When was the last time you felt this optimistic?
I feel pretty optimistic now- like I haven't felt in a decade really (or around the time UM and OSU played each other as #1 and #2).
I figured out why: fundamentals. Today I saw a game where the players were executing the fundamentals with precision- blockers were blasting, defense was wrapping, runners were plowing and the QB was sharpshooting. And all the mechanics looked like they should. There was no need for lots of fancy gadget plays for the most part. Just bread and butter dominance.
I never saw that basic soundness under RR or Hoke and never felt very confident about their teams- no matter what their records were or what direction they were heading. We never blew anybody out that was decent under them- never dominated a good team. I always felt we were faking it when things were going well and that it wouldn't last. The fundamentals were usually very bad.
Now- suddenly- I feel like I have been returned to an earlier time- before the nightmares. I really liked how the announcers at the Citrus Bowl talked about the UM tradition- and how it was crazy to try to change that- they showed the legacy stats. Yes, it was crazy.
And it felt the world was well again and the future has REAL promise- not fools gold.
How long has it been since you felt this way?
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:41 AM ^
The last time Michigan beat Florida in the Citrus, with RR in the wings. This feels different though. It's hope based on experience and not conjecture.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:54 AM ^
I remember, at that time, that I was very excited to see what RichRod could do, but there was a part of me that was sad about seeing us shed the offensive identity we'd had for so long, which had produced so many great players. I felt that the problem with Carr wasn't his offensive system, but his general risk-averse game management. He finally threw caution into the wind for that last game and was rewarded, but that was it, just one game.
Now I feel like we've gone back to the 2008 Citrus Bowl offense, but full-time now. Under Harbaugh we will attack a defense at its weak link, wherever it may be, and we will be relentless. His attitude of competing to the end permeates everything. The announcers kept speculating that Jim was "showcasing" Rudock by letting him pass in the fourth quarter, but I don't know if that was it. I think it was more that the the game was still on, and Harbaugh wanted to finish it well. Until we got to the point where we could kill the clock by kneeling, we were going to keep competing. We called a timeout with 2 minutes left and Harbaugh was right in the middle of the huddle, eagerly teaching. It was awesome.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:59 AM ^
I was actually surprised when, up 41-7 with 30 seconds left, we took a knee. I love that Harbaugh makes that scenario something other than a foregone conclusion. Will he kneel? Will he go for a fuck-you touchdown? Will he put Houma at QB and run a dropkick field goal?
Nothing is out of the question.
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:23 AM ^
still allowed? I've never seen one.
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:49 AM ^
Just no obvious advantage at the college level, while the technics are much harder than kicking the ball off the ground.
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:11 PM ^
When we did that slick roll-out pass a few plays before I thought for sure Harbaugh was going to punch it in and we were going to have a sweet post game confrontation
McElwain: "WHATS YOUR DEAL"
Harbaugh [confused]: "What? You're supposed to put the ball in the endzone in football. The morning lark rises early and I like that. We try to be like the morning lark"
McElwain: "....."
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:41 AM ^
Harbaugh's offense resembles anything Carr or even his biggest mentor Bo put on the field in appearance only. Harbaugh's offense is much more evolved. Most of all, he isn't predictable. He knows that you can't just say, "we're going to run the ball down your throat," run basic plays and out-execute opponents anymore. The talent is just too equal nowadays to do that.
Harbaugh demolished a Florida team that had as much talent on the field as Michigan did today. That didn't happen much with Bo or with Carr, who played it close to the vest most of the time. With a few notable exceptions, they only blew out teams that they really, really out-talented.
January 2nd, 2016 at 4:21 AM ^
Totally agree. It makes me so up set when they call Harbaugh an "old-school" type offense just because he uses multiple TEs, power sets and FBs.
If anything, Harbaugh is taking every element of traditional offense and updating it for the modern game.
Houma and Kerridge both had multiple mis-direction hand-offs (in the first half of the season) where the defense didn't even know they were the ball-carrier until after they were 5+ yards past the line of scrimmage, just because how many offenses utilize a full-back running? It wasn't until the 2nd half of the season (once defenses had seen it on film) that they even keyed in on the FB run, and even then it was as effective as any RB carry, and thus they had to respect it.
