UM does not play well on the road - why?
I have turned to the Board many times to help me understand things. Thanks to many.
I keep reading that Michigan does not play well on the road. The metrics back that up. Why is this? Growing up, every football player has home and away games. All of the coaches have coached home and away games. It's not new concept. I can understand why players don't perform well when they are used to artificial turf and then have to play on grass - but I don't get the away game stuff. I would like to hear opinions on why Michigan is road challenged.
October 1st, 2018 at 6:08 PM ^
You think other teams get that excited to beat the third or fourth best team in the division? I know this blog is excuse making central sometimes but this one seems pretty ridiculous.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:06 PM ^
Last week was more of a case of the players overlooking NW. That's easy to do when the other team has losses against weaker opponents. Road games in general are harder because the routine is different, it's not what you're used to. The crowd obviously factors into it also. Think of it like staying in a motel or at a friend's house. Sure it's fine, but it just isn't the same as being at home.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:07 PM ^
Maybe if we invent a phrase?
I dunno, maybe:
"Home field advantage"
got a nice ring to it don't you think?
October 1st, 2018 at 4:09 PM ^
Doubt that will catch on.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:10 PM ^
No one plays well on the road. Look at how Wiscy and PSU fall apart when they come here and how OSU has to ugly its way to close victories on the road. Even MSU has only been successful here because of freak occurrences.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:24 PM ^
1 week and 2 days ago, Penn State played Illinois even for 3 quarters at Kinnick. I don’t have an answer for why it happens, but I know it isn’t something that only happens to Michigan
October 1st, 2018 at 4:32 PM ^
Penn State played Illinois in Iowa? That's quite a trick!
October 1st, 2018 at 4:32 PM ^
Wait! Illinois played Penn State at Kinnick?
I do not think so...
October 1st, 2018 at 4:32 PM ^
Kinnick is Iowa's stadium.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:14 PM ^
Lol, apparently I was thinking Illinois played at Kinnick. I had meant Memorial Stadium, which is even less intimidating than Kinnick, so PSU has zero excuse
October 1st, 2018 at 4:37 PM ^
Kinnick is Iowa's stadium so that would have been truly bizarre.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:49 PM ^
"Penn State played Illinois even for 3 quarters at Kinnick. I don’t have an answer for why it happens..."
Neither do the people at Kinnick—they're completely mystified why Illinois and Penn St. showed up and played a game there.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:33 PM ^
Well I hope they both waved to the kids, even though PSU fans waving at kids is STILL kind of creepy.
October 1st, 2018 at 7:49 PM ^
I enjoyed watching OSU get torched at Kinick last season. I wonder if we'll ever murderwolf OSU at home.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:10 PM ^
It seems to specifically be a first-quarter problem on the road. In quarters 2-4 we've outscored ND and Northwestern 37-17.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:11 PM ^
TWO WORDS- JIM HARBAUGH!!!!!!
October 1st, 2018 at 4:13 PM ^
Because we were road warriors under Hoke?
October 1st, 2018 at 4:14 PM ^
EXACTLY!!!!!!!!111!!
October 1st, 2018 at 4:21 PM ^
You clearly have no idea what the hell you're talking about if you think the team was good on the road under Hoke.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:00 PM ^
I think he is aware, just not fully aware.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:20 PM ^
Just ask yourself, "Who else do we know has a habit of typing in all caps?"
October 1st, 2018 at 6:25 PM ^
I think jmblue was being a wee bit sarcastic about Hoke Road Warriors.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:48 PM ^
Just curious, are you always a douche bag or is today your special gift to the rest of us???
October 1st, 2018 at 4:12 PM ^
Maybe everyone has a pink visitor's locker room.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:13 PM ^
Kinda like a public toilet. You can get the job done if you absolutely have to, but it's uncomfortable and everything's weird and they provide awful toilet paper and it just sucks.
