Florida State 33, Michigan 32
Dalvin Cook lived up to his billing. [Bryan Fuller/MGoBlog]
Sometimes you make it a game despite yourself and the human lightning bolt that is Dalvin Cook and then a freshman receiver who looks like a tight end turns a dumb play into a game-swinging kickoff return and a 5'11" guy beats Jourdan Lewis for a touchdown because sure why not and a series of improbable events occur and a laugher turns into a heartbreaker.
For most of the game, Florida State showed why Michigan is on the wrong side of the playoff bubble. Michigan's offense couldn't overcome a shaky offensive line to put any sort of consistent attack together, mustering only 83 first-half yards. Florida State's couldn't either but for the notable exception of Cook. The future Pro Bowl running back had 141 yards and a score on 16 touches. Nyqwan Murray exploited a busted coverage for a 92-yard touchdown. The rest of the FSU offense had 22 yards on 17 plays. The Seminoles held a 20-6 lead at halftime.
Neither team did much of anything in the third quarter until Kenny Allen, for seemingly the umpteenth time, backed up FSU deep in their own territory with 1:12 left in the quarter. Facing second-and-ten from his own eight-yard line, quarterback Deondre Francois rolled right to escape pressure and threw a pass directly to Mike McCray, who ended his short trip down the sideline with a dive into the end zone to make it 20-15. Michigan had pulled within a score for the first time since the opening quarter, setting up one of the wildest finishes of this college football season.
Chris Evans, flying. [Fuller]
Cook once again pulled the game almost out of reach, breaking a 71-yard run on third-and-22 to set up a three-yard touchdown run by his backup, Jacques Patrick. After the teams traded punts, Wilton Speight capitalized on great field position with a third-and-goal touchdown pass to Khalid Hill. The Wolverines returned to the end zone less than four minutes later, forcing a three-and-out before Chris Evans juke-posterized an FSU safety on a 30-yard touchdown scamper. Before you could say "Captain America," Michigan had taken a 30-27 lead.
The ensuing kickoff looked as innocuous as could be. FSU freshman Keith Gavin fielded Allen's boot a couple yards deep in the end zone, surveyed the field, and paused. In football, when you pause on a kickoff return, you kneel for a touchback. That is the only play. Except for this play. This play, Gavin belatedly took off despite the protestations of fellow return man Kermit Whitfield, burst through a tackle, and was finally dragged down 66 yards later by Jourdan Lewis.
The winning touchdown. [Fuller]
Cook got the Seminoles to the 12-yard line on a screen pass. Two plays later, Murray rose over Lewis to haul in the go-ahead touchdown. As if this game wasn't frantic enough, Michigan blocked the extra point and Josh Metullus, filling in for an injured Jabrill Peppers, brought it all the way back for two points. With 36 seconds left, down a point, Michigan had the opportunity to give this meandering game one final twist.
Instead, the Seminoles held strong, intercepting a desperation fourth-and-ten heave by Speight forced by instant—perhaps too instant—pressure by DeMarcus Walker.
It may be coachspeak cliché, but it's true: Florida State made more plays. The better team, at least tonight, won the game. Cook showed Michigan what they lack: an offensive playmaker that makes opponents sigh with relief every time the ball goes elsewhere. That, or an elite quarterback, can overcome a porous offensive line. The Wolverines had neither.
Maybe next year.
December 31st, 2016 at 12:59 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:14 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 2:03 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 2:10 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 2:51 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 8:56 AM ^
We have an offensive playmaker. He even made a play for a touchdown. His name is Chris Evans. Instead, we tried to get the edge on an athletic defense with Deveon Smith. Brilliant...
December 31st, 2016 at 11:42 AM ^
Evans should have played a lot more all season and in this game.
December 31st, 2016 at 4:24 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:17 AM ^
missing players in the game and one day before the game is completely different than missing in the early season. or before the bowl practice. coach's offensive and denfensive game plan is limited because of that. We are not bama that can reload on the fly. we are far from there yet. still need 2-3 years of recruit to achieve that.
