Wolverine Blues
Mods, please feel free to slide this over to a thread you feel is more appropriate...
Bob Wojnowski
A little luck never hurt, right?
Well unless you're the Wolverines, who've been on the wrong side of some Irish charm in recent years.
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ANN ARBOR -- If you see a Michigan football fan today, you should give him a hug, as long as you don't wrinkle his cashmere sweater.
These are tough times for the Wolverines, whose bitter rivals are getting all the attention amid grumblings that maybe Michigan has slipped, that maybe it isn't so high and mighty, that maybe Notre Dame and Ohio State and Iowa and Southern Cal and West Virginia and Florida State and Grand Valley State and the Minnesota Twins and the Detroit Shock are more title-worthy.
This is the toughest week for the Wolverines. It also happens to be the week that can change everything and restore the luster, if Michigan can solve one teensy-weensy little problem. Hint: It rhymes with Gloater Shame.
Yep. It's that time of year when all of the Wolverines' hopes and dreams and flimsy offensive playbooks are loaded onto a bus and shipped to South Bend, Ind., where no matter how overrated, overhyped, overblown, overwrought and ridiculously lucky the Fighting Irish might be, they always make Michigan's athletic supporters tighten, if you get my meaning.
This is the game college football fans love, and Michigan fans dread. When the 11th-ranked Wolverines (2-0) meet the second-ranked Irish (2-0) on Saturday, more than national acclaim will be at stake.
For instance, NBC is expected to stop the game midway through the second quarter to present Irish quarterback Brady Quinn with the Heisman Trophy. Also, in keeping with its high standards of objective coverage, the cloying, blubbering network hand-picked by Notre Dame will air a scathing halftime report on the guy who cuts Charlie Weis' hair.
Back? Or blue?
Michigan has bigger things to worry about. The program is going through a bit of an identity crisis. It seems no one's sure anymore whether to identify the Wolverines as "great" or "great in their own delusional minds."
Last year they were 7-5, which technically is listed in Michigan's record book as "bleepin' awful." So Lloyd Carr dumped some assistants (true), reemphasized the running game (true), demanded all road games be cancelled (not completely true) and suggested Notre Dame's campus be paved over and turned into an IKEA store (that's what I heard).
Michigan has lost three of the last four to the Irish and hasn't won in South Bend since 1994. It hasn't won its road opener since 1999. Fans are grimacing and squirming and making strange noises, and not just because of the pregame chili.
We all know how it works. Lose to Notre Dame and the grumbles grow. Beat Notre Dame and the national title is assured!
In Ann Arbor, the players swear they don't fear the Notre Dame mystique.
"I definitely don't believe in ghosts," Michigan safety Jamar Adams said. "They're a very, very, very talented team, but we are also. This isn't Goliath fighting David. This is Goliath fighting Goliath."
(Not to sling stones at a fine analogy, but wasn't Goliath the biggest choker in the ancient world? Wasn't Goliath so confident and smug that he figured he was unbeatable, that no one else mattered, that he should be guaranteed national TV appearances and major bowl bids every single year? Hmm. Maybe a perfect analogy after all.)
Where's the love?
Listen. It's much too strong to say Michigan and Notre Dame hate each other. It's more accurate to say they openly, pathologically despise each other.
"I don't want to start anything, but I don't like anything about Notre Dame," Michigan defensive tackle Alan Branch said. "When I was growing up, we didn't have cable, so the only game we saw was Notre Dame on NBC. We just got tired of 'em, I guess."
Even former coach Bo Schembechler has campaigned for Notre Dame to be dropped from the schedule, and I don't think it's because of Michigan's recent stumbles. I think it's because when the Big Ten graciously invited Notre Dame to join the conference, the Irish laughed and laughed until mucous bubbles came out of their noses. Then they dabbed their eyes with $100 bills from NBC.
Notre Dame might be the only program in America that can outarrogant Michigan. We're forever bombarded with the Irish legends, including the weepy tale of "Rudy," some pipsqueak who actually got into a game, probably a loss to Michigan State. (Note: The week after the Wolverines stumble to the Irish, the Spartans almost always beat the Irish. This is considered extremely amusing.)
The Wolverines and Irish are the two winningest programs in college football history, but Notre Dame lore gets all the attention, from Knute Rockne to the Golden Dome to eight straight bowl losses and general irrelevance most of the past decade.
That started to change when Weis arrived last year amid such fanfare, a proposal to give "Touchdown Jesus" a Weis-like crewcut was narrowly defeated. Weis is a big deal there. Actually, he's a big deal anywhere, except perhaps at a sumo convention. That's a cheap shot, and in the interest of fair play, I'll point out Carr's saggy countenance reminds some of famed cartoon character actor Droopy Dawg.
For the Wolverines to get out of this Droopy Dawg phase, they'll have to defy history and crack a Leprechaun or two. They can start by barreling over that creepy little mascot during pregame warm-ups.
Odd, bad things happen to Michigan against Notre Dame. Star tailback Mike Hart left last year's game with a pulled hamstring and the Irish hung on, thanks to Chad Henne's fumble on Notre Dame's 1.5-inch line.
In 1989, Raghib "Rocket" Ismail returned two kicks for touchdowns, a wimpy way to win a football game, in my opinion. And no one can forget the 1988 classic, when some tiny kicker named Reggie "Don't Call Me Don" Ho booted four field goals to edge Michigan 19-17.
I can say with complete confidence the Wolverines have a decent chance to win this game because their defense is very good. I also can say with complete confidence that if it's close, Notre Dame will find some magically delicious way to squeak out a miraculous win that will spawn an eight-part NBC mini-series. John Goodman will play Weis, I'm told.
Pick: Notre Dame 22-19
