Why does Michigan ALWAYS get screwed on B10 schedule, and then compounds with out of conference idiocy?
OSU playing FAU, Cincy and UAB or some other scrub out of conference. That's it. Then they get PSU, Wisconsin and MSU at home.
Why are we consistently screwed by scheduling in B10 (I know the origins but why is AD never on record pushing back?) and why do we compound this with ND and... Army? Why?
This program really enjoys setting an upper band at 9 wins, testing roster depth and lackluster post season bowls.
Spare us the "I'd rather earn it vs good teams" garbage. It is clear that the only thing that matters right now is winning the dang Big Ten and to do this we need to play lower tier teand non conf, conserve depth and truly go all in vs OSU. Literally everything needs to be done to beat OSU. This ain't it.
January 8th, 2019 at 10:59 AM ^
I don't get scheduling Army at all. Having to prepare for an option offense you won't see again, combined with the potential damage caused to our defense from cut blocks.
The person in the AD department who scheduled this game was an absolute moron.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:14 AM ^
Not was....
IS a moron.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:53 AM ^
It’s fucking insane. Practice a bunch of shit your defense won’t use again and beat the hell out of them.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:21 AM ^
Because anything having to do with the military is guaranteed cheap applause that marketing folks live off of.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:18 PM ^
It is also respectful to help the Service Acadamies fill out their schedules with a quality opponent.
It is also one of the few benefits playing for Army, Navy, Air Force affords. How great to be able to tell your friends and kids you played at the Big House instead of just against SW Missouri State because SW Missouri St was the only school willing to put you on their OOC schedule.
January 9th, 2019 at 4:54 PM ^
This. Supporting the service academies and the Michigan directional schools is a class move.
January 9th, 2019 at 10:24 PM ^
The military is wasting tax dollars on a daily basis. Hope we beat them by 50.
January 9th, 2019 at 9:54 AM ^
I have great admiration for our military. Army and Michigan have a lot of history back when West Point was a powerhouse. I think it’s great!!
January 8th, 2019 at 11:39 AM ^
OU beat Army* and made the CFP. Maybe the same thing will happen next season.
* - Yes I'm ignoring the fact that OU should've lost that game in regulation and needed OT to win.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:10 PM ^
This was scheduled just after the 2016 season when Army had gone 22-51 the previous 6 seasons. It was probably assumed to be a cupcake that would get pretty solid publicity because everyone loves to watch armed forces games.
Not their fault Army turned out to be worrisome the last two seasons.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:12 PM ^
OSU played Navy in 2014. That OSU team went 14-1 and won a National Championship. Was Gene Smith a moron for doing that? (I agree he is a moron for a lot of other things, I'm focused on this specific point.)
January 8th, 2019 at 5:20 PM ^
you forget, the game after playing Navy, OSU laid an egg against VaTech.
If you gamble of Foosball, always bet against the team that played against Navy the week before. ALWAYS.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:46 PM ^
I like playing service academies.
January 8th, 2019 at 6:01 PM ^
I thought you just liked holes?
January 8th, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
Stopping Armys run game is all about discipline in your run fits. While we wont see this exact offense again working on perfecting your run fits is never a waste of time.
January 8th, 2019 at 1:16 PM ^
Yeah, the option doesn't bother me, its their tendency to cut block players on the edge that scares me. It's still never called properly and is so dangerous for the O-lineman.
I think Harbaugh has been mandating full knee braces for a few years now, but its still annoying.
January 8th, 2019 at 2:18 PM ^
Michigan and Army have history. They played some bruiser games in the 1950's. To me it makes more sense to schedule them now that they're good again, not less.
January 9th, 2019 at 7:47 AM ^
Agree, and btw what’s wrong with playing our service academies?
January 8th, 2019 at 10:41 PM ^
"...who scheduled this game is a moron."
Probably a DB himself...David Brandon.
