Overwhelming a hapless MAC school in the second half of a game is sorta fun, but few left Michigan Stadium Saturday with a new opinion on the direction of this team. Many of the empty seats will be occupied next Saturday when Utah visits you can bet. To the Sights and Sounds:
Big Jon – Always great to see Jon Falk in the house – even if it is upstairs on not on the sideline:
Pomp: Several items out there Saturday:
SSB? – The band celebrated the 200th year of the writing of the Star Spangled Banner. Nerd nit: And 200 years later the scoreboard doesn’t show the proper punctuation when they display the lyrics to the song. At half the band either spelled out LIBERTY or LETHARGY, it wasn’t clear from on high. Nevertheless, here’s Big house the beautiful pregame:
Not from THERE. Miami band displayed a “NOT COLUMBUS” banner on the opening number before playing THE VICTORS. Pandering? Guilty. Do I Love it? Guilty.
Capacity – Two minutes before kickoff, sparse in the student section and the unsold whatever-we-call-it section just north of the students:
Booing – There were some loud BOOs in the 2nd quarter and the crowd was obviously frustrated. I’m not a big BOO-bird when given the opportunity, and no, I’d never boo college players. That said, to those holier-than-thou fans are chiming in criticizing the boo-birds, I’ll say this: the BOOing wasn’t directed at the players—it was directed at the coaching staff.
Media: Many of you surely know that Marcus Ray was in the booth doing the color for BTN. Here’s how he looked before the game (looking tight, Rock!):
My highly scientific twitter poll in-game and post-game gave Marcus a hearty thumbs up and naturally some snark:
Mood Update: The Mood Index, the metric attempting to gauge how great it truly is to be a Michigan Wolverine. Eenced & weenced up thanks to Butt. Still not good. Suddenly Utah is a big game:
Uniform Update: Nothing of note this week, but here’s a close-up of the bedazzled RedHawk headgear:
Uniform Timeline here.
History Notes – via #1000SSS:
• Michigan has won 17 straight non-conference home games, the second-longest active streak in the Big Ten. The Wolverines have won 19 straight September home games. Hoke improved to 11-0 against non-conference opponents in Michigan Stadium and 13-5 (.722) in all non-conference matchups as the Wolverines’ head coach.
• Michigan’s game captains were junior linebacker Joe Bolden, fifth-year senior guard Joey Burzynski, senior/junior defensive lineman Alex Mitropoulos-Rundus and junior wide receiver Dennis Norfleet.
• U-M hosted several commemorative events in honor of Military Appreciation Day, including a pregame moment of silence, a 21-gun salute conducted by the Washtenaw Honor Guard, an appearance from Challenger — an American bald eagle — and a flyover conducted by five L-39 Albatros aircrafts from the Black Diamond Jet Team. The Wolverines also recognized veterans Ken Weinert and Robert Fletcher.
• Michigan improved to 10-for-10 in the red zone this season and has scored touchdowns on 8-of-10 trips inside the 20-yard line (.800)
M Blogs Killing it:
mgoblog :
After Michigan tried to run a quick play on fourth-and-1, only for Miami to call a timeout before the snap, Brady Hoke decided to punt on 4th-and-6 from the Miami 37 when the Wolverines took a delay of game penalty coming out of that timeout. The decison [sic] to punt was so surprising Miami didn’t put out a returner, then called a timeout of the “you can’t be serious” variety. Finally, U-M took another delay of game to give Will Hagerup more room to boom a punt that hit the end zone on the fly.* Insert giant red “WTF” flag here.
Maize and Blue Nation:
..maybe football is just a weird sport sometimes and things don’t always go the way you want. When you have a 2nd quarter like Michigan did, its easy to second guess everything and everyone.
After Miami scored to make the game a 10-10 tie, Michigan responded by scoring 24 unanswered points. Yeah, Michigan was a 30+ point favorite…and for most of the game, they played like it. I guess I chose to focus on the positive here, but Michigan did what they were supposed to do to a team like Miami (not that Miami).
Maize N Brew
Maize & Blue News – Video: Players discuss win over Miami (Ohio)
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