A Brief Reflection from an Ohio State fan

I would appreciate a brief dispensation to comment on this excellent Michigan team.

Today I am genuinely happy for Michigan and Michigan fans. Prior to this season, Michigan was 4-14 in its last 18 bowl games - a stretch of futility that began with a 45-17 loss to Tennessee at the January 1, 2002 Citrus Bowl. Their 4 wins during that run are mundane at best - a 2003 Outback Bowl victory to cap a 10-3 season, a 2008 Capital One Bowl victory to cap a 9-4 season, an 2011 Sugar Bowl victory to cap an 11-2 season, and a 2016 Citrus Bowl victory to cap a 10-3 season.

That's a historically miserable run for any program, let alone the winningest college football program of all time. For comparison, the Ohio State dark years under John Cooper only ran to 3-9 overall in the postseason - and one of those 3 victories was the famous Rose Bowl win against Arizona State, easily the best win Ohio State had in the 1990s.

For many, if not most, sports fans, observing a great rival being subjected to this kind of anguishing, decades-long failure would provoke a deep schadenfreude. And I have certainly experienced that at times over the last 20 years - so I am in no way holding myself above anyone else.

But, for me, this Michigan team is different. It's stocked with truly good kids who stayed through rougher times, developed their talent, and returned to school to win a national championship - JJ McCarthy, Blake Corum, Donovan Edwards, Zak Zinter, Trevor Keegan, Max Bredeson, Kris Jenkins, Junior Colson, Michael Barrett, Josh Wallace,.. and the delightful Mikey Sainristil. It's coached by one of the true greats of the sport as a player and a coach - Jim Harbaugh - who absolutely bleeds Maize and Blue. And it's a team that has endured multiple NCAA investigations while under an immensely critical media microscope (despite zero evidence that the sign-stealing program was a significant departure in scope or effect from what other teams already do).

And, in a still roiling college football landscape marked by immediate transfers and universities-as-capitalist-brands, Michigan has gone a markedly different direction by recruiting within the elite academic constraints of the university, developing lesser talent into elite production over multiple seasons, sticking with an old school I-formation and multiple tight ends offensive attack, and finally winning a title with the lowest roster talent of any national champion in at least a decade.

Contrast this with the Ohio State University's football program, which increasingly feels like a collection of mercenaries who happen to wear the same jersey. And, to be clear, I do not hold that against any of the players - they should do what is best for them to maximize their talent to reach the NFL, no question! But it is refreshing to see a throwback team that genuinely cares about the university, honors the deep history of the Maize and Blue, and has actively chosen to put aside individual glory for the pursuit of something greater as a collective. And, what's more, they did it with immense and carefree joy.

Brian already memorialized this Michigan team best:

"They run like my kids run. My kids do not have keys, or a wallet, or a phone. They do not have objects they carry around every day that represent demands, obligations, responsibilities. Mortgages, credit card balances, texts you have to answer from people you do not want to talk to. Unlike my kids, they do have all of those objects, and all of those demands, obligations, and responsibilities. They've signed up for an order of magnitude more than their fair share by playing football at the University of Michigan™. But they do not seem burdened by it. They are joyful. They run like there is nothing in their pockets, nothing at all."

I will never be a Michigan fan. But I'm not ashamed at all to say that I'm a fan of this Michigan team in this moment.