MICHIGAN VS. EVERYBODY: NEBRASKA

 @ NEBRASKA

Saturday, September 30, 2023

Crinkly leaves blew on the sidewalk, making scraping sounds that were audible in the silence of pre-coffee Uptown on a Saturday morning. The weather app on my phone said it was already 82 degrees, pretty hot for early morning and pretty hot for the last day of September. Despite the Indian Summer weather, however, the grass at Mueller Park remained wet from heavy rains that fell in the preceding week, forcing me to forego my usual spot on the grassy hill in favor of a picnic table. I set my canvas tote bag down on the bench of the table and read a few pages of Misery by Stephen King, smoking a pair of Marlboro Lights while I did so. I was still unwinding from a particularly stressful Friday at work. Actually, it had been more than stressful. In the middle of the school day, just after lunch, a teacher from another room came into my classroom to inform my coteacher and me that a rogue tow truck driver was towing vehicles from the parking lot the school shared with the bank next door. I hadn't parked in one of the bank's designated spots, so I wasn't worried; as a matter of fact I had parked in the same unmarked spot every day for more than a year. Then the teacher came back to report that the towing predator had towed away my coteacher's vehicle and was in the process of towing mine. As I discovered later, towing from these spots constituted a violation of Minnesota state law, which requires a tow company to give 24 hours before towing cars from private but deceptively unmarked parking spots. I burst into the parking lot when the bastard had my car halfway up on the tow truck. I confronted him right there, pointing out his own stupid logic: "look at the private parking spots. They have signs. This one doesn't." 

"You're a teacher?" he smirked. "You're an angry teacher. I'd hate to have you as mine." That ticked me off. "And?" I replied. "You drive a tow truck for a living." "I've been doing this for 40 years," he bragged, as if that were some sort of accomplishment. "Doing a lot of good for the community, huh?" I responded sarcastically. He refused to let my car down, knowing he had a payday in it. Sweet capitalism. Even though the owner of my school paid for the towing expenses, the confrontation left me angry and flustered, so much so that I found our towing hero's name and called him up that night to ask if he followed Minnesota state laws in the course of his job. "I'm looking at the statute right now," I told him, "I wonder what the authorities would think of your practices." All things considered, I was looking forward to a full day of college football, knowing it'd help me push the incident and the negative emotions conjured by it out of mind.

Around ten I went back to my apartment to catch the last hour of Fox's Big Noon Kickoff Preview Show. Urban Meyer, Brady Quinn, Matt Leinart, and gang broadcasted live from Boulder, Colorado for the second time in three weeks. This time, the Sanders family took on eighth-ranked USC in a Pac-12 clash, one that had lost some of its luster after Oregon routed Colorado the week prior. Were the Buffaloes pretenders? That appeared to be the case early on; Caleb Williams and the Trojans raced to a blitzkrieg 21-0 start, silencing the Folsom crowd. Williams looked like the frontrunner to repeat as Heisman Trophy winner; he threw the ball all over the field against the Buffaloes' depleted secondary, putting up video game numbers. In total, he threw for 403 yards and 6 touchdowns on the day. Neither team played much defense for that matter. At the half, USC led 34-14. 

Third quarter action saw USC pad their lead with another couple of touchdowns. Their team down 48-21, at that point, many of the Colorado fans started making their way to the exits at Folsom. Yet Shedeur Sanders fought on, to his credit, demonstrating his mettle by leading a furious fourth quarter rally and nearly pulling off the unbelievable. He threw for three touchdown passes in the final sixteen minutes of the game, all of them unanswered scores. The third of those, a sixteen-yard pass to Jimmy Horn Jr., made it a one-score game with USC leading 48-41, but only 1:45 remained in the game. With no timeouts left, Coach Prime had no choice but to try for an onside kick. He sent out kicker Jace Feely, the son of legendary Michigan kicker Jay Feely, to do the job, but Colorado's magic ran dry then and there. USC fielded it clean, then ran out the clock to avoid an epic collapse. Lincoln Riley's Trojans stayed unbeaten through five games, putting them squarely in contention for the College Football Playoff. Colorado, on the other hand, suddenly fell to 3-2 on the season despite Shedeur Sanders' heroics.

Elsewhere in early games around the college football universe, Kentucky licked #22 Florida 33-14 at Kroger Field in Lexington. Not far outside Chicago, a scandal-tarnished Northwestern team looked to play spoiler when they hosted #13 Penn State at Ryan Field. To their credit, the Wildcats fought the Nittany Lions to a stalemate in the first half; the teams went into the locker rooms at half tied 10-10, a shocker of a halftime score that necessitated changing the channel to check the game out. Naturally. I pulled for Northwestern, the underdog, but Penn State imposed their will in the second half. The Nittany Lions outscored the Wildcats 31-3 after halftime, giving James Franklin's squad a 41-13 victory that kept them undefeated through their first five contests. Penn State hosted U-Mass next in a tune-up game before they traveled to Columbus for a showdown with Ohio State, one ripe with Big Ten title ramifications for both schools.

