The Heart Of Saturday Night Comment Count

Brian

10/11/2014 – Michigan 18, Penn State 13 – 3-4, 1-2 Big Ten

OONTS OONTS OONTS OONTS

Songs designed for da club have one over-arching theme: tonight. Buy another drink, raise it to the sky. The OONTS OONTS commands you. Feel the beat. The beat is inside you. Tonight is going to be a good night, says the worst song ever written. The people around you accept this and so do you. Your sky-drink is empty. You are commanded to buy another. The OONTS OONTS doesn't care if you vote or do your homework or wake up tomorrow with a gremlin jackhammering at your temple. It commands you to see only what is in front of you now.

What is in front of us now is a lady named Victory. She is… well… she's a little ragged. Makeup's smeared; eyes are a little twitchy; you don't want to know the Vegas over/under on how many times she will throw up in the cab. Because she will do that, in the cab. Because there is going to be a cab.

Tonight, we go home with Victory.

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Michigan put it all aside. There is no one to credit here; I found out a long time ago that pushing large groups of people in a direction is impossible. To lead is to find yourself at the head of a tidal wave hoping it won't notice your tiny course corrections. The people are the direction.

And except for a third of the student section that was momentarily absent because of malice or apathy—impossible to tell—the people showed up, were as into it as can be expected of people watching two cows rub against each other threateningly, and were happy to win.

After the game a section in the south endzone unfurled a section-wide FIRE BRANDON banner; that was about right. Michigan fans have for the most part held their fire on players, held their fire for the portions of games in which Michigan can win. When things get out of hand or are just intolerably incompetent on the staff's part, they let their feelings be known. They have in fact been as good as an enormous amorphous mass of pissed-off people can be at aiming before firing.

They're still mad, because they should be. This kind of win over this kind of team is just more of the same, and the athletic director's futile gestures towards humanity are the definition of too little, too late. But tonight is tonight and tomorrow can be dealt with later.

---------------------------

Devin Gardner put it all aside. A guy who'd been moved to wide receiver because the coaching staff thought more highly of Russell Bellomy. A guy whose ribs are a fine paste after last year. A guy who got benched for Shane Morris because the coaches had lost faith in him. There is a guy to credit here.

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He's going to be a footnote, now, no question. All hopes and dreams of being a towering colossus have fled. He won't have Navarre's redemption story, and unless something deeply bizarre happens he won't have an OSU win. Ten years down the road mention Devin Gardner and most Michigan fans will wince involuntarily and offer sympathy.

This is especially cruel on the heels of his predecessor. Denard was a tragic hero but he got his OSU win, his BCS bowl, and anyone still trying to be disappointed with him after what happened when he left is certifiable. Ask a Michigan fan about him in ten years and it's different. A lot different.

But that's tomorrow, and tonight the guy who's had his leadership questioned since he arrived is going full Novak on his sideline to WIN THIS FUCKING GAME. He limped out on the field because that's just what he does. Probably can't even throw right unless several different areas of his body are telling him to go to the spa immediately. Rod Gilmore's screaming that he shouldn't be in the game because Rod Gilmore is incapable of telling a head from a leg—not that we are at all surprised by this revelation—and Devin Gardner is just like I put my heart in this shit.

-----------------------

Heart only gets you so far. It gets you to a narrow win over a Penn State team starting a broken vacuum and a Teddy Roosevelt biography at guard. We appear to have a vicious all-day hangover scheduled in two weeks. But that's for tomorrow.

Tonight, we are in a cab and squinting and feeling pretty okay, because we've got something to hang on to.

Awards

DEVIN GARDNER I PUT MY HEART IN THIS SHIT POINTS OF THE WEEK.

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1: Devin Gardner.
2: Dennis Norfleet.
3: Devin Gardner again.

[After THE JUMP: don't start thinking about tomorrow. Oh no we did.]

Offense

Okay here we have to downshift into tomorrow mode. Sorry.

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[Eric Upchurch]

Your safety was not that helpful. Michigan's touchdown was fortunate. Great play by Funchess to go get that ball, yes, and you may as well punt it up to him even when he's double covered because what else is going to work.

That particular punt should not have worked. Penn State's safety drifted back and tried to catch it in his chest, as if he was fielding a punt. A semi-competent guy at least steps in front to break it up and it looks like if he high-points the ball he's definitely picking it off.

Funchess did make an awesome catch, though, reaching those enormous arms out—possible the safety didn't think he had a play on the ball at all, because many humans would not have. Funchess 2014 == Jacob Trouba 2011-12.