Teams like Ohio State on the other hand, live in a butthole town, play in a toilet of a stadium and shit in coolers wherever they go so they've given themselves an advantage on the road.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:54 PM ^
Bravo.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:59 PM ^
Solid last sentence (no pun intended).
October 1st, 2018 at 4:14 PM ^
The Northwestern crowd sounded like they were cheering louder for us than them.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:22 PM ^
"Northwestern crowd"
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:08 PM ^
Well, his way's not very sportsmanlike.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:17 PM ^
Think of how many important games we would have won if we just eliminated the first quarter. I'm recommending the coaching staff begin numbering away game quarters as 2,3,4,5 for the team and problem is solved!
October 1st, 2018 at 4:21 PM ^
Really don't understand it. I'd change the road uniform until something works. We were doing well in them until the Iowa game in 2016.
Pre-2016 Iowa game in all-white: 7-1
2016 Iowa game and since: 4-6 including an OT scare at Indiana and then this past weekend.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:29 PM ^
They wore maize pants again vs Penn State during the white out last year but that didn't help.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:38 PM ^
When you're WD, all problems are nails, and uniforms are the hammer.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:35 PM ^
My thoughts exactly. I'm sure that WD only changes his lucky maize underwear after a loss. Maybe his girlfriend needs to tell him they used to be white.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:22 PM ^
It’s difficult to win road games.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:24 PM ^
Stop it with your logical response to a question clearly designed to rile up the masses!
October 1st, 2018 at 4:49 PM ^
I took some ski lessons once because I sucked at moguls. The instructor was very fond of saying "there's no such thing as a bad moguls skier, they're just bad skiers period, the moguls are just exposing them as such."
I think that's the case here. Michigan's abysmal road record is a function of being a not very good team period. Even the "good" teams in recent memory have had a fatal flaw or two. Those flaws ruthlessly exposed when the pressure of playing in a hostile environment take players that little bit extra off their game.
October 1st, 2018 at 4:58 PM ^
"Abysmal" is over the top. Harbaugh is 10-6 on the road, and all of those games have been against Power 5 opponents.
What we've lacked is that signature road win. Harbaugh got one (USC) in his first year at Stanford but that has eluded him to date here, although 2016 OSU was a heartbreaker.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:52 PM ^
Those 10 wins are MD x2, MN, IN x2, PSU (7-6), Rutgers, MSU (3-9), Purdue, and NW this week.
Abysmal is over the top, I'll give you that, but "lacking a signature win" isn't doing the record justice in the other direction either.
October 1st, 2018 at 6:31 PM ^
Other than 2016 Iowa, all of the road losses have been to teams that won 10+ games (or figure to do so, in 2018 ND's case). Those were objectively very difficult games and we'd expect to lose a lot of them. It's tough to lose all of them though.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:04 PM ^
I've generally been in this camp. I'm wondering if there's something fragile about the way Harbaugh's Michigan teams like to play football, though.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:36 PM ^
Serious question: Can you explain what you mean by fragile?
October 1st, 2018 at 5:45 PM ^
His offense definitely requires more guys to execute correctly to work, compared to a spread. More road biffs by any one guy on any given play means that play likely doesn't succeed.
October 1st, 2018 at 5:39 PM ^
By ‘abysmal’ do you mean 1-1?
October 1st, 2018 at 6:15 PM ^
It may surprise you to learn that Michigan has been playing football prior to 2018
October 1st, 2018 at 8:33 PM ^
Back in the day, before parabolic skis, when longer skis ruled (I used to ski on 203cm Rossignol ST Comps), the problem in moguls was the skis were too damned long for the moguls, so basic lack of preparation, where a much shorter ski was required (150cm or less). The analogy here is that we look unprepared in the first quarter of road games. The other team's scripted plan is working perfectly while we're reacting to their plan, rather than the other way around. We need to find a way to take it to them right from the opening kickoff!
October 1st, 2018 at 5:02 PM ^
Too much football mumbo jumbo
October 1st, 2018 at 4:24 PM ^
Because you touch yourself at night.