8A - The Michigan Daily - Thursday, September 14, 2006
® FOOTBALL
H amilton's kick spoils
Powlus's comeback
By Brett Forrest
Sept. 12, 1994 M ICHIGAN VS.
SOUTH BEND - It was the NOTRE DAME
first last minute, game-winning
field goal in the Ron Powlus Era. W EEK
The game marked the first field-
rushing by fans in the Ron Powlus All week long, Daily Sports will run After defeating Notre Dame, 26-24,
Era. It was also the first time an its original coverage of one of the Michigan finished a disappointing 8-
injured Irish player was basket-car- 33 games in the historical series 4 on the year.
ried off the field by his teammates between the NCAA's two winningest We've also included a column from
in the Ron Powlus Era. programs. then-Daily Sports Writer Michael
But most importantly, it was The series continues today with Rosenberg, who now writes a column
Notre Dame's first defeat in the Ron coverage from the 1994 season. for the Detroit Free Press.
Powlus Era. In what was supposed
to be Ron Powlus's coronation as Notre Dame 42. and former Michigan kicker Mike
the next great Notre Dame (1-1) Collins rifled one to wide receiv- Gillette, Hamilton walked onto
quarterback, an anonymous Michi- er Seth Smith down to the 33-yard the field and readied for the most
gan (2-0) placekicker rained on the line. Time out Michigan, its last. charged moment of his life.
parade. On the following play, as the The timeout appeared to calm
One of college football's great- clock crept under ten seconds, Irish things down for Michigan, allowing
est games perhaps ever - in one of outside linebacker Bert Berry pres- the unit to prepare.
college football's greatest rivalries sured Collins to the edge of the "(Notre Dame) did us a favor
- was decided in the last minute at pocket. With Berry's arms wrapped (by calling the timeout);" Hamilton
Notre Dame Stadium. around his waist and his knee inch- said. "Thanks Lou (Holtz)"
Michigan 26, Notre Dame 24. es from the midfield turf, Collins With Riemersma holding, Ham-
And Remy Hamilton became the lofted the ball to Smith again, who ilton booted the ball through the
latest kicker-turned-big name in the lunged out of bounds at the 24-yard uprights for his fourth field goal of
Irish-Wolverines conflict. Michigan line with seven seconds left. the day with room and height to
now leads the all-time series, 15-10- Michigan coach Gary Moeller spare. There were just 2 seconds
1. then sent in Hamilton for a 42-yard remaining on the clock.
With 2:08 leftlin the game and his field goal attempt. "I'm sure I won't appreciate this
team down six points, Powlus (15- Before Saturday's game, the until I'm older" Hamilton said fol-
27, 187 yards and two touchdowns) sophomore had just one field goal lowing the game.
led a fateful touchdown drive that hit attempt under his collegiate belt. Following a mobbing of the
paydirt with just 52 ticks on the sta- One attempt: And that was against field by Wolverine fans, Hamilton
dium clock. It seemed as if another Minnesota. squibbed the kickoff to Notre Dame
typically fortunate Irish finale was Notre Dame is not Minnesota. tight end Pete Chryplewicz and the
being scripted by its newest golden- "After Notre Dame scored, I game was in the books.
domer boy. didn't think we had enough time to Michigan placed itself in dire
But Michigan quarterback Todd come back," Hamilton said. "But straights prior to Hamilton's hero-
Collins (21-29 for 224 yards and the guys on the sidelines told me we ics. Thanks to a Powlus fumbled
one touchdown) and the rest of the had 52 seconds and to get ready for snap that was recovered by Michi-
Wolverines offense had other plans. a field goal" gan linebacker Steve Morrison, the
Gaining possession of the ball on its As he stepped into position with Wolverines had the ball at the Notre
own 17-yard line with just 46 sec- the play clock in single digits, it Dame 34 with 4:35 to go in the
onds to go in the fourth quarter, just seemed as if Hamilton may have fourth quarter.
one timeout left and down by one to rush the play. But the Irish called Up by three points, Michigan
point, Michigan did the impossible. a timeout. Trying to psyche out the tried to pound the ball into the
"We worked on our hurry-up kid? endzone on the ground and put the
offense quite a bit in practice," "We got fouled up on thinking game out of reach, running tailback
Collins said. "I had confidence we that we had 12 men on the field," Tshimanga Biakabutuka on five
could score" Notre Dame coach Lou Holtz said. successive plays. On third down and
Collins first scrambled for 15 "It was not an attempt to ice (Ham- five at the Irish 13, the sophomore
yards to the Michigan 32. He then ilton)." was stuffed and Hamilton put his
hit tight end Jay Riemersma for 26 After being pumped up by team up six.