I don't know what I expected dot gif. Michigan's ground game came up against one of the best rushing defenses in the country and went splat. The only run longer than ten yards was a 25-yard Gardner zone read at the beginning of the second half; Dennis Norfleet's single run for three yards was the most productive output of the night. At least they didn't end up with –48 yards?

I think I'm serious about that. When Michigan faced the best rush defense in the country last year they were over 100 yards worse, sacks inclusive. When you go from completely awful to mediocre at best it kind of looks like this.

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[Eric Upchurch]

Darboh rising. Darboh had four catches for 66 yards, which is a big chunk of the total production on the night from everybody. There was one bad drop in there but he also showed off some skills against a decent secondary for the first time.

Gardner was actually pretty good. He was 16/24 with two clear drops from Funchess and Darboh and hit 8.0 YPA despite that; the interception was bad but I think that you've got to put at least some of the blame there on either the play design or the OL because that DE has to be cut to the ground or otherwise dealt with.

Is this really all I have to say? Uh… it appears so. Nature of the game.

Defense

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[Bryan Fuller]

I will wave the tiny flag. A dominating performance against a team that is hard not to dominate. This is where I'd say something like "I haven't seen an offensive line that bad since…" but of course I have. I haven't seen a line that bad since 2013, and it lived in Ann Arbor.

It's good they comprehensively smashed them; it means that Hackenberg was not able to fire his first read in rhythm time and again. That's progress. How it will last against teams that can have a gameplan other than zero faith in the OL I don't know.

Breaking 'Berg. Did anyone else detect signs of Gardner 2013 syndrome in Christian Hackenberg?  It may not have been easy to see on TV, but Penn State was seemingly in give-up-and-fade mode for much of the second half. Michigan—specifically Jourdan Lewis—played these pretty well; Hackenberg would give up on that route and either go try to find another or bug out because he thought his line was going to crumble.

Neither one of these things went well*. Hackenberg is no Gardner at the beheaded chicken stuff, and he was generally right about his line. So what do you do in that situation? Punt it up to that fade. The back shoulder's there, and if you do get it picked off you've avoided a sack and a 30 yard punt.

*[Except once in the second half when Hackenberg lasered out a corner route for 17 yards, causing some guy behind me to exclaim "HOW CAN HE BE THAT OPEN" at Penn State's first downfield completion in about 30 minutes of game time.]

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[Bryan Fuller]

Don't confirmation bias this one. The Penn State touchdown did happen to come against the guy Blake Countess was in coverage on, but it was in no way Countess's fault. Hackenberg had forever for once, Countess was in the guy's pocket, and the throw was the NFL bullet Hack pulls out every once in a while to remind you that it's not his fault.

No DTs? Late on someone noticed that Willie Henry was wearing a cast on his hand, which is probably a result of his sack against Minnesota when his thumb got caught in the QB's helmet. Ryan Glasgow's absence was more mysterious. He's been one of Michigan's best defenders this year and he did play some late (reports that he was getting in during the first half are probably people mistaking Godin for him because the numbers on the jerseys were hard to distinguish). The injury that holds a guy out until sparing snaps in the second half on which he plays well is a weird one indeed.

A wild Gedeon appears. Oddly, Michigan has dropped linebacker rotation to zero after Desmond Morgan's injury. It's odd because Michigan did a reasonable amount of rotation last year with Ben Gedeon and now he's gone. I think the sack he got early may have been his first meaningful snap of the year. And then he went away.

Miscellaneous

Correlation is causation. Ever since Brady Hoke got super paranoid about injuries, Michigan has suffered more of them than anyone in the country. Chesson and Khalid Hill joined the infinite list of walking wounded, with Hill out for the season. The clear move is to be a open about your injuries as possible, because then you won't have them anymore. #science

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WAT U DOIN [Bryan Fuller]

Oh God, the timeouts. You think there's no way to top Brady Hoke taking timeout with three seconds left in the half, sending his punt return team out, and then having to hurry them off when Penn State shockingly goes for the Hail Mary. And then James Franklin takes one

  1. down three points with under two minutes on the clock
  2. with the clock running
  3. with three seconds on the playclock
  4. from his own one
  5. so he can tell his team to take a safety.

And then you find out that it is possible to top giving the opponent a free shot at the endzone.