I would argue that the most important player we lost was our LT newsome. Since then our running game has been struggling a lot.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:19 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:31 AM ^
the complete lack of a running game in the 3 losses didn't help. Against FSU the running backs carried the ball 28 times for 88 yds. Before Evans last two carries that was 26 carries for 48 yds. Against OSU, taking out Speights 3 rushing attempts, UM had 40 carries for 108 yds. Against Iowa, taking out Speight's 3 rushing attempts, they had 31 carries for 101 yds.
The complete lack of a running game in the 3 losses was a killer too.
December 31st, 2016 at 2:09 AM ^
Running game was mediocre, sure, but if Todd Collins is our quarterback this season, we're in the playoff.
December 31st, 2016 at 10:16 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 11:25 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 10:47 AM ^
whatever you want but in the 3 losses almost all faucets of the offense were medicore: QB, oline, play calling, etc. It'd be a great feather in the cap to be in the playoffs, the UM oline would probably get destroyed by whoever UM played.
December 31st, 2016 at 5:03 PM ^
Todd Collins would have a serious downgrade in talent around him if he were the QB on the 2016 team. Back in 1993 and 1994 he was handing the ball off to Wheatley, Biakabutuka and Ricky Powers. He was throwing the ball to Derrick Alexander, Amani Toomer and Mercury Hayes, and had guys like Rod Payne, Trezelle Jenkins and Jon Runyan blocking for him. The talent Collins had around him in 1993/94 is/was far, far, far superior to the talent he would have around him on the 2016 offense.
December 31st, 2016 at 3:07 AM ^
pick 6 in the Ohio State game was not on Speight. Smith missed his blocking assignment and Speight got hit as he threw, causing the ball to be underthrown. If Smith gets his assignment correct, Chesson was open on the play behind the defense. The second pick was on Speight. It was a bad read and I believe he had Jake Butt breaking open on a corner route on that play.
There were plenty of throws that went beyond the sticks. Darboh came down just a 1/16th of a butt cheek out of bounds on a long throw and Speight air mailed a couple of others, which is somewhat understandable given the pressure that he was under from the FSU front. The OL was really bad in the first half and better in the second half, though there was still plenty of room for improvement.
In my opinion, it wasn't as much on Speight as it was on the OL. The inability to run the ball, especially to close out games, was a bigger problem.
December 31st, 2016 at 9:18 AM ^
The pick 6 is never blamed on Speight, but I think it should be a little bit. The defender/rusher was coming right at him and he had to have seen him coming. Throw away sooner? Take the sack? Anything was a better option than waiting too long and having the pick 6 be the outcome. It wasn't a blind side hit. It was right in his face and he didn't adjust.
December 31st, 2016 at 11:23 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 8:54 PM ^
was responding to Mgowild's post in which he clearly blamed Speight for the pick 6.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:47 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 6:43 AM ^
January 1st, 2017 at 1:21 PM ^
I'm pretty sure Peppers and Butts injuries were mentioned.........often.
December 31st, 2016 at 8:54 PM ^
Speight missed some throws, but putting it mostly on him is inaccurate. The OL was pretty bad, although they played better in the 2nd half. There are a ton of "if" plays (not going for two in the third quarter, etc.), but at the end of the day Michigan had a chance to win and didn't.
The kicker failed to kick the ball out of the end zone, Jourdan Glasgow missed a tackle on the kick return, and then the defense failed. Jordan Lewis had what appeared to me to be a bad game, maybe his worst, in what has been a stellar career and gave up the game winning TD.
December 31st, 2016 at 2:06 AM ^
How does Hill fair differently on the goalline? The line blew the line call and let a LB have a free run into the backfield. I'll grant you that Hill being closer turns the 4-5 year loss into a 2 yard loss, but the play is blown up either way.
December 31st, 2016 at 2:56 AM ^
agree.
December 31st, 2016 at 7:42 AM ^
Hill was blocking off the right guard, Smith was tackled by a blitz from the left guard hole due to either a missed call by Cole or simply Bredeson not understanding to pick up the LB that was screaming into the hole between him and Cole.
