When All is Said and Done, More is Said Than Done

Sorry I'm going to break you down before we can build this back up.

The Spartan's game winning drive included controversial penaties, game clock fraud, and possibly the most terrible no-call on a holding penalty ever on a play that shouldn't have even occurred. In the end, the Michigan players walked off the field disgusted, cheated, and unsatisfied. Lloyd Carr on Michigan Replay said he expects a call from the Big Ten apologizing for the disgrace.  The horrible thing about it is that it should have never been that close. The Wolverines were out-rushed and basically out-played by their weaker neighbor. TJ Duckett ran for over 200 yards on a defense let up an average of 54 yards for the first 7 games of the season.  - 2001 UMTailgate.com

They wanted it more.  Our young team wasn't rattled by the crowd or foreign field.  They were rattled by a team that knew what this game meant.  A team that was visibly more into this rivalry, and whose passion seemed to grow with every snap.  I could see it.  They celebrated every tackle like it was a touchdown.  Someday, hopefully next year, these young players and this new coach will really understand what this rivalry means...not to us, but to State.  And if we don't drum up some semblance of OUR backs being against the wall to counteract THEIR backs which are ALWAYS up against a wall, it will be tough to compete no matter how much better we are than them position by position. - 2009 UMTailgate.com

That's right, Harbaugh will be here soon enough, wasting talent and flirting with chicks 30 years his junior at Rick's, marching the Wolverines back to high expectations and results that fall below those expectations. - 2010 UMTailgate.com

We were in it to the end, which is to say that Sparty was Sparty enough to keep us in it.  Unfortunately, Sparty was also Wolverine enough, or tough enough, to expose what we are....still mired in a few years of small and fast recruiting, small and fast player development.  We're built for slants and tricks and reads after the snap, but not for fights or wars in the trenches, and little brother proved to be too much on this day.  - 2011 UMTailgate.com

This is a disaster, and this is not a hiccup, it's our reality.  Four games remain.  None look like wins.  The offensive line is not improving, and it's worse than we ever could have imagined.  The season saver at the end of the year with the Buckeyes is so out of the realm of possibility at this point, that I can't even muster the courage to preach the underdog role I loved so much in '95 and '96.  -  2013 UMTailgate.com