Actually… did that top the Hoke timeout? The only thing that makes sense there is that Franklin was actually intending to punt on fourth and 31 when that would just about end the game and then either he or someone else on the sideline figured that a safety was their best bet. And I can understand why your game theory competence doesn't extend to that fringe situation.

Meanwhile literally every coach in the country has been on a team when they run the first-half playclock down to three and taken timeout so they can run a Hail Mary. It's close, at least. /waves tiniest of all flags

We won a puntwar. There were only four second-half plays of consequence: the Hackenberg interception, the Norfleet catch, and two shanked Penn State punts. Chris Gulla had back-to-back 26 and 29 yard punts into the sideline, giving Michigan the multiple cracks at drives starting in Penn State territory they needed to get the ball in field goal range.

It's 1950, you decide like it's 1950. After the Hackenberg interception, Michigan rolled Bellomy onto the field to go run-run-yikes-field goal and I was fine with that. I would have been fine with run-run-run-field goal, because when your teams are combining for 250 fewer yards than Baylor got against TCU your decision matrix should tilt towards fear.

1950 decisions weren't wrong in 1950, and this was a 1950 game. Which brings us to James Franklin's insane fake punt that put a guy in motion (HI PAY ATTENTION TO ME) on fourth and eleven. On the Michigan 37 the opposition is going to be looking for a fake, too. You have two options there: go or punt. They're not good options, but move that Hackenberg interception up 17-30 yards and Michigan has to punt it back after going three and out with Bellomy on the field.

Punting was in fact winning, and once we stepped through the time portal there was nothing conservative enough to draw ire from me.

Band. Best show since half of 'em became the Titanic and half an iceberg and they sunk the Titanic.

So hooray for that.

Uniformz. Not that you're surprised by this take but bleah. Number legibility issues (hard to distinguish between 6, 8, and 9), the racing stripes thing made them look like bicyclists wearing reflective tape, and all blue isn't as good as the maize and blue contrast.

They looked worse than Michigan's standard uniforms. Everything does, yes. This is why I'm generally opposed to uniformz.

Reflol. It's not often that both teams assume a call is going to be overturned before it actually comes down, but the Penn State offense and Michigan defense were waiting at the previous line of scrimmage for a good minute before the refs indicated that the "fumble return touchdown" Jourdan Lewis snagged was the world's most obvious incompletion.

For the rest of the game, any ball on the ground was pounced on; I'm surprised no one leap on the ball after the ref spotted it.

Can you imagine what would have happened in State College if that had not been overturned? By now they'd be trying to burn the cows because everything else is ash. I only root for hilarious injustices like that against Penn State.

HILARIOUS INJUSTICE. There were a bevy of competing screenshots in the aftermath of the offsides call on Penn State's recovered onside kick, one of which barely had one Penn State guy's helmet on the 20 yard line:

offside_1.0[1]

any part of you intersecting the plane of the ball is offsides

That's close, so it's perfect: a 50/50 call that is unlikely to change the outcome of the game that makes Penn State fans collapse into a frothing lather, made by the Witvoet crew. And then Witvoet took two seconds off the clock, because f--- you that's why.

TrollrefMuschamp[1]

HERE

Best And Worst:

I don't need to go into the gory details about Gardner's time at UM; you've heard these stories numerous times before, "hot takes" about his failings and odes to his greatness are legion in these parts:  He's a winner except when he's throwing crippling INTs or struggling to hold onto the ball under intense pressure, or a maddeningly inconsistent QB who never learned how to play the position due to a revolving-door of disinterested/ill-equipped offensive coaches and whose success typically comes from being a better athlete than the guys chasing him and/or a healthy bit of luck sprinkled with defensive incompetence.  He's off-the-charts when it comes to feelingsball and playing hurt, but through 7 games this year he's throwing more INTs (8) than TDs (6), and his team is 3-4 with one semi-competent win.  He's everything you want in a QB but with just enough rough edges and blemishes that you can't enjoy it.  He can wear whatever hat you want, can both prove and invalidate any argument, and at all times fit into a narrative without being attached to it.  Heck, against Miami I called him "Chaotic Neutral", and even now I'm not sure if that should be considered a compliment or a condemnation; it's probably just a statement of fact.

Inside The Box Score:

Allow me to share my "cool story bro" story. Back when I was a student at UofM, I gave a paper at the Materials Research Society Meeting in Boston. This meeting had somewhere around 30 parallel sessions going on at the same time (hence, the word parallel.) Some of the more popular topics, like silicon, were granted the larger meeting rooms. Folks like myself who were studying compound semiconductors (like indium phosphide) got to speak in a closet in front of 15-20 people.

