Not gonna lie, those 5 turnovers were disappointing
Going into this game, I had mentioned that one of the reasons that Iowa's defense has been thriving was their 10 turnovers in 5 games. Now, I hadn't seen all of their games, but I suspected that opposing offenses had been doing Iowa some favors. Tonight, we certainly helped them out a lot. I think most of us agree that we could have put up 3 more points if we had finished those five drives with some combination of punts/FGs/TDs.
But, the frustrating thing is that Iowa didn't earn those turnovers. We can discuss the three turnovers by our freshmen QBs, but Minor also gave up a fumble in a physcial, short yardage situation, and Mathews muffed a punt - on a fair catch. . Those are our seniors.
So, while the long term situation certainly looks bright, the uber-competitive side of me (and, I suspect most Michigan fans) just doesn't like to lose. Especially when we made five unforced turnovers, two of which were by our seniors, and even more specifically since we knew this Iowa defense thrived on turnovers.
Personally, I feel like Denni Green right now - Iowa really wasn't that good, but we let them off the hook.
So yeah, 24 hours to linger on the loss, and then it's time to get excited for . . . Delaware State. Sigh. Thanks for listening, all, and good night and GO BLUE.
October 11th, 2009 at 12:52 AM ^
I watched three of Iowa's other games and most of the Turnovers were forced. They were punching out balls from the backside on tackles, hitting people hard, and really reacting well in zone drops to get tipped balls. Today we had 2 unforced turnovers though, and you might be able to call denard's pick unforced too.
October 11th, 2009 at 12:57 AM ^
Unfortunately, my "unforced turnover" count is around four. The two picks are simply balls that shouldn't have been thrown; Mathews, as a senior, should have caught the fair catch, and it's tough to argue that Iowa forced the ball out of Tate's hand.
Shit happens, I know. It happens to me, and probably to you, too. It happened to Stanzi, who gave us a pick six.
Lucky life goes on, but it's tough to get over these losses sometime!
October 11th, 2009 at 12:52 AM ^
Minus the turnovers, that would have been at least a 2 touchdown win. God Damn Herpes
October 11th, 2009 at 12:54 AM ^
i agree with the part about the seniors, it was disappointing. we need them to be the ones we can always rely on.
i know, they were just unlucky mistakes, but it still is hard to see that. I'm sure they feel horrible about it though, and minor sure as hell responded later in the game
October 11th, 2009 at 12:57 AM ^
The turnovers were very disappointing; I'm sure Bo is turning over in his grave because of them. I also don't understand the on-side kick and why Denard was in the game during the last series instead of Tate. The last series was an obvious passing situation and Denard was not the man for that job right now.
October 11th, 2009 at 1:11 AM ^
Balancing these two QBs is a tough act, IMO. I mean, I think we all love Denard, but he's just not where he needs to be for us to win games with his passing ability. The drive the he lead us to a TD took more than 3 minutes off the clock, so that's not gonna work when there's 1:30 left in the game, with no timeouts.
On the flip side, Tate was playing with fire all night. He was forcing balls into coverage the just shouldn't have been thrown.
I guess that leads us to the obvious conclusion: Tonight, our freshmen QBs looked like ... freshmen!!
Having said that, losing is tough to accept. Always! I don't think any of us want to accept losing, regardless of how young we are, or how could we could be in the future, etc. So yeah, as you can probably tell, this is a tough one to swallow for me personally.
October 11th, 2009 at 1:11 AM ^
for at least catching the picks. They made M pay for bad throws. Beyond's Warren's pick six, Michigan didn't make Stanzi pay for his. Warren and Woolfolk both had what looked like relatively easy opportunities (Warren's especially) and couldn't hang on.
Herbie called Mouton's break up on that Stanzi throw back over the middle an interception opportunity. I dunno about that one.
How about Brown in the end zone? Man, if he somehow able to hang onto that one, M gets it on the 20 rather than the 1.5 ... We were lucky just to survive that 4th down play, I know. "If only" ... you can drive yourself nuts with that phrase.
October 11th, 2009 at 6:26 AM ^
Are the three most useless words in the English language. You were absolutely correct that the "if only" phrase will drive you nuts. However, utterly pointless. What happened, happened.
October 11th, 2009 at 1:42 AM ^
Here is are a few pf my recent statuses on Facebook which defend the team, Denard, and Coach Rod, most importantly:
"Some things to keep in perspective: NO ONE wins with 5 turnovers. Also, let's remember, Michigan fans: this is an extremely young team which has holes in skill all over the field. Warren and Woolfolk both missed two easy picks (ie, team effort...). Finally, this is not your Dad's Wolverines. I'm much more resigned to these losses with this team, than I am say, to getting upset with a #5 ranking late in the season."
Also:
"For the record, I defend Coach Rod's decision to keep Denard in the game. He was clearly sending a message to Tate. The team is not far off though. We're at a deficiency in talent, the learning curve is still in effect, and we come within 2 on the road. No moral victories, though."
I defend the decision to keep Denard in. Coach was going with the momentum: Denard was giving us positive mojo, Tate was not.
That's my two cents, disagree if you want.