January 8th, 2019 at 10:59 AM ^
Win The Game - that is the last hurdle for the program. The rest of the schedule is secondary to that right now.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:06 AM ^
Yep, that's all there is to it. We need to get over that hump. Beating OSU has to be the focus. Fuck, I'd take an 8-4 season if it included a win over OSU. Something about just knocking them out in the 90's when we underwhelmed in other games (sans 97') just felt good. Real good.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:12 AM ^
Winning the game isn't happening and the schedule is part of the reason why.
Every season at least a handful of our starters are "banged up" entering OSU.
We play the toughest schedule in the nation but refuse to use anyone but starters.
Every year end of season our starters are injured and gassed.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
It's football. Everybody has guys banged up. OSU was entirely without the best player in college football this year when they played us. It's no excuse.
If anything it's the coaches fault. If we want to rest guys or go in more fresh, there's no reason to keep your starters in the game until the end of massive blowouts against Nebraska, Penn State, etc. just because you have some petty vendetta for how the game went last year and are trying to get a shut out.
Mature programs do what they have to do to win secondary games and then they pour everything into the high leverage games. Michigan does the opposite right now. For four years we've been taking way too much pride in destroying bad teams rather than focusing on the ones that matter.
I do suspect that this is the year they turn the corner and act like a team that is supposed to win the first 11 games of the year and focuses on making sure they win the 12th.
January 8th, 2019 at 3:10 PM ^
there's no reason to keep your starters in the game until the end of massive blowouts against Nebraska, Penn State, etc. just because you have some petty vendetta for how the game went last year and are trying to get a shut out.
What is this in reference to - McCaffrey's injury? I don't recall any other garbage-time injuries those games.
If you're talking about Winovich's injury, that came when the IU game was still in doubt.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:15 AM ^
That's a dumb way of thinking. Look at Clemson and ND's schedules. That's how they got to the playoffs. Look at SEC non-conference schedules. That's why an SEC team is always in the playoffs.
Michigan has not been smart with scheduling at all.
January 8th, 2019 at 6:20 PM ^
Not to mention the Big Ten Schedule. We all know the home away madness of OSU/MSU, but why do we play Wisconsin as a cross over for something like 8/9 out of 11/12?? The games have been enjoyable, but Wisconsin most years are no joke.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:00 AM ^
The nd game mid big ten schedule makes little sense.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:03 AM ^
Zip. Zero. No sense at all. We put coach Harbaugh in a bad position with this idiocy. We go 10-2 again next year and miss playoff or B10 championship game and the damn fans go on and on about "mediocrity" when we CONSISTENTLY play the toughest schedules and MSU, PSU OSU play scrubs out of conf. For most part. I realize OSU had Okla on schedule 2 yrs.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:09 AM ^
Harbaugh fought to get the ND game back on the schedule. It was back in 2016ish when it still looked like the Death Star was going to be a thing. Things did not pan out quite as expected.
I think pretty much the AD, the fans, the players, everybody (including ND) was good without it. I know I had seen that matchup enough.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:56 AM ^
And ND looked vulnerable.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:59 AM ^
Having ND on the schedule is a positive. Great rivalry.
Playing crap games makes the regular season... crap.
This mentality that all that matters is making the playoff is incredibly shallow, and very contrary to what made college football fantastic.
January 8th, 2019 at 3:26 PM ^
I welcome difficult games. I am just sick of playing Notre Dame.
January 8th, 2019 at 3:49 PM ^
Not if it is away - and the first game - the same year as both MSU and OSU are away. Should have said remember fucking us over ending the series just before the game? Come see us when your ready to restart the series here.
January 8th, 2019 at 4:40 PM ^
What do you mean by the Death Star?
January 8th, 2019 at 11:49 AM ^
Everyone will celebrate when we go 10-2 with losses to OSU and take your pick of PSU, ND, MSU, or even Army.
The "Muh 10 wins" crows will be fellating themselves.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
Exactly what record would satisfy you?
We haven't finished a season with fewer than 2 losses since 1997.
January 8th, 2019 at 1:16 PM ^
Beating OSU, even at 8-4, would satisfy me.
Getting 10 wins and losing bowl games and to OSU just rings hollow.