At this conference, I overheard talk that Shuji Nakamura was giving an invited talk. He is one of the three fellows who just won the Nobel Prize. So I wandered over to that session's conference room. It was a little larger than a closet, but the interest was extraordinary for a compound semiconductor talk. I'm talking standing room only at a technical conference. This guy was already a rock star.

This was over 20 years ago, when gallium arsenide was still regarded as the technology of the future ("...and always will be" is how that joke finished up.) Now, everyone's phone has a GaAs power amp and gallium nitride based blue LEDs are ubiquitous. At that time, no one thought a blue LED was possible because the defect density in gallium nitride materials was extreme, and defects cause non-radiative recombination, etc. So halfway through the talk, Nakamura pulled out an array of green LEDs (the pre-cursor to today's blue LEDs) and powered them up.

The brightness was more intense than anyone thought possible. The audience was shocked, awed, and amazed. He explained how they were motivated to generate all LED traffic signals, and the green LED was the only thing missing. I had a feeling I was witnessing the future. And now, more than 20 years later, Nakamura has rightly earned his Nobel Prize. I was a witness to this due to my attending the University of Michigan. Damn right, I'm proud to be a Michigan Wolverine.

What, you didn't expect to hear a story about LEDs?

ELSEWHERE

I'm late today so I'll round it up later.

Comments

Njia

October 13th, 2014 at 1:51 PM ^

Michigan's all-time record with my daughter in the stands. I think the team needs to offer her lifetime season tickets on the house and name her an honorary co-captain.

umumum

October 13th, 2014 at 3:32 PM ^

1.  her record depends a bit on the opponents we faced in the games she attended

2.  there was a time that wouldn't have been special--at least for the home schedule.

That said, don't take any chances--she must hereafter attend all games--home and away.

s/

matty blue

October 13th, 2014 at 1:52 PM ^

the other thing about the way-too-long replay?  rod gilmore saying at LEAST six times that yes, that was indeed an incompletion.  sweet christ, we can all see the goddamn thing, we don't need you to keep talking about it.  find something interesting to disc...uh...oh, hell.  never mind.

CompleteLunacy

October 13th, 2014 at 2:11 PM ^

I'm sorry, but the timeout from Franklin in the 4th quarter was objectively worse than Hoke's timeout at halftime, and it's not even close. The decision is OBVIOUSLY PUNT THE BALL because you are not converting 4th and 32 from the 1 yard line. The timeout saved all of one yard and more or less forced them into a situation where they needed an onside kick recovery AND a touchdown...rather than a defensive 3-and-out with 2 timeouts to burn clock and a drive for just a field goal to tie.

Also it seems to me that Penn State's decision to throw a hail mary there is arguably as risky as Hoke's decision to force Penn State to run another play (what if Hackenburg had fumbled the ball, or thrown an interception that got returned for a TD?). In the end nothing remotely terrible came of it anyway.  I was definitely confused by it at the time...but I think it was just some gamesmanship, that's all. Is there a little bit of confirmation bias going on here? Because now it seems like any decision Hoke makes is automatically the wrong one just because.

Space Coyote

October 13th, 2014 at 2:24 PM ^

That while Hackenburg probably has a strong enough arm to cover that distance if he can step into it cleanly (~65 yard throw), he doesn't have an OL that can protect him from not getting sacked, let alone throwing the ball cleanly. I honestly thought PSU was going to take a snap and run around for three seconds and then just go down and was surprised they'd put their QB in a position where he was very likely to get sacked (very long developing play with an awful OL).

I probably wouldn't call that TO (I'd probably let the clock run out, calling a TO earlier might see PSU go for it and now you're looking at a decent chance at giving up points), but I thought Franklin's choice of throwing a Hail Mary was more risky than the possible reward.

matty blue

October 13th, 2014 at 3:26 PM ^

there's not really any risk in trying a hail-mary, right?

i mean, i guess we're going to argue every single opinion, but i can't think of a single time that a hail mary attempt went bad in a game-changing way, and i mean ever.  if you can point out an exception, i'll shut up on this, but let's be serious here.  there are very, very few coaches who wouldn't at least fire it at the end zone with a guy who can get it there.

Space Coyote

October 13th, 2014 at 3:30 PM ^

PSU can't, as was evident by the entire game, including that play, which ended in a sack. Running 4 guys deep on a very long developing play and leaving yourself with an immodilbe QB, 5 OL, and maybe a RB vs a potential strip sack or a hit while throwing into the waiting arms of a LB is, IMO, as big a risk in that situation as a hail mary would be for Michigan.

