UMxWolverines

November 2nd, 2015 at 12:41 AM ^

I don't remember what book it was but there was a story about Michigan fans that went to Champaign and after the game one of the guys went into the port-o-poty and some Illinois fans started shaking it so he got shit all over his shoes and pants. Then they put an apple in their tailpipe. Sounds like they're some angry little people.

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BlueinLansing

November 2nd, 2015 at 2:01 AM ^

only from Illinois perspective.  I've never been treated so rudely in my life as when I went to Champaigne many years ago to watch Michigan.

 

In college my hall mate convinced me to tag along with him because Illinois-Michigan was a great rivalry (he was an Illini fan).  I sat and listened to him for hours on the drive about how this was such a big game for the Illini every year.  I was just perplexed because even when Illinois is good at football there are at least 6 other Big Ten programs I want Michigan to beat more than Illinois and that's not even counting Notre Dame years.

 

 

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gwkrlghl

November 2nd, 2015 at 5:27 AM ^

Did one of you just add this?

 

The relationship between the two programs is one of the best examples of an asymmetric rivalry. For folks in Illinois, it is one of the premier matchups on the schedule every year it occurs; for players and fans in Michigan, it is "rarely treated as a special game"..

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flashOverride

November 2nd, 2015 at 6:15 AM ^

We really shouldn't be so disparaging, we should be honored. There are plenty of other teams, one whose name escapes me but is very near geographically, who would kill to have someone, anyone, consider them their biggest rival. 

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jsimms

November 2nd, 2015 at 8:16 AM ^

michigan has played illinois 94 times, more than any other team except minny, michigan state, and ohio state

plus as other people have pointed out, the "teach-em-a-lesson-for-moeller-and-we-hate-mike-white" games;  the mid-eighties games [great goalline stand led by hammerstein, field goal block by heren to save a tie, etc.,] , games agqainst red grange [ok, that's long ago, but still....]

anyway, i think that there is a good argument that through modern realignments, scheduling, etc., that by not playing a team like illinois that we have played since almost forever, that we are losing more than we are gaining

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snarling wolverine

November 2nd, 2015 at 9:27 AM ^

Apparently it was considered a rivalry at one time, hence the annual games. But that time ended many years ago. Aside from the period when Bo was pissed off at them, it hasn't registered on our side of things. The fact that we haven't been in their division in either version of the B1G realignment (Legends/Leaders and East/West) - and that no one has seemingly cared about this - says it all. Some rivalries are lasting and some come and go. At this point I think PSU is probably the next biggest game after OSU and MSU.

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Yeoman

November 2nd, 2015 at 9:27 AM ^

  1. Ohio State 111
  2. Michigan State 107
  3. Minnesota 101
  4. Illinois 94
  5. Northwestern 73
  6. Wisconsin 64
  7. Indiana 63
  8. Iowa 59
  9. Purdue 58
  10. Notre Dame 42

Those are our rivals. There's a century of memories and shared history with those ten schools that we don't have with anyone else.

(Next on the list are Case and Chicago. I still think Chicago's a bigger rival than Rutgers.)

 

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jabberwock

November 2nd, 2015 at 8:46 AM ^

We should invite them for a new, bigger, better than ever Under The Lights game where we will unveil the "Rivals Trophy" for the first time.

Then the night of the game lock the doors to the big house & yell PSYCH!

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Yeoman

November 2nd, 2015 at 9:15 AM ^

...but Bo was angry at Illinois for their shabby treatment of Moeller and he absolutely loathed Mike White. He took visible pleasure running up the score on them in '81--it was quite un-Bo-like but completely understandable.

Rivalry isn't quite the right word for it but that was a red-letter game in the '80s.

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GoBlue74

November 2nd, 2015 at 9:39 AM ^

I did my undergrad at Michigan and my grad at Illinois so I felt today was a perfect day to sign up after seeing this thread.

The hatred for Michigan began in earnest back in '89 when Michigan beat Illinois in the Final Four Semi-Final on Sean Higgins' putback at the buzzer. They felt this was their best team ever with future NBA players like Nick Anderson, Kendall Gill and Kenny Battle and were destined to win it all. Hence, the hate.

A guy who owned many of the campus bars in Champaign capitalized on the hate by creating the "Muck Fichigan"/"Ann Arbor is a Whore" t-shirt and essentially invented the "rivalry". This is still the #1 selling shirt on campus.

I went down to Champaign around 2000 for a night game between Michigan and Illinois and thought it was cool that they had these shirts printed up just for this game. I soon realized when I went to grad school there beginning in 2005 that it wasn't just for the game as they were literally everywhere.

I received a lot of dirty looks whenever I wore my Michigan apparel on campus and was told how much they hated "us". I asked around and was told that Illinois doesn't have a natural rival as Northwestern is a private school and not very good at athletics (especially basketball).

