Michigan Monday
https://theozone.net/2018/09/michigan-monday-husker-doom/
My my, I smell fear (or just respect eh). Also we must be selling more jerseys now...
September 25th, 2018 at 12:09 AM ^
I don't get the fear thing, but whatever.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:41 AM ^
their Haskins is still a lot better than our Haskins. We are still going to be the dog going into the Game.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:55 AM ^
The top 30 players on each team are very even. And I will (continue to) beat this horse-that is not dead: This game is about execution!!!! If Michigan makes several gimme plays in their last several games against OSU they win-it's that "simple".
September 25th, 2018 at 8:35 AM ^
Why do people seem to forget that in both recent games, Michigan had double digit leads...but no quality depth...which is part of the reason why OSU simply wore Michigan out...Michigan's Top 30...other than QB...has been pretty much equal with OSU the past couple of years, talent wise
September 25th, 2018 at 6:52 PM ^
I don’t think they wore us down in ‘16. Just benefited from awful officiating and a couple of Speight mistakes.
September 25th, 2018 at 12:56 AM ^
Probably not fear, but maybe a bit of begrudged respect . . .
September 25th, 2018 at 1:00 AM ^
He is right that it would be reassuring to see the passing offense click and really breakthrough for a game, any game, just to see that Michigan can do it. There are enough weapons that the ball is getting spread around, but there are no ‘go-to’ players at this point.
The result is that the passing offense feels more tenuous and inconsistent than it probably is. Minor complaint in the grand scheme, I suppose.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:14 AM ^
The only time I rember Michigan "opening" up and airing it out was 2008 gator bowl when carr shocked the world and had Henne throe all over the field.
I would love it if harbaugh does that, but would he ? Not sure his offense never tries running and just throws it up arm punt style
September 25th, 2018 at 1:30 AM ^
The mad scientist Al Borges opened it up all the time, even when he didn't have the line to support it and it resulted in our QB getting murdered. In 2013 Gardner had several games where he passed for over 300 yards. Let's not forget the heroic 451 passing yard performance against OSU with 4 TDs and no interceptions.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:42 AM ^
Great point. Forgot about those years and in particular that Gardner game against osu! In the famous words of Kellen Winslow Jr "he was a fucking soldier out there!"
September 25th, 2018 at 5:25 AM ^
Probably one of the greatest ever performances by a Michigan QB that won't be remembered because we lost
September 25th, 2018 at 6:10 AM ^
His 41-30 ND game was a gem too (except for that one play that ended up not mattering eventually)
September 25th, 2018 at 6:59 AM ^
Gardner also holds 2 UM all-time single game records, albeit against a lesser foe. On October 19, 2013 at Michigan Stadium, he threw for a record 503 yards, completing 21 of 29 attempts, with 2 TDs and 0 INTs. On that same day, he also ran for 81 yards and 3 TDs on 15 carries. His total offense of 584 yards was the second record he set that day.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:25 AM ^
"There are 3 things can happen when you throw the ball, and 2 of them are bad." - some non-Michigan coach
Stick with 3.33 yards and a cloud of dust, baby, yeah!
September 25th, 2018 at 11:47 AM ^
3.33 yards will leave us at 4th and inches (3.6"). we need 3.34 yards and a cloud of dust and refs that can place a football properly. On second thought, maybe we don't leave it in the ref's hands.
September 25th, 2018 at 2:00 PM ^
yeah, but my OCD wouldn't let me type 3.34 (oh no, AAAAAGGGGH!)
September 26th, 2018 at 11:33 AM ^
This quote never made sense to me. When you hand the ball off are there not 3 possible outcomes two of which are bad?
September 25th, 2018 at 5:32 AM ^
Gentry feels like a 'go to' guy to me.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:24 AM ^
Michigan's passing game is just fine. In fact, it's pretty much exactly where it needs to be. Both Patterson and McCaffrey have demonstrated the ability to execute every aspect and phase of a lethal passing attack...including pulling the ball down and converting long first downs.To dog this is simply silly. Here, specific to the Nebraska game, imagine the score and passing stats if the officials would have either had a clue or the integrity to call those three or four egregious PIs against NE and swallowed their whistles on the ticky-tacky calls against Michigan.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:54 AM ^
Exactly....
Harbaugh has no problem throwing the ball and going deep (been done from day one w Rudock) but the ability to run the ball with confidence really makes any offense much more dangerous...and that's especially so for a team in the upper Midwest.
September 25th, 2018 at 9:25 AM ^
Running on Nebraska is fine and dandy, but Michigan ran for 50 yards on Wisconsin last year AFTER running for over 300 on Minnesota.
Michigan will have to successfully air it out on Wiscy, MSU, PSU, and OSU. Maybe even NW this weekend, as their front 7 is pretty good.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:51 AM ^
Yeah, SMU showed that if you stack the box, Michigan can't always run on you so they need to be able to hit over the top. I think the Nico catch and the Bell catch were the two of best passes and catches I've seen this season. I still don't have full confidence that the passing game is there yet against elite defenses. Luckily Michigan has time to build on what they have in the next few games.