Would you trust Michigan to throw a hail mary from their own 40 last year without giving up a sack and potentially a fumble that could go for a scoop and score? I wouldn't. PSU's OL is Michigan's 2013 OL without Lewan essentially, so yes, it is a risk. Not likely a huge one, but at least as big of a risk as Hoke was taking by facing a Hail Mary.

Space Coyote

October 13th, 2014 at 3:48 PM ^

That with Hoke calling a TO with three seconds left, he put himself in a position where there was a very, very low risk of it resulting in points for PSU. By PSU actually running a Hail Mary, they put themselves in likely an almost equal risk of giving up a TD on a turnover. Both risks were quite minor, which is why the thing to probably do is just let the clock run out (the biggest risk, in this case, is a potential injury on an odd end-of-half play). This wasn't a play from Michigan's 40, mind you, this was a play from the PSU 39 yard line. In a straight line, Hack would have had to buy time and make a 61 yard throw to make it into the end zone, that's a really long throw in a game situation. Again, very low risk, and with probably a negligible difference as the risk by going for that Hail Mary.

Contrast that, where Franklin allowed the clock to run for 37 seconds, down 3 points with two TOs remaining and 2 minutes remaining, so he could call a TO and save half a yard. Were they likely going to punt in that situation and that's why he called a TO? Probably. But one is an extremely low risk, one forced PSU to recover an onside kick and drive 70 yards for a TD with one TO remaining. One was 99.9% likely to have no impact on the game either way, one had a major impact on the likely outcome of the game.

Space Coyote

October 13th, 2014 at 5:01 PM ^

Having wasted 37 valuable seconds and a TO to come to that decision, at that point, taking the safety became the correct call. If he would have punted right away or taken a safety right away, he would have been in significantly better position to win the game. What happened isn't really the worst thing ever either, but it did in fact have a major impact on the game, whether PSU recovered the kick or not. Hoke's TO was very unlikely to make any significant impact on the game one way or another.

DowntownLJB

October 13th, 2014 at 6:05 PM ^

but taking the delay of game penalty instead of burning the time out would've cost them what, half a yard in distance for the snap?  and could've still given them time to discuss taking the safety.  maybe there's not another way to get your snapper's (or kicker's) attention to not run a play they're already set for though?

matty blue

October 13th, 2014 at 8:39 PM ^

the chances of penn state giving up a touchdown on a turnover in that situation are vanishingly small to the point of impossibility, and you know it.  

i'll re-ask my question - have you ever, even once, heard of the offensive team giving up a defensive touchdown in that situation?  nope.

i'll ask a couple more - did you say "oh boy, penn state is going to try a hail mary"?  of course you didn't.  what do you think greg mattison was thinking about that play?  think he was excited that he had to defend one more play before halftime?  of course he wasn't.

michclub19

October 13th, 2014 at 2:36 PM ^

From those defending Hoke's timeout, explain to me why he should have waited until 3 seconds to call that timeout instead of at 18 seconds when the play ended?  A punt return touchdown is much more likely than a pick-6, and we could have had 1 or 2 plays to try to get into FG position (albeit unlikely).  The issue was not so much him calling the TO.  It was waiting to do so until Penn St had the lowest risk of Michigan scoring.

CompleteLunacy

October 13th, 2014 at 2:50 PM ^

Personally, Hoke should have just let the clock run out, or yeah, taken the timeout with at least 10 seconds on the clock to give Penn State less incentive to run a hail mary and risk handing the ball to Michigan with time on the clock.

But I'm just saying it's not the worst decision of the game, and that it's nowhere near the worst decision of the game from either coach. And honetsly, it's nowhere near the worst decision Hoke has made this year. So I'm going to cut Hoke a little slack for something that really wasn't nearly as bad or "incorrect" as some are making it out to be.

michclub19

October 13th, 2014 at 3:17 PM ^

Seems like we're in agreement here.  Franklin's burning his second timeout to set up(?) a safety was definitely worse.  While it was on the very outskirts of game theory I have to believe game theory also says save your timeout in case you don't recover the onside kick.

My concern is it seems it was a decision that was not thought through.  Almost as if he was going to let the clock run out until some on the sideline said, "Coach, it's 4th down.  Make them punt."  At which point he immediately called timeout without realizing so much time had gone that Penn St could run an offensive play.  Making rash decisions is not a great strategy as a head coach.