I even went as far as to write and be published in their local school paper (The Daily Illini) explaining that it wasn't a rivalry but it is still going strong down in Chambana to this very day. My Illini work colleagues also enjoy talking smack about their hatred for the maize and blue whenever they get a chance. 

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WestQuad

November 2nd, 2015 at 10:13 AM ^

This came up when I was in college and I thought it was strange then.  But, every Big Ten school thinks Michigan is their rival.  My Grandfather and Uncle went to Purdue and I saw a couple of Michigan games at Purdue with my Grandpa.  He said that Purdue hated Michigan the most other than perhaps Indiana (The bucket game) because the fans were so arrogant and were always so drunk.  MSU thinks Michigan is their biggest rival b/c of the in-state thing and recently the little brother thing. Minnesota has the Brown Jug,  Illinois is a rival for whatever reason.  PSU/OSU may be a thing, but with the Manningham game and Lloyd Carr owning PSU, all of the PSU fans I know hate Michigan the most.

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BayWolves

November 2nd, 2015 at 12:23 PM ^

We are the best. OSU and Staee both put winning scores against us on their freaking BOWL RINGS thus watering down the importance of their bowl games, and every team claims a rivalry with us that doesn't exist.!we get all of the attention even though OSU and Staee have dominated us in recent years. It is all because we are the greatest in football history and no matter what our record is everyone has to compare themselves to us. Makes me proud and also makes me laugh at how pathetic these other universities are. We are the leaders and best and always will be in everyone's eyes.



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markusr2007

November 2nd, 2015 at 10:57 AM ^

the flames.

This mgoblog post and subsequent comment thread features a lot of information about Illinois-Michigan, particularly the Gary Moeller era, that the wikipedia page might not contain (yet).

Link: http://mgoblog.com/content/unverified-voracity-kuiper-belt-object

Illinois and Michigan were rivals back in the Red Grange, Tommy Harmon days of the 30s and 40s, as well as the 1950s.

But in more recent years (1980 onward) a lot of the bad blood, IMHO can be laid directly at the feet of two former Illinois ADs Cecil Coleman and Neale Stoner. Combine their allegiances and management styles to Bo's insistence on retaliation to cure all things and boom, hatred and rivalry.

A lot of Michigan fans forget that Bo had never forgiven the Big Ten commissioner, nor Illinois among other BIG schools, for the 1973 Tie-breaker Rose Bowl vote and debacle. Illinois' AD Cecil Coleman voted for Ohio State to play in the 1974 Rose Bowl, not Michigan.  Bo was enraged. He exacted his personal revenge out on the scoreboard for the rest of his career. Illinois only clipped twice (1983 and 1985).  Then there's this old chestnut: 1981 Michigan 70, Illinois 21.  I don't know that there were limits to Bo's anger on this question. In some ways I think that for 20 years Illinois football fans were just an unknowing passenger on the Bo Schembechler Revenge Express. Bo was conductor and engineer and someone always pays when you screw over one of his long-time trusted friends.

 

 

 

 

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JudgeMart

November 2nd, 2015 at 11:21 AM ^

I also attended the infamous 2000 Michigan-Illinois game at their place, the infamous A-Train fumble game.  Other than the typical Sparty and Buckeye fans, it was the worst group of opposing fans I ever saw.  Anyway, the very next day after that game, the Lions happened to be playing the Bears in Soldier Field.  My buddies and I went to that game as well, all of us wearing our Michigan gear.  In the first quarter, a drunken Bears fan and his friends started screaming at us that Michigan should have lost the game the prior evening.   This rant went on until about halftime when I calmly turned around and yelled back: "Your great team gave up over 500 yards yesterday, including over 300 yards rushing.  You didn't deserve to win shit."  He looked at his buddies, and one of them replied: "Yeah, he's right".  Shut them up the rest of the game (which the Lions won, incidentally).

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CTSgoblue

November 2nd, 2015 at 1:58 PM ^

I grew up in Illinois and attended the 1994 & 1995 Illinois-Michigan games since my family had season tickets.  I remember seeing those winged helmets on the field and thinking "I want to go to the school that actually wins."  I also grew up thinking that both Illinois and Michigan hated each other; and when I finally got to Ann Arbor, I was suprised how one-sided it was.

Sometime around my sophomore year at UM, I went down to visit some friends in Champaign for the weekend.  When I went back to my car on Sunday, it had been egged and pissed on and stinkbombed (??? there was something that smelled like a skunk all over my car).  Despite running it through the car wash immediately, some of the smell didn't dissipate until about a week later.

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HailfromChicago

November 2nd, 2015 at 9:43 PM ^

Born and raised in Chicago and know plenty of Illinois grads. They can't explain it either. The "rivalry" will be renewed October 22, 2016 for Homecoming.

And the Wiki page now reads, "The rivalry dates back to 1898 and features one of the most prominent programs..." Nicely done.

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