January 8th, 2019 at 6:51 PM ^
We get screwed on the crossovers for sure and MSU plays scrubs, but OSU has scheduled a bunch of top notch OOC opponents. Off the top of my head, they’ve played Oklahoma, USC, TCU, Texas, VT (got whipped lol), Washington, ect. I’ve never felt like they’re trying to get over on the schedule
January 8th, 2019 at 11:00 AM ^
Speaking of this ain't it...
It's going to be a long offseason.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:16 AM ^
Thankfully it will be a long off season.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:01 AM ^
Scheduling the service academies once in a while is a good thing in my book, though yeah, you can make a case that its often a more difficult game than it should be. Though if your goal is to get to the CFP, you can't really be that worried about an Army game, even in their best year in 60 years.
To be clear though, the majority of our schedule is favorable this year, which is why last year everyone's complaints about the 2018 away schedule were more reasonable. The result of last year's horrible away schedule is, a better 2019.
We also get a bye before hosting MSU, while state plays at Iowa. Both Wisconsin and us have a bye week prior to the game in Madison.
The only really WHY this year is that Notre Dame gets a bye week before playing us, and we have a challenging away game at PSU. If you want to yell at Warde, I'd use that. Otherwise it's pretty favorable next year.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:27 AM ^
October 26th was the only 2019 date that really worked from the ND POV. When the U-M/ND game was announced in July 2016, (1) ND was already locked into at Louisville on Labor Day, (2) which precluded the following Saturday (no way ND wants to play on 5 days rest), (3) ND at Georgia was locked in for September 21st, and (4) ND wouldn't want to play September 14th or 28th either because that puts Michigan and Georgia back-to-back.
That said, I'm not sure why U-M agreed to October 26. It may have worked for ND, but it definitely puts U-M at a disadvantage schedule-wise.
Most logical would have been to have Washington visit AA in 2019 and Notre Dame visit AA in 2021. That would have required Washington's partnership, of course, and likely Washington (not wanting 2 road OOC games in one year) moving their own road game against BYU from 2019 to 2021. Perhaps U-M looked into that option, who knows.
January 8th, 2019 at 12:06 PM ^
I dont give a damn what's good for ND, who they play and when is of no consequence to us. We've taken there shit with scheduling from them chicken shotting out of the original series, to starting the series back at their place. No matter how you look at it this game mid season is dumb. Should be Under the Lights in September; same as we did this year. To hell with Norte Dame!
January 8th, 2019 at 1:26 PM ^
Sure - but scheduling OOC games is ultimately a negotiation where the other side's concerns typically need to be considered.
As I said - I'm not sure why Michigan agreed to the October 26 date. It's fine for ND to say "September 2019 is a no-go for us to visit AA." Michigan should then say "OK, October and November are no-goes for us. So 2019 is a no-go as a whole. What other years can you come to AA and play in September?"
Michigan still had a credible OOC foe (Arkansas) on the 2018/2019 schedules at the time, so they weren't negotiating from a position of weakness. I found it strange U-M agreed to the 10/26 date, could have either pushed for another year or walked away.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:01 AM ^
We have all three rivals at home plus Iowa this year...what are you bitching about exactly?
January 8th, 2019 at 11:03 AM ^
It's obvious we should only schedule football games as home games. No away games ever. I'll get Warde on the phone.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:07 AM ^
I'm bitching about scheduling that challenges our depth, depletes us before stretch run and consistently leaves us more wounded and exhausted by OSU then vice versa. OSU coasts in non conf next year, will be dominate in their EASY big ten schedule at home (do travel to Nebraska) and once again same old dang narrative for us. 10-3 or 9-3 and national narrative matters and this is all self inflicted.
January 8th, 2019 at 11:46 AM ^
Are you speaking as someone who will be buying season tickets this year and who will go to see those games?
Or are you speaking as someone who looks at college football as an extension of your NFL fantasy team, and the important thing is getting to the playoff?
January 8th, 2019 at 12:06 PM ^
Cool. What do you think of Clemson and Alabama scheduling tough OOC games each year and having the depth to go the distance?
January 8th, 2019 at 9:02 PM ^
Are you speaking of The Citadel?