2B — November 12, 2018
SportsMonday
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Another Daily road trip
T
he Daily’s sports sec-
tion
takes
road trips.
It’s oddly
part of our
identity.
And
they’re not
normal road
trips, where
you stop
at a hotel
and take it
easy. We’re talking through-
the-night-for-10-hours-back-
from-New-York road trips. The
type of road trips where you
get done writing after a game
and immediately get in a car,
because there’s class or a paper
to make the next day.
We wouldn’t do it if we
didn’t have to, but the budget is
tight, and we apparently don’t
have any alumni at Boeing who
want to donate a plane.
So we drive. And when we
get to games, the adult sports
writers shake their heads and
laugh at our efforts.
That’s especially the case for
a trip like last weekend’s, when
the football beat drove to Pis-
cataway to cover No. 4 Michi-
gan’s game against Rutgers.
About 20 hours on the road
for a game that was all-but-
predetermined.
But The Daily’s sports sec-
tion prides itself on covering
things in person. So, Mark Cal-
cagno, Max Marcovitch, Ethan
Wolfe and I — along with the
two photographers: Alec Cohen
and Ruchita Iyer — crammed
in a rental Dodge Caravan and
took off around 10 a.m. Friday
morning. An experienced crew,
the trip to Rye, N.Y., — where
we were staying the night with
another Daily writer’s parents
— went off without a hitch.
We stopped once for gas at
a small station in rural Penn-
sylvania, where the attendant
pumped our gas for us and
told us to “just use the ladies’
room,” while we were waiting
in line for the restroom. The
local newspaper, The Prog-
ress, had stories
about selfie sta-
tions and leaf
pickup opera-
tions on the
front page.
That was
pretty much it
until Rye, but
the daytime
drives aren’t the
interesting ones
anyway.
We had a
hot dinner and a good night’s
sleep, woke up, watched the
Wolverines beat up the Scarlet
Knights for a few hours, then
wrote our stories and got back
on the road, just over 24 hours
after we had gotten off it.
Mark started
and took the
first tank of gas,
filling back up
at another rural
Pennsylvania
station around
3:30 a.m. Sun-
day. From there,
I took over.
By this point,
I’ve developed
a reputation
for driving the
graveyard shift on road trips.
The next morning I regret
it very much, but during the
drive and with the help of too
much caffeine, I honestly don’t
mind it. There’s something
peaceful about it, and if any-
body’s going to
fall asleep and
crash into a
ditch, it might
as well be the
Managing
Sports Editor.
More than the
actual driving,
though, I think
the affinity for
these road trips
stem from what
you learn about
the people in the car with you,
and the memories that result
from that.
If we didn’t take these road
trips, I wouldn’t have memo-
ries of Mark’s lead foot, Max’s
inability to steer smoothly
through a turn
or Ethan’s crip-
pling carsick-
ness. More
formatively, I
wouldn’t have
the countless
inside jokes to
fondly look back
fondly on.
It seems
weird that these
things come
to mind for
me before the events that we
actually covered. I’ve covered
Jordan Poole’s buzzer beater
and a Final Four and football
games at Notre Dame Stadium,
Spartan Stadium and now,
Highpoint.com Stadium.
Come to think of it, it’s
weird trying to describe any
of these personal memories
shared between a few people.
Perhaps this column was much
better in theory than it was
in practice, but in the dead of
night, with nobody else on the
road and me clinging to my
sanity and the steering wheel
at the same time, I pondered
why we do these drives in the
first place.
Then I looked in the rear-
view mirror, at Mark leaning
on top of Max, both trying
to get a few hours of sleep. I
looked at Ethan, valiantly stay-
ing awake with me and singing
along to the words. I saw Alec
and Ruchita in the backseat,
falling in and out of sleep
but along for the ride. I hope
they’ll remember these dumb
trips affectionately like I do.
Anyways, it’s better than
any exaggerated conclusions
I could have tried to draw
from the football game, which
ultimately went as planned
and told us nothing we didn’t
already know.
We got back to Ann Arbor
after the sun had already risen.
I dropped off Mark then Max
then Ethan. As I pulled up to
Alec and Ruchita’s apartment
building, Ethan texted me that
he forgot his aux cord in the
car. It’s a good thing he did,
because I didn’t know how to
end this column at that time.