Also, our FBs contributions can't be understated (as well as athleticism, you all saw Houma shake Brantley--a future NFL player--in the back field and bounce outside for a big gain), and I really hope Harbaugh is able to find similarly skilled replacements.
Obviously only in-depth football fans can appreciate it, but Harbaugh's offense is so dynamic, he really doesn't get enough credit. And as time progresses, it's only going to get better.
His "hybrid-ized" old-school/new-school is so much fun to watch, and it's anything but "old school".
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:23 AM ^
As I'm watching the game and we got into some key 3rd down situations, I did what I always do . . . try to predict what we will run based on our field position, distance to go, and the alignment.
But I couldn't tell.
There was only 1 series where I felt that we got into a play-calling rut where you knew we were going to run the Full Back dive on 1st down, and we were going to throw to the WR on the sideline behind the LOS for a run. Florida knew too and blew those up.
But that was it. The rest of the time you could not be sure what we were going to do.
Hybrid is a good term to describe it. We do some old-school stuff that fewer and fewer teams do these days - Full Back runs, Under Center snaps on long yardage, etc. - but you can't be sure when we are going to do them. It is a very complex offense. We run everything.
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:23 AM ^
Even Bo's were not as relentless as this year's team. Bo would put in scrubs and would take his foot off the pedal a bit.
It looks like Harbaugh doesn't take his foot off the pedal until he thinks there's no more room for improvement. And he doesn't care what the score is; if he thinks they need to work on something, he will have them do it.
January 2nd, 2016 at 10:17 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 6:18 AM ^
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January 2nd, 2016 at 10:06 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:11 AM ^
We are all big on revisionist history around here, but we were very excited about the Rich Rod hire.
We had just been torn up by masters of the Spread - App State/Armanti Edwards and Oregon/Dennis Dixon in 2007. We had no answer and worse, no clue how to deal with it. In the meantime we were stuck in an obsolete ball control system that counted on you holding the other team to 10 points while you felt them out and punted for 3 quarters.
Then in a stroke of pure luck (that felt just as lucky then as the York/Harbaugh situation did last year) . . . the guy that invented the Spread fell into our laps.
Whoo Hoo!!! Peanut Butter Jelly time!
Well, we know how that turned out.
What's different now is that our optimisim is not based on hope or interpolating what somebody did somewhere else to Michigan. Our optimism is based now on real results, at Michigan, with Michigan players.
When Harbaugh says that we will get better and better each day, you believe him. It's not even optimism any more, it's now just observation.
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:39 AM ^
The speculation was rampant after the Coach Rodriguez hire, what he could do with real talent now that he was at a destination job. The season after the Championship was also full of expectation but back then we were used to winning though shackled with too many losses than we at Michigan would like to suffer through.
The 'Now' feels amazing. I also don't recall being this expectant for a High School all america game; we could nab a large number of commits today. Next year, hoe-boy! It's on Spartans! It's on Buckeyes! It's on Alabama and Clemson and who ever else we might be playing in the Natty!
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:59 AM ^
We are all big on revisionist history around here, but we were very excited about the Rich Rod hire.As I said, I was excited when we hired RichRod - he was one of the hottest coaches in the country at the time. That said, watching Henne throw darts all day against Florida in the Citrus Bowl a month later, it was a little bittersweet thinking that we were going away from that system, right when we finally had a game plan that took full advantage of our talent. The problem with Carr wasn't that he ran pro-style, it was his philosophy of game management. He would run or die trying. He would sit on the ball in the second half with a lead to "protect his defense." On the other side of the country, Pete Carroll was also running pro-style, but he would aggressively take what the defense gave - and his teams put up a ton of points.
January 2nd, 2016 at 11:29 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 11:59 AM ^
aware of the 3,000 yd stat and was allowing Rudock to stay in to get there. He ended up with 3,017 yards.
January 2nd, 2016 at 6:32 AM ^
To answer the op's question
Late December back in '63. What a lady, what a night.
January 2nd, 2016 at 12:14 PM ^
Paradise by the Dashboard Lights?