Michigan played next in the 2:30 CT time slot, having traveled to Nebraska for their first road test of the season. Forever Michigan's enemy for taking a claim of the 1997 National Championship, Nebraska entered the contest with a middling record of 2-2, having lost back-to-back games to Minnesota (on a last-second field goal) and Colorado to start the season, Nebraska's first under Matt Ruhle after the school parted ways with Scott Frost in 2022. Ruhle was a good get for the Huskers, who have been mired in mediocrity pretty much since their glory years under Tom Osborn, but the back-to-back losses in Ruhle's first two games at the helm demonstrated that the rebuild would take time. Vegas listed Michigan as a 17-point favorite on the road. 

At kickoff, the broadcast team reported, the temperature in Lincoln, Nebraska was 93 degrees. That qualified as the hottest starting temperature for a game at Nebraska's Memorial Stadium since 1985, when Florida State visited in early September of that year for a battle of eighties powerhouses. The heat only worsened throughout the day, with temperatures reaching 96 by mid-game.

Michigan started with possession of the ball, and JJ McCarthy wasted no time marching his offense down the field. The drive lasted over five minutes, covering 75 yards in 11 plays. JJ capped the drive with a 29-yard touchdown pass to Roman Wilson, who made a circus catch sure to be added to the season highlight reel. Wilson, standing near the back of the endzone, reached over the head and shoulders of Huskers defender Isaac Gifford to catch the slightly underthrown pass, pinning the ball against Gifford's back to maintain possession as he fell out of bounds. Even the referee seemed mesmerized, incredulous, delaying a call for several seconds before putting his hands in the air to signal touchdown. The roar of a sellout crowd of 87,000 plus (Nebraska's 392nd straight sellout) quieted to a murmur as James Turner booted the extra point, giving the visitors an early 7-0 advantage. 

Nebraska's response fell flat, and fast. Their opening possession started from the 25-yard line after Tommy Doman kicked the ball into the endzone for a touchback, but it didn't last long. On first and 10, Huskers running back Anthony Grant took a handoff and ran for one yard. Then on 2nd and 9, quarterback Heinrich Haarberg, who started the season as a tight end but switched back to quarterback after QB1 Jeff Sims suffered an injury in the loss to Colorado, attempted his first pass of the game. Braiden McGregor, Michigan's 6'6 end from Port Huron, put up his right fist and deflected the pass, batting it up. Tracking the ball's trajectory was big boy Kenneth Grant, a 339-pounder from Indiana, who cradled the ball as it fell into his paws for his first career interception. 

Grant's interception gave Michigan the ball at Nebraska's 29-yard line. They capitalized quickly, needing only three plays for the score. Corum ran on the first play for 4 yards, then on the second for 5 yards. On 3rd and 1, JJ handed the ball to Kalel Mullings, who broke free for his first touchdown of the season, a 20-yard scamper that put the Wolverines ahead 14-0. 

Nebraska put together a nice little drive with their second possession, pushing the ball into the red zone before Jesse Minter's defense tightened and forced a 4th down and 1 at the 12. Ruhle, the first-year coach looking for a statement win, rolled the dice, calling for a quarterback sneak a la the Philadelphia Eagles' "tush-push." It failed. Michigan's defensive front stuffed Haarberg, forcing a turnover on downs; at that point, it was still the first quarter, but the turnover on downs felt like a death knell for the Huskers' hopes of making it a competitive game. 

By halftime, Michigan had scored touchdowns on 4 of its 5 possessions (JJ scored the team's third touchdown on a 21-yard quarterback scamper, then connected with Wilson again with only 23 seconds left in the first half for the team's fourth TD). Accounting for three of those four touchdowns, McCarthy looked as sharp as he had all season, slinging the ball with zip and accuracy. The Wolverines led 28-0 going into the locker rooms. The deficit and the sweltering heat convinced many Huskers fans to head for the exits early, such that by the time the second half started, Memorial Stadium appeared half-empty. Wake them up when volleyball season starts, I guess.

That 28-point halftime lead felt so comfortable that Mom, Dad, Kate, and Jim Racine took the boat out on Little Crooked Lake; via text, I received a picture of them seated on the pontoon boat with a caption that said "Go Blue! Halftime score calls for a boat ride." They looked great. It made me miss them dearly. I utilized the break at half to walk back to the park to read some more of Misery and smoke another heater.