But after Alec and Ruchita
got out of the car and I was by
myself again, “Comfortably
Numb” by Pink Floyd came on
shuffle.
I can’t explain, you would
not understand, sings Roger
Waters.
Persak can be reached
at mdpers@umich.edu, on
Twitter at @MikeDPersak or
on Venmo at @Mike-Persak.
ALEC COHEN/Daily
The Michigan Daily’s football beat drove 10 hours to Piscataway for Michigan’s game against Rutgers on Saturday, their longest road trip of the season.
Michigan beats Rutgers, 42-7
PISCATAWAY — For a
fleeting moment, HighPoint.
com stadium broke out into
riotous cheers.
With 39 seconds left in
the first quarter, Rutgers
running back Isaih Pacheco
found a gaping hole through
the teeth of the No. 4
Michigan
football
team’s
No.1-ranked defense — an
accomplishment of its own.
Then he kept running, past
a
flat-footed
secondary
and into the endzone for
an 80-yard touchdown and
the longest rush since the
Scarlet Knights joined the
Big Ten in 2014.
“The immediate response
is we’ve been through a lot
worse,” said junior defensive
end
Rashan
Gary.
“One
touchdown is not gonna hurt
us. We’ve got to get back to
playing football.
“And that’s what we did.”
The
moment
—
an
explosion
of
excitement
from
fans
who
rarely
experience it — faded. It
was
never
Rutgers’
(0-7
Big Ten, 1-9 overall) night,
nor
was
it
supposed
to
be. The Wolverines (7-0,
9-1) eventually settled in
and cruised to a 42-7 win,
spearheaded
by
junior
quarterback Shea Patterson,
who
finished
18-for-27
for 260 yards and three
touchdowns.
“That was a really tough
night to throw the ball.” said
coach Jim Harbaugh about
the playing conditions. “…
He made some throws that
were just unbelievable. Put
it in the right spot, with the
wind blowing and swirling.”
Before Pacheco’s score,
senior running back Karan
Higdon found paydirt first
on a drive featuring five
different ball carriers to give
Michigan the early lead.
On the drive following
the
80-yard
touchdown,
Higdon scored again from
one yard out. Both of the
Wolverines’
touchdowns
could
have
materialized
into longer scores, but wind
and dropped passes kept its
longest play to 16 yards.
That
was
until
the
5:07 mark in the second
quarter.
Secondary
miscommunication allowed
sophomore
wide
receiver
Nico
Collins
to
streak
unchecked
and
open
for
an easy 36-yard toss from
Patterson to bring a 21-7 lead
into halftime.
“It was like, the (defensive
back) passed me off and it
was one-on-one with the
safeties in the middle of the
field, so I thought ‘I’ve got
a chance to make this play,’
” Collins said. “And once he
passed me off I’m like, ‘It’s
just me back here, the safety
is nowhere near here,’ and I
got the ball.”
Rutgers, meanwhile, met
expectations of mediocrity
in the first 30 minutes: no
sacks
or
tackles-for-loss,
cornerback
confusion,
a
shanked punt, zero first-
half passing yards despite
two
completions
and
so
on.
But
the
infrequent
chunk yardage plays and
sluggishness from Michigan
were
enough
to
warrant
praise from Collins.
“They came out and they
were ready to play,” Collins
said. “They had nothing to
lose so they came out there
with a little chip on their
shoulder and try to beat us.
… They came out with their
A-game.”
Then
the
second
half
happened. Both teams and
fanbases probably wish it
hadn’t.
Already
without
safety Josh Metellus and
cornerback Lavert Hill to
respective soft tissue and
head injuries according to
Harbaugh,
the
Michigan
defense saw linemen Kwity
Paye and Josh Uche leave the
field in pain.
And in terms of on-field
excitement, it was few and
far between.
Sparked by a reaching,
21-yard catch by tight end
Zach Gentry on third down,
Michigan
kept
its
first
drive of the half alive. It
culminated with Patterson,
given all day to throw, toying
with the Rutgers defense
on a broken play to find
Oliver Martin for a 16-yard
