We still had a great season

I don't think anyone is saying we had a bad season overall. It's just that this year was probably the best chance we've had in ages to beat a vulnerable OSU, get to the B1G championship, and make the CFP. But instead we blew it against OSU and that's gonna sting for a long time

We were ranked in the low teens to start the season.  And we'll probably finish ranked there or slightly better.  We are who most everyone thought we were.  Shrug.

There is and never will be anything "great" about getting your teeth knocked down your throat by your bitter rivals - in front of the world, after a month of hype, AGAIN.  The losses to them are getting worse and more humiliating, not better in any sense.  We get to sit here tasting our own blood from our knocked out teeth dripping down our throats for 5 weeks - until we maybe make some team we could give a shit less about pay for it - or worse yet, not.

tPOSu wants to win The Game more than we do.  That much is evident.  Until we meet and exceed their level of hostility and intensity the outcome will continue to be the same.   

No. Big ten title is a great season. 

"Great" is a relative term. If you wanna define it based on how the team did against how people thought they would do before the season or entirely on their record, then fine.

But both require you to forget about what happened over the course of the season and what happened in the last game. You can't convince me that after the team laid such an egg in such an important game against their biggest rival that the season was "great." 

Michigan had the chance at a great season. They were playing a deeply flawed OSU team that had played horribly for months in supposedly the most winnable game for Michigan in this rivalry in a while with a chance not just to win their division for the first time and play for their first B1G title since 2004 and their first appearance ever in the CFP, but they also had a chance to validate everything we've seen since the Notre Dame game as well as reset the narrative about the program, how they perform against top teams/OSU, and where they're headed.

Instead, they got humiliated on national tv and that "top5 defense otherwise" allowed 62 points. Michigan is 1-14 against OSU since 2004. 10-straight losses in Columbus. The problems with the offense (offensive line, qb play, play calling) reemerged as if they'd never gone anywhere and a defense that is going to lose a lot of starters after this year played like absolute crap. The secondary was killed and Gary and Winovich were invisible. 

After that game and how Michigan collapsed, you can't say that the trajectory of this team is up. It's better than it was after last year, but Harbaugh and his assistants aren't getting paid millions to have 2nd place in the division as the team's ceiling. And with that game against such a poor OSU team, it makes me doubt if the team will ever be able to put 60 minutes together and beat OSU as long as Meyer is there. And that revelation definitely prevents this season from being called "great."

This was terrible! Epically terrible! This was equally offense and defense! This was just as bad as Jim Herman and Ron English not adjusting to what they're putting on the field. The offense was called terribly as well. 

I’d call this season a success if we won the bowl game. I don’t consider them meaningless generally. It counts as a game just like any other and is post season play. Obviously we had larger goals that were steam rolled today but c’est la vie.

11-2 would be nothing to sneeze at. Sucks which two games we lost but we’re still building.

What do you think Bo would say about giving up 62 points to Ohio state? He probably rolled over in his grave today.

There's a wide gap between great season and not-so-great season. Today was a bad day. Today was also the only day on the calendar that really mattered.

It is not unreasonable to expect the team to focus on this game, to the point where focus was almost lost on Indiana and maybe even Rutgers as well.

The effort put forth today was not good enough. That's not about entitled; that's about how to measure priorities within Michigan football. I think they got caught up in this "revenge" thing when a couple of flukes against Michigan State hardly constitutes urgency. Today was urgency.

Sure, the sun rises tomorrow. But I think it's reasonable to be upset and it's not reasonable to call today an anomaly. It is a real problem that Harbaugh must put first next year above all other distraction. He knows this. He will be better next year.

Probably the type of season I thought we would have but after being in playoff talks after we blew out PSU,  this horrific loss to OSU has given most of us a severe case of bpone. All we had to do was beat an OSU team that did not look that good all season. And to come out and lay an egg and have OSU give us our worse loss ever has really gotten me down. I just hope we get the Rose Bowl and can beat UW. This could make up for the horrible feeling after the OSU game.

Oh yeah.  Tell Bo back in the day that we had a "Great Season" losing to OSU and ND and allowing OSU to put up 62 points against us.  I'm sure he'd say that was a "Great Season." Get the hell out of here with that garbage. Lots of fun moments this year, but a B1G title was always the benchmark for this program.

"great" is a strong word, it'll be great if we win the bowl game.

8-1 conference finish is the best since 2006 (7-1).   Hate all you want, it's a fact.

yes others have pointed out Northwestern is going to the B1G championship.  Guess what? they don't have to go through OSU to win their division.

What we saw yesterday was UM still needs better talent.  We're still outmatched, especially on the lines.  Even when OSU struggles against teams like Maryland you can tell they have ridiculous athletes everywhere.

It was NOT an anomaly. We keep losing to them. At the end of the day, it really doesn't matter by how much--we lost. It keeps happening. That's not the definition of an anomaly. Us beating them is the anomaly. 

You're right, the sun will rise and in the grand scheme of things it doesn't really matter--but to say 10-2 is a good season when you can't even beat your rivals and get into your own conference championship game is pretty much a joke. 

It's all about the rivalry games and championships. If you are beating Notre dame, MSU and most importantly Ohio state folks are happy. It's like going all you can eat buffet and filling up on ice cubes.

No. It absolutely was not a "great" season. When you have your most talented team in years get punked yet again and all your goals are washed away, it isn't a great season. It was a good season. And maybe it can build towards something. But nothing about any of this is or was great. 

Bullshit. We got embarrassed by our biggest rival (who we can’t beat anymore) with a division title and possible conference title and playoff birth on the line. All the “well it was still a great season” nonsense can’t whitewash that fact. 

I've purposefully stayed away from the blog since Saturday, because I knew full well just how insane and defeatist this place would become. So having allowed the angst to cool a bit I have a couple points to make:

First a caveat. There is nothing in football that I hate more than losing to OSU. Absolutely nothing. So I'm not remotely interested in looking for rainbows after this loss, but I do think that some perspective is in order. 

1: Despite this loss, and losing various QBs for stretches last season, Harbaugh has won 38 games in the last four years, 39 if he wins the bowl game. It's been a damn long time since the program has had that kind of record. As disappointing as Saturday was, the program hasn't had this kind of overall success since Carr. 

2: We can agree to disagree about RichRod's qualities as a coach, but we all must acknowledge that he was a terrible fit for the Michigan football program and the results of that lack of fit was to blow a massive hole in recruiting and retention in the most fragile positions on the team. Hoke made "some" progress in fixing this, especially on the defense, but the hole was too deep and retention problems persisted. Harbaugh has made progress, but we are still shallow on the lines and young in places that we need to be seasoned. 

This is a very good football team. For all the complaints about Pep, this is an outstanding coaching staff. Sadly elite comes hard. Very very very hard. Michigan is a historically elite football program that has stumbled, and it stumbled when other Big Ten programs were rising.

I've been an active fan since the early 60s, so I've lived through this kind of adversity before, until a coach named Bo reset the program. 

Yes I sorely wish Saturday had gone the other way. That said, I've lived through what is required to resurrect an elite program. Harbaugh, assuming he stays, will get it done. 

I'm not going to ask for patience, because the fan base lost that in 2009. Juste ask yourselves, who can Michigan hire to coach who would be more suited that Harbaugh, At this point there is no better coach who can fit at Michigan. This will be a long difficult road, but the reality is that there is no one out there who give the program a better shot than Harbaugh. So suck it up buttercups