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:43 AM ^
2007 preseason....
:-/
January 2nd, 2016 at 7:32 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:26 AM ^
1998, after we had won the NC and had the #1 recruiting class in the counrty (we had the #1 or #2 recruit at each position for like 5 different positions).
January 2nd, 2016 at 3:16 PM ^
Preseason 2000 before Henson broke his foot also high on the list
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:45 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:33 AM ^
Even us fans that are older have not seen a meaningful blowout in a bowl game for ages. We blew out Ole Miss in the '90 season, NC State in '93, and Colo State in '94, but who cares? We didn't then or now.
The last meaningful blowout was Bo's first Rose Bowl win in 1980. That was truly excellent. Then you have to go back to 1964 for the next one.
Meaningful Michigan blowouts in bowl games are extremely rare for us and I enjoyed every second of it. I still have that walking on air feeling today.
January 2nd, 2016 at 10:23 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:46 AM ^
Probably haven't felt this confident since just before the App State game/season kicked off.
This will NOT go the same way, I promise.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:47 AM ^
That winter day in 2004 when I got into Michigan.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:48 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:09 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:50 AM ^
Probably after the 2011 Sugar Bowl? Back-to-back wins over OSU and then VT in a BCS bowl. I thought Hoke was our saviour.
If not that then 2007 preseason
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:56 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 5:48 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 7:08 AM ^
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January 2nd, 2016 at 8:37 AM ^
Yeah, God bless Notre Dame. For 4 years - '09, 10, '11, and '13 - they made us feel that we were going to win the National Championship and win the Heisman at QB.
Turns out, they just sucked.
Bastards.
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:29 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 10:21 AM ^
I did not feel good after the Hoke Sugar Bowl- it was a close game against a coach (Beamer) who always chokes (JH and Stanford destroyed him). On top of that the refs gifted UM by invalidating a great TD catch by a VT receiver thaat was a catch and probably would have won the game for them.
This, after we won against a disaster intern, Fickle, at OSU. Plus the football fundamentals weren't there- players were playin sloppy. I felt very uneasy after that Sugar Bowl- felt it was not a legit team.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:51 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:51 AM ^
2006 UM/OSU game.
January 2nd, 2016 at 1:51 AM ^
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:12 AM ^
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January 2nd, 2016 at 1:53 AM ^
probably 2005 coming off the Vince Young RB. that team was legit and most of it ran through freshmen
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:02 AM ^
at that TD pass to put us up to 24 points. Rudock hit a window the size of a poptart box. Perfect placement with a speed on the ball that prevented anyone but the receiver from touching it. That was a pro pass if there has ever been one. It's that kind of improvement and sound preparation that has been missing over the years. It's good to see it back again.
January 2nd, 2016 at 3:54 AM ^
I know... but still, that was VERY tight, like the announcer mentioned if that one Florida player hadn't cut his finger nails this morning that was an interception.
January 2nd, 2016 at 9:20 AM ^
Even when I watch that on replay. I still mumble to myself for him not to throw it. Unreal that it went through in a perfect window like that.
January 2nd, 2016 at 2:10 AM ^
Denard was coming back for a final kick-ass year, Hoke had "restored" us to Michigan football (registered trademark), and I foolishly thought that teams tended to get better over time as they learned the system.
This feels the same way, but I have confidence in this coaching staff, and I hope I'm quite a bit wiser and more perceptive then I was in college.
January 2nd, 2016 at 8:43 AM ^
What's different is that 2011 felt like there was a lot of luck involved. We were OK with it because we thought we would improve in 2012. But we were still relying on hope for the next year, we had not actually seen directly the results we were hoping for.
This year is different. There is no luck involved, and what "luck" there was, went against us. This year we have seen the results. We have seen the improvement. There is no speculation.
January 2nd, 2016 at 10:08 AM ^
Exactly...
I think some are offering up a bit of revisionist history around that Sugar Bowl. I remember there being a LOT of angst after that game. VT out gained UM considerably, Denard was bottled up and only had 13 yards rushing and really bad passing numbers. The team rushed for less than 60 yards. People here and on other message boards were not happy after that game.