yards down the middle. Ball on the injured wide receiver Walter Smith See IRISH, page 11A
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Forget the Irish -mystique*
By Michael Rosenberg
Sept. 12, 1994
SOUTH BEND - Memo to the
mystique-makers who document
the luck of the Irish: There's another
chapter you might want to add to
your next volume. A big one. About
42 yards long. It's got all the ele-
ments of all the great Notre Dame
folklore. The tight game. The adver-
sity to overcome. The player with no
confidence getting inspired by one
of his predecessors. The comeback.
Best of all, it came in the annual
game between Michigan and Notre
Dame, one of the biggest rivalries in
the nation.
One small problem. You know the
Wolverines? Yeah. They won.
Oh, where to begin? We'll skip
the details of the first three quarters,
because those are not the moments
that will be repeated to our grand-
children, who often get bored of such
talk.
"Get to the good part, Grandpa;'
we can hear them saying. "Also,
wipe the drool off your wheelchair."
OK. The good part's coming. But,
for the record, let history note that
for 45 minutes in South Bend, on the
second Saturday in September, 1994,
the Michigan Wolverines and Notre
Dame Fighting Irish played some of
the most intense, physical, open-field
tackling, tight, spiral-throwing, quar-
terback-chasing, fingernail-chewing,
chess move-making football anyone
has ever seen - even on the hal-
lowed grass of Notre Dame Stadium
- and that when the final gun was
fired to end the third quarter, the
scoreboard read: Michigan 20, Notre
Dame 17.
But that, as they say in all those
volumes of previous Notre Dame
folklore, was just the beginning.
The teams went back and forth
in the fourth quarter until Michigan
finally managed to kick a field goal.
Wolverine fans celebrated. How
naive. The field goal gave Michigan
a six point lead with 2:08 to go,
which gave Notre Dame freshman
Ron Powlus a chance to march his .
team downfield and score the win-
ning touchdown and then get carried
off the field by several thousand joy-
ous NBC executives.
Powlus proceeded to lead the
Fighting Irish straight into Michigan
territory, a textbook Notre Dame
comeback. This should surprise
none of you Irish mystique-iakers,
because you guys are always talking
about how Notre Dame players carry
textbooks with them everywhere,
even to football games, in case they
should, for example, want to study
during halftime.
At this point it was obvious to
everyone that Notre Dame was going
to win, and Powlus's pretty pass to
flanker Derrick Mayes was regarded
as a mere formality. The extra point
gave the Fighting Irish a 24-23 lead.
Wow. This Powlus kid learns quick.
Too quick, as it turns out, because
the kid left 52 seconds on the clock
for Michigan to work with, and in
football, as in economics class, 52
seconds, can seem like forever.
Collins answered Powlus, driving
the Wolverines downfield. ake that,
freshman. Suddenly Michigan had
the ball on Notre Dame's 33, with
time for just one play to get them
into field goal range.
Just minutes earlier, not far fro
this very spot, Collins had been hit
from behind and fumbled the ball
over to Notre Dame. It was the kind
of play that players replay in their
minds again and again if they lose.
From the start, the play did not
look good for Michigan. Collins
was immediately flushed out of the
pocket. Fighting Irish linebacker
Bert Berry decided that Collins
would look much nicer with his head
embedded in the field, and grabbed
the quarterback by the jersey. As he
was pulled down, Collins somehow
completed a pass to Seth Smith,
who scrambled for nine yards before
diving out of bounds. There, Collins
had done his part.
Now all Michigan needed was a
42-yard field goal. From a guy who,
until Saturday, had only made one
field goal in his career.
It would have been great if Remy
Hamilton had just kicked the win-
ning field goal. People would be
talking about it for ages, like they
talk about eh Four Horsemen and
George Gipp and Joe Montana's
Cotton Bowl comeback, about how
Hamilton was an untested player
who came through in the clutch.
But you know how these legends
are. You always need to keep tug-
ging at the heartstrings.
So it wasn't enough that Hamilton
kicked the winning field goal. You
also have to bring up that since com-
ing to school he had been injured,
frustrated and had lost confidence in
himself. He was thinking of transfer-
ring.
"You have to realize where this
See ROSENBERG, page 11A
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