Michigan 40, Ohio State 34

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"You see those kids over there?" Brady said pointing at his celebrating seniors who had jumped into the first few rows of the student section. "That's their final legacy."

I've watched that ending a few times now. Still chokes me up. It was an emotional day. It was something I'd been waiting a long time for.

Michigan is back.

Brady didn't cry, but his voice cracked a little more than it usually does, and it reminded me of 1996, when Lloyd's bottom lip wiggled a bit after the Ohio State game. He uttered "It's a player's game, like most of these Ohio State - Michigan games are...and it was won...on the field...by a team that believed that they could win." And win they did, despite being 17-point underdogs that day.

I remember thinking then that Coach Carr really had developed an amazing relationship with these guys, and he was only their head coach for a couple of years. Brady Hoke has been here for 11 months, and the bond he developed with the seniors that he had no hand in recruiting, and had only coached for a few months, was extraordinary.

He is us, we are him. I love him. I love how he coaches. I love his leadership ability and how he does it. I’d do anything for him. - David Molk

It now looks as if he was the perfect hire for the situation. He surrounded himself with the perfect assistants, and most importantly, preached the Michigan tradition so well, that the team forgot it ever did anything but win. This was not the team that lost 22 games in the previous three years. This was THIS team. This was team 132, with navy seal's chains hanging around their necks.

We went through a lot to get here. It's so hard to imagine that less than a year ago I walked out of a bowl game in the 3rd quarter, that a week later I absolutely loathed the hiring of Hoke, that at the spring game I was certain we were in for a year of attempting a vanilla power offense with RichRod's mighty midget recruits.

I was wrong. So very wrong.

Sugar Bowl (likely) bound and ten wins is a big deal. It's even bigger when you've averaged five wins per season over the last three years. Offensively, we took a half step back for the greater good of the future installation of Power and Pocket, but maybe ended up building a better, if not more healthy, Denard. Defensively, we witnessed what has to be the greatest single season turnaround for a team...with nearly identical personnel.

The season wasn't perfect, as no season when little brother beats you is...and there are going to be a lot of questions going into next season. The questions however will pale in comparison to the expectations. Michigan is going to be a top 15 preseason team, top 10 if they win this bowl game. Michigan will likely be picked to win the Big Ten. And there will be a lot of weight on the shoulders of a senior Denard Robinson.

But I have the ultimate confidence in Brady and this staff to manage expectations. I'm done complaining. Sorry I'm so late to the party. Goals will be set. The expectations will be for the position. Hold the rope. Etc, etc, etc....

Just beat Sparty under the lights in 2012.

Fold or Fight

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It's not supposed to be like this. Tuesday is here and I'm uninspired. I've lost some of the faith in a system I believed in. I've cringed at the last few press conferences. Maybe I don't have the stomach to be the last guy flying the "keep Rich Rod" flag. Maybe it's time to move on. What's weird about the whole thing, is that the season has pretty much gone the way I expected it to. But now that it has happened, I feel differently, and I'm not sure why. It might just be that I've seen more losses in these three years than ever before. It might be the way the defense is so perfectly inept, giving up huge chunks of yards on plays that these teams have been running for 30 years. It might have been that 24-0 halftime score on senior day in a newly renovated Big House.

All the discussions this week are centered around the future...the distant future. Will he be back for a 4th year? Will Denard leave with him if he's fired? What if he lets Greg Robinson go...is that enough "quid pro quo" between a head coach and a former player turned AD? And in the midst of all of that, somehow we snake oiled a running back recruit right out from under Notre Dame. Weird.

But there was a time, not so long ago, when this week was about something else. It was at this time of year that I would find myself consumed with hatred. I'd think about the history, the stuff "before my time," like how Woody Hayes went for two because he couldn't go for three. Or when the Big Ten sent Ohio State to the Rose Bowl after the tie game in 1973...and how MSU was the deciding vote in a cowardly secret ballot that Bo would later uncover. Then there were the things I remember first hand, like being disrespected when they made us 17-point underdogs in 1996 (we showed 'em), or when David Boston got in Woodson's face in the '97 game (we showed 'em again). Mistakingly passing through the OSU tailgates while visiting Columbus in 2000 and being pelted with raw hot dogs...having a 80+ year old women flip me off and tell me to "get the fuck out of (her) town" in 2002...that OSU student that attempted to steal my Michigan hat from off of my head in 2004...

Anger. Hatred. Rivalry.

That was then. With each passing year since 2003, I've felt more and more like Andy Dufresne fighting the Sisters. In fact, I can almost hear Morgan Freeman's voice summarizing the next iteration of Michigan-Ohio State:

I wish I could tell you that Michigan fought the good fight, and the Sisters let them be. I wish I could tell you that, but Columbus is no fairy-tale world.

How do I get that fight back? How do I get angry? It's almost sacrilege to ask the question, but....how do I get fired up for Michigan-Ohio State? The residents of Columbus don't even care anymore. They've become downright nice over the past few years. Long gone is the animosity built on ruining their collective lives in '95. '96, and '97, and the times when we considered renting cars in Toledo with Ohio plates to avoid state troopers and increase our chances of survival.

A couple trips back, somebody actually stopped by our car and said "Welcome to Columbus." That's the reality of this rivalry. It's closer to a punchline to anyone under the age of 23.

There is only one way to get that fight back. Strip everything out of the equation...the coaching controversy, the pros and cons of a spread offense in the Big Ten, the 3-3-5 defense, the 2500+ days since we last beat them, the past, the future, that stuffed animal GERG rubbed on Demons...and make it just about Michigan and Ohio State. Winged helmets, white jerseys, and maize pants. Buckeye-laden gray helmets, scarlet jerseys, and gray pants. Us. Them.

Winning may not fix everything, but it will fix Saturday. And for now, that has to be enough.

GO BLUE!

The Buckeyes? They're Doing Everything I Want to Do

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Let me make a short list...

1) Played a home at home with Texas in football

2) Played a home at home with USC in football

3) Won "the game" 6 consecutive times

4) Has a modern day "fab 5" (really 6) recruiting class coming in for hoops next year...and they don't even need it (BTW...66-55, Buckeyes over Michigan in hoops this afternoon)

5) And finally, the game I wanted, in the venue I wanted, has been scheduled for the team that I hate.  The Buckeyes will return the home at home to Navy in Baltimore to open the 2014 season...at M&T Bank Stadium, the home of the Baltimore Ravens.

Lost in all this Rodriguez talk, in the idiotic NCAA investigation, and the lack of wins around here, is that we have a serious deficiency in COOL SHIT.  Cool shit creates a buzz, which makes people take notice of your program, which makes future recruits buy your hats and baggy shorts when they're 8 years old, virtually locking them in and creating recruiting classes 10 years in advance.

Somebody call Dave Brandon, and tell him that we need to fix Michigan Athletics the way he fixed the pizza at Dominos.  I'm sick of the bland taste and the cardboard crust.  Like it or not, Rich Rodriguez is the new spicy sauce...and that's why I want to keep him around, why I want him to succeed.  Throwing out the metaphors, I don't want to be scared to schedule a west coast road trip, or to agree to a home at home with a decent team.