Nonetheless Nebraska refused to quit. Getting the ball to start the half, the Cornhuskers kicked off the third quarter with their biggest offensive play of the game theretofore, a 56-yard pass from Haarberg to Marcus Washington that gave them a first and ten at the Michigan 19. It gave the loyal fans remaining in attendance at Memorial Stadium something to cheer for, at least, but it proved fruitless ultimately. Nebraska's offense sputtered in the red zone. Then Braiden McGregor recorded a big sack of Haarberg on 3rd down and 7, forcing a field goal attempt on 4th and 14 that the Nebraska kicker proceeded to shank. McCarthy then finished his day by leading the offense on another patented Michigan drive that ate up a big chunk of the clock and wore down the opposing defense; this one chewed up nearly six minutes, covering 78 yards in 11 plays. This time, Blake Corum finished the drive, hammering it home from the one-yard line to keep his touchdown-per-game streak alive. 

Backups started easing into the game for the Wolverines with the score out of reach. Jack Tuttle replaced McCarthy at quarterback midway through the third, leading an impressive drive of his own that resulted in a 30-yard field goal. That pushed the lead to 38. At this point, I briefly switched channels to check in on the Georgia versus Auburn game, which I'd read was 17-10 Auburn, this a major upset alert. By the time I switched channels, though, the mighty Bulldogs had reclaimed the lead 20-17. I switched back to FOX to find a quarterback named Jayden Denegal commanding the Michigan offense. Denegal is a black quarterback from California who wore Harbaugh's old number 4 jersey, but other than that I knew little about him. Apparently, he can throw laser beams, though. He demonstrated as much on his only passing attempt of the game, a frozen rope to Peyton O'Leary in the endzone for Michigan's sixth touchdown of the game. 

Following O'Leary's touchdown reception, Michigan led 45-0 with only four minutes left. Their flirtation with a shutout ended when Joshua Fleeks broke free for a 74-yard touchdown run against Michigan's backups, but such trivial accomplishments mattered not a bit to Michigan's players and coaches, who had larger goals in mind. The 45-7 thrashing of Nebraska constituted business as usual for Team 144. Next on the schedule was a night game in my neck of the woods, a clash in Minneapolis for the Little Brown Jug. I'd been looking forward to that one for some time, as Al had plane tickets booked to come visit for the game. 

Saturday's evening slate of games provided more exhilaration. Nearing sundown, sixty-six thousand liquored-up Southerners stumbled from The Grove to Vaught-Hemingway Stadium in Oxford, Mississippi, where they packed the seats to cheer on Lane Kiffin and the 4-1 Rebels against 3-1 LSU. The Bayou Tigers took a two-score lead with only eight minutes left in the game, going up 49-40 on a 34-yard touchdown pass from Jayden Daniels to Brian Thomas Jr. (Daniels' fifth touchdown of the night), but in a game that saw little defense, Ole Miss clawed back. Quarterback Jaxson Dart, who accounted for 5 TD's of his own, led the Rebels on two touchdown drives in the final eight minutes for a comeback victory. The overdressed drunks stormed the field when time expired, sending Brian Kelly and his LSU Tigers back to Louisiana on a hot seat. 

ESPN's College Gameday visited Durham, North Carolina for a showdown between Duke and Notre Dame under the lights. Notre Dame squandered a thirteen-point halftime lead -- Duke took a 14-13 lead in the fourth quarter -- before QB Sam Hartman led the Irish 95 yards down the field in the final minute. Audric Estime scored the winning touchdown for the Fighting Irish.

In the Big Ten, Michigan State gave Iowa a dogfight at Kinnick Stadium, making me wonder how in the world Hawkeyes fans tolerate such mediocrity year after year. Former Michigan quarterback Cade MacNamara injured his leg in the first half and exited the field on a cart, granted, but I expected Iowa to roll a decimated program at home with or without a QB1. That just wasn't the case. Iowa's offense looked anemic. Sparty actually led 16-13 in the third quarter before Iowa regained their composure, scoring 13 unanswered points in the fourth for a 26-16 victory. 

I went to bed by 10:30, Saturday night. Early Sunday morning, Jacksonville and Atlanta squared off at London's Wembley Stadium. ESPN+ carried two broadcast options, the first being your standard NFL broadcast. The second, produced by Disney+, was a "kid's" version of the game, with live action animated gameplay taking place on the floor of Andy from Toy Story's bedroom. The first such I of its kind, I found the Toy Story broadcast entertaining, at least in small doses. It was tailored for kids, obviously, but I found it also worked for adults who may or may not have had two THC gummies for breakfast. When that game ended, I packed a sandwhich lunch and set off on foot for Lake of the Isles, where I read and worked on some writing while listening to the Vikings game on my little portable radio.