Hill had a shot simply because he would have already been into the line on that play.
December 31st, 2016 at 9:15 AM ^
I don't agree with the idea that FSU playing close to home mattered all that much, but if we are going to start listing missing players going into that game UM was without their starting LT (Newsome) and probably their second-best corner in Clark. And they've had months to compensate for those losses; UM lost two All-Americans in a span of a couple of hours. Timing does matter.
Not having a guy like Cook has always hurt UM; they haven't had a home-run threat running since Denard was back there. Maybe Harris signs with UM and gets some carries, but Dalvin Cook may be the best running back in the country (or at least top-5).
December 31st, 2016 at 12:57 AM ^
their best players but FSU was playing without some of the secondary. Going into the game the thought was we could take advantage of FSU's depleted secondary. FSU's dline and pass rush made sure that wasn't the case.
December 31st, 2016 at 12:58 AM ^
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December 31st, 2016 at 1:02 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:04 AM ^
I think we could have used him on that 3rd and 22 run that went for 70.
We certainly could have used him on the numerous line-drive punts that Lewis went down immediately on.
On offense, I don't know what we had planned for him. If it was just Pepcat zone read plays, it may not have mattered, but with a month off, maybe there would have been more - who knows. I would have liked to have simply used him as a decoy to pull FSU's LBs away.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:14 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 9:41 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:21 AM ^
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December 31st, 2016 at 8:47 AM ^
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December 31st, 2016 at 1:05 AM ^
Without that play, M probably wins.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:32 AM ^
Michigan wins.. microcosm of the final two month.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:12 AM ^
It was nice to see them eventually become stout sans #5, but his absence was MAJOR culprit for the early defensive woes. We had essentially no preparation for his absence and it showed in the busted coverage on that 98-yard touchdown. They did a good job of adjusting as the game went on, but he was likely a critical piece to Don Brown's plan to stop Cook.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:33 AM ^
effect the defense on the busted coverage? He's not usually tasked with coverage responsibilites on outside receivers or deep over the middle.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:50 AM ^
Griese provided the analysis on this after the play - they were in an unusual zone rather than their more typical M2M, and it was likely due to the loss of Peppers that they were changing up their more typical schemes.
December 31st, 2016 at 3:17 AM ^
that was an RPS play. Lewis played a cover 2 zone and expected safety help over the top. The problem was that Michigan had only one deep safety, and he covered the post route by the slot receiver. If the safety had covered the 9 route by the outside receiver, the post route was a TD.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:16 AM ^
December 31st, 2016 at 1:30 AM ^
first quarter that Peppers would have/could have helped at lot with. And our pepcat read-option wasn't working well, but there's no doubt he was very valuable as a decoy and our offense lacked some misdirection/creativity without him.
And as many have mentioned, we lost the game on two big FSU plays? the 3rd and 22 and the 92 yarder. He may have prevented or limited one or both.
December 31st, 2016 at 2:13 AM ^
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December 31st, 2016 at 9:17 AM ^
I actually think not having Peppers on offense hurt in this game; he's the only guy in the backfield with game-breaking speed and elusiveness. Plus, all those line-drive punts caught on the run by Peppers could absolutely have resulted in better field position and, myabe, a quick score.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:32 AM ^
totally meaningless game. It was fun, and we played with heart to fight back into the lead. It looked like it took a quarter for the defense to settle into not playing with Jabrill, but after the 92-yarder, the defense asbolutely dominated other than the crazy Cook 3rd and 22.
I mean, it got the point where their only hope was to just run Francios on designed runs as if he was a wildcat QB because they were eating dirt any any other play...until the game winner. That came out of nowhere but I guess a broken clock is right twice a day. Throw enough of them up there and you'll hit one once in a while.
December 31st, 2016 at 1:37 AM ^
in all caps: GO FUCK YOURSELF.
December 31st, 2016 at 12:52 AM ^
Brian and Ace are such homers.
December 31st, 2016 at 12:53 AM ^
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