Michigan v. Minnesota on Halloween, 1981 (With Video)

Submitted by BursleyHall82 on

This is actually the fourth time we've played Minnesota on Halloween - all at Minnesota, interestingly enough. In 1903, we tied them 6-6. Then we beat them in 1981 (34-13) and 1998 (15-10).

I went looking for video of the 1981 game, because I was there. I was a senior, and I went with a friend of mine because we had another friend (recent U-M grad) who lived there, so we had a free place to stay. The 1981 season was up-and-down. We started ranked No. 1, then lost to Wisconsin, and followed that up a few weeks later with a loss to Iowa.

But we steamrolled Minnesota in this game. Steve Smith was in his first year as our starting QB, and he threw three TDs. One of them was to Anthony Carter, who had a great game - 150-some yards and a TD.

After the game, we ran into Trent Tucker, the kid from Flint who was playing basketball at Minnesota. We asked him who he was rooting for, and he said, "I always root for Michigan in football." So that was cool.

Anyway, here's the video of the game from Wolverine Historian (sorry for no embed - I'm stupid). This video is great - it's early ESPN, and there's an excellent interview with Bo at the beginning. And lots of great game footage, especially of Carter and Stan Edwards.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-UbV8ZQRjCk#t=304

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maizenbluenc

October 29th, 2015 at 12:46 PM ^

I seem to recall Steve Smith doing option pitch plays in 1983, but there are none in this game from 1981. Am I getting old and mis-remembering or was that something they added in later as Smith gained experience?

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