Erik_in_Dayton

October 13th, 2014 at 2:49 PM ^

It was terrible.  They weren't hurrying (as they'd shown they could do earlier in the game) and let the play clock get to single digits at least once.  And then they didn't have the punt team ready to run onto the field and kick ASAP when Hackenberg was sacked.  As you say, they could have given the ball to Michigan at the 45 or so with roughly 2:00 left and still had two timeouts remaining.  You need a three-and-out, but do that and you've got the ball back with a minute-plus left only down by three.  PSU scored a touchdown against Michigan in roughly a minute - with no timeouts - at the end of the game last year.

MI Expat NY

October 13th, 2014 at 4:14 PM ^

I agree, that was a mind-munbingly stupid timeout.  Some PSU people were saying he needed the timeout to confirm you could onside a kick after a safety, but that doesn't make any sense.  If they had had their punt team ready to go or had just taken the penalty, they wouldn't have needed the onside kick because they would have had two timeouts.  If they're on top of things, they should have punted with 2:00 on the clock.  With two timeouts, we would have been looking at kicking with 1:00 to go.  Now, what were better odds?  Stopping a Michigan offense that couldn't move the ball, probably getting a touchback, and going 50 yards in 50 seconds for a game-tying FG or recovering an onside kick, going 70 yards for a TD with 90 seconds left and one timeout?  I think that the former was the more likely scenario to give PSU a chance (and that doesn't include stuff that could happen like a muffed punt, a fumble, a blocked punt, a punt return for a TD).

Hoke's problem with the timeout was waiting too long.  If he thought the chance something goes right and we get a TD off of a punt return or a blocked punt outweighed the chance something went wrong such as a muffed punt, ruffing the kicker, etc. then call it earlier.  Otherwise eat the timeout and go to half.  

petered0518

October 13th, 2014 at 6:32 PM ^

On one hand, yes the Franklin timeout was worse on the surface. EXCEPT, if the PSU staff called a regular punt originally and the players weren't looking to the sideline since they already had the play call.  In that case, the timeout is actually necessary since PSU couldn't afford to kick it off at that time.

Still terrible communication but at least there is a scenario where a timeout is needed.

BlueGoM

October 13th, 2014 at 2:16 PM ^

"So hooray for that."

Come on, man.  Come on.

Mr. Cook's negativity is just getting a bit too much.   Last two games the team showed signs of a pulse, which to me means they'll at least have a chance to win down the road.

The time for negativity will be when Gardner isn't yelling on the sidelines and when Norfleet isn't dancing.

 

ST3

October 13th, 2014 at 4:17 PM ^

I mentioned a time when I saw the future (green LEDs). The other time was at Michigan when I walked into a grad student office and a couple students were browsing for porn using Netscape 0.0 beta version. They definitely realized the potential of a good browser...

BlueGoM

October 13th, 2014 at 2:43 PM ^

I did read the whole thing, and I came away with an impression that you were overall negative about the team  and the events of the evening in general.  Your "So hooray for that." comment about the band also gives me that impression - not that you are critical of the band or something but seemed like you were saying that was one of the lone bright spots of the evening.  They did win the game, afterall.  The defense played well.  The patient has a pulse.

 

 

umumum

October 13th, 2014 at 3:42 PM ^

we are more likely not to win another game than to defeat MSU or OSU.  That doesn't mean won't beat Indiana, Northwestern or Maryland--or at least some combination of them.  But Penn State was awful--really awful.  So that win at home, under the lights with an announced full house must be kept in perspective.  

 

m1jjb00

October 13th, 2014 at 2:28 PM ^

1.  We won because we were even in turnovers and outplayed them on special teams---the latter not because of what we did, but what they did or failed to do.  Weird.

2.  I'd be careful about making judgments about the offsides given the picture above or any that I've seen.  Recall, PD Toussaint's fumble against OSU that I and everyone else swore could not possibly have been a fumble because it was already a touchdown.  Well sophisticated analysis that only this blog and its contributors could provide showed that it was indeed a fumble.  

westwardwolverine

October 13th, 2014 at 3:10 PM ^

Watched the game at a bar in Northern Michigan. Great atmosphere and the place went nuts after the sacks on PSU's final drive. Really happy for the players and even the coaches. Hoke needed that one. 

I'm also glad that this game finally answered the question of "What would happen if if 2014 Michigan played 2013 Michigan?"