toughness or dedication and they are simply heading out to the field the way they want.

A modest playoff proposal.

ELSEWHERE

MVictors stays on brand:

White Lines. Read this thread for the context and more photos but–in a nutshell this week Michigan, and coincidently Ohio State, ditched the white field lines that had run over their respective midfield logos this season. Requiring the lines to be visible through field logos is apparently another ridiculous NCAA regulation that no one follows. Except that U-M and the Buckeyes did…for a few weeks.

Earler this year:

Last night:

And P.S., to the twitterati who came at me with “Who cares???” tweets when I pointed out the white lines, a) you might want to switch channels because this is basiscally what I do, and b) suck it – look what happened.

Maize and Blue Nation:

Saturday night in the Big House was all kinds of fun. There's just something about a game like this with weather like it was that makes it endlessly memorable for all of the right reasons. If you were there, you'll remember this game for the rest of your life...looking back with fond eyes at memories of the folks you were with, family and friends, soggy tailgates, muddy shoes and drenched clothes, and the spectacle of a massive, convincing blowout of a top-10 Notre Dame team.

Michigan plays this ND squad in a rain storm in week 1 or 2...they don't win like this. No way.

Hat tip to this lady:

I was at the grocery store this morning in my small town south of Ann Arbor, wearing my Michigan hat that I recently reclaimed from an unfortunate smoothie spill during summer 2018 (the initial wash didn't work, hammering it with the Shout gel with the brush end did the trick.  Honestly, good as new.)  A woman in her mid-50s relatively non-descript, walked by me in the aisle, saw my hat and said "Go Blue.  They kicked Notre Dame's ass last night."  To which I could only reply in my best Phineas Flynn voice "Yes, yes they did."