September 25th, 2018 at 9:00 AM ^
We haven’t done it because our tackles still can’t pass block and there’s no need to get your qb killed in these games
September 25th, 2018 at 10:09 AM ^
Protected pretty well against Nebraska.
September 25th, 2018 at 5:28 AM ^
How the hell did this team lose to Notre Dame is right. If that game was in week 4 instead of week 1, I wonder how different the result would be
September 25th, 2018 at 7:20 AM ^
ND is better now also. They might have found a QB. If they beat Stanford this weekend, they could run the table.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:50 AM ^
It pains me to say this, but that’s what I’m rooting for
September 25th, 2018 at 8:06 AM ^
Aside from running the table, here, Michigan's best case scenario is that ND knocks off Stanford then gets beat by a Northwestern team that Michigan thoroughly throttles. As Coach Harbaugh stated, Michigan left a lot of points on the field at ND-and gave up more than they should have. Today Michigan wins comfortably against ND.
September 25th, 2018 at 9:08 AM ^
The overconfidence from beating 3 bad teams is astounding. When is the last time Michigan beat a good team on the road comfortably? ND might not be a top 10 team but they are at worst a fringe top 25 8-5 team with a top 20 defense. Last time we played a team like that with a supposedly superior team was at Iowa. And even if you want to say we lost due to flukes it was never close to comfortable
September 25th, 2018 at 10:06 AM ^
Seriously. The average S&P+ ranking of our last three opponents? 89! You’d struggle to find a P5 team with that low of an average opponent rank for the last 3 games. And does no one remember our OL getting abused by the only good defense they e played? We have improved, no doubt, but unless they imported some All-Pro offensive tackles to Ann Arbor we would struggle to beat Notre Dame.
September 25th, 2018 at 10:00 AM ^
ND may be better, but Michigan is MUCH better than what it showed in the first game. If we play ND on neutral field, I bet we win more than not. It won't be just a toss up.
September 25th, 2018 at 7:58 AM ^
ND on the road and night is a tough opening game draw esp for a team with so many new pieces a critical positions (QB and Oline) ...and yet UM was right there until the end.
September 25th, 2018 at 8:16 AM ^
How the hell did this team lose to Notre Dame?
This was the second question I asked myself as I exited the stadium on Saturday. The first was, as always, "Now, which street did I pretend to live on again?"
September 25th, 2018 at 8:19 AM ^
INERTIA ... moar Ben Mason
https://m.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=328252217970229&id=155034533624&refsrc=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2F&_rdr
September 25th, 2018 at 9:41 AM ^
I don't get why people are complaining about not passing the ball. I have no clue why people think the offense should 'open up' and throw it 458 times. That's ridiculous! They've scored 150 points in the last three games! The running game is the base - it provides the staple offensive plays and blocking schemes. Work those until you can't screw them up - which we saw Saturday has been working pretty well. The staple passing plays (waggles, drags, corner routes, some crossing stuff, and go routes) have all been used, and they all work very well. There is simply no reason to unwrap more exotic runs or passes until they are needed. Continue to burn in the staples and base patterns.
Some new stuff was shown against UN, until we saw that it wasn't needed - then right back to the staples. I'm good with that. There is no reason whatsoever to unleash stuff that isn't needed, until its needed. If the base is perfect, you can run everything out of that and make it work.
September 25th, 2018 at 9:58 AM ^
Because against good teams - OSU, PSU, MSU - we will need to pass the ball to win. We saw that against ND. They stuffed our running game and the OL couldnt give Shea more than 3 seconds to stay in the pocket. Outside of a couple long completions, Shea was throwing a bunch of 5 yard passes that game and the offense looked terrible. Like someone else said, we ran for over 300 against Minnesota and then 50 the next week vs. Wisconsin.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:31 AM ^
You sure about that?
Penn state just gave up 250 on the ground to Illinois... Lmao .
September 25th, 2018 at 10:16 AM ^
Nobody is suggesting that Michigan throw the ball 458 times in a game like that, but Shea threw the ball 22 times and averaged only 5.5 yards per attempt. DPJ, Martin, and Collins combined for 4 catches for 53 yards.
Harbaugh obviously doesn't care about style points, but those are pretty underwhelming numbers against a really overwhelmed team.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:27 AM ^
take what the defense gives you
September 25th, 2018 at 9:59 AM ^
I smell teen spirit.
September 25th, 2018 at 11:27 AM ^
"I understand the desire to win the surest way against overmatched opponents, but this is also an opportunity to turn inexperienced players into experienced playmakers."
This is a great point and I think it captures what frustrates many fans about a game like the last one. We destroyed them, but we didn't really try out half of the offense. Sure, save some surprises for the better competition, but make sure the offense works too. I'd like to see much more passing in some of these games to just rep them in games.
September 25th, 2018 at 1:03 PM ^
+1 to Gerd for title of MM: "Hüsker Dööm."