2015 northwestern

Previously in this series covering the 2010s: Favorite Blocks, QB-RB-WR, TE-FB-OL, Defensive Line, Linebacker, Secondary, Worst Calls, and Dumbest Plays so might as well do the flipside.

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10. Martin and Van Bergen, Coaches at Large

2012 SUGAR BOWL

Football hmmm… [Eric Upchurch]

The press got word after the 2011 Ohio State game that senior DTs Ryan Van Bergen and Mike Martin had been given the green light by their coaches to make the line calls for each play, including when and how to stunt. That in itself wasn’t highly remarkable; the modern Michigan equivalent of RVB’s position, the Anchor, makes line calls for the defense today. The reason it goes down in the lore of these guys is they got so good at it.

They were also the two who lined up and dove into the A gaps to stop VT’s hurry-up 4th and 1 sneak, called the slant that got Frank Clark in to intercept a screen pass, and the slant that got Jake Ryan inside the tackle then chasing inside out on the ensuing rollouts. RVB was doing it on a broken foot too.

-Seth

[After THE JUMP: Glasgows be here]

[Bryan Fuller]

When you get a prompt this good, you use it.

@AceAnbender can we have a special "A Look Back" GIF History section this week of different times Pat Fitzgerald has gotten ostentatiously and annoyingly pumped up in Michigan games he then lost in extremely sad-trombone fashion

— Ben Mathis-Lilley (@BenMathisLilley) October 1, 2018

As we've covered this week, Pat Fitzgerald has everything going for him to be difficult to dislike—local kid returns to alma mater in time of turmoil, runs a program that's historically bad, is funny and charming in press conferences when he's not saying batshit stuff about RPOs and communism, etc.—and yet, when you see him on the opposing sideline, it becomes pretty easy to find the guy obnoxious.

The feeling can be acute when Northwestern is unexpectedly winning and Fitzgerald goes full-blown cheerleader. Which is fine. It's fine. I'm not mad. This didn't bother me at all after one of the more miserable opening quarters in recent memory.

Definitely not mad, he said, while squeezing the remote until the battery case snaps.

Anyway, we never have to stay mad at Fitz for long, because his teams always find a way to gack it away to Michigan, usually in exceedingly comical/painful fashion.

[After THE JUMP, one man's emotional rollercoaster.]

[Upchurch/MGoBlog]

You’re excused if you had to rub your eyes and check the scoreboard to see if it really happened. Joe Kerridge is no stranger to big plays, but having them come on offense instead of special teams is novel. That’s not a condemnation of his talent, but rather a reminder that before this season these things just did not happen. Harbaugh called it heartwarming to see a fullback so productive; I call it fun. This offense may not be in the upper echelon yet, but it hasn’t taken that to befuddle opponents weekly. Northwestern stacked the box; the deep safety was eight yards off the line of scrimmage, and Kerridge busted through the line and ran past the edge defender- to the inside, no less!- before that guy even thought about the possibility of a fullback roaring past him.

The annular path of the day necessarily led back to more fun, with the game ending on the “defense” chant Brian already touched on. He talked about the pin-pricks on your scalp and the willful repression of suddenly building tears; you could feel that chant in your bones. It was the first time I’ve felt a true sense of unity with 110,000+ people in I don’t even know how long. Up in the press box we’re supposed to be isolated from that; the goal is to create a working environment, and while the free wi-fi and lack of line for the bathroom is great, the sacrifice is being able to get a good feel for the stadium environment. Not so at that moment. The chant clawed its way up the massive glass panels and poured in through the few open windows, the little rectangular ports of entry for external emotion. It enveloped us quickly and quietly, and in that moment I knew that even if things go south at some point this year we’ll have an emotional anchor to fall back on, our first real “remember when…” moment of the Harbaugh era.

Right now, though, there are no indicators that things are going to head south. Bill Connelly’s statistical profile projects Michigan as the winner of every remaining game. The offense, to borrow a favorite term of Jim Harbaugh’s, is ascending. The defense is ranked first nationally in S&P+. Some of the stats from both last week and cumulatively are, frankly, drool worthy. Statistics, like the press box, are designed to fuel orderly and controlled analysis. At least, that’s how they work in theory. Last Saturday was a different story.

[After THE JUMP: I’m running out of ways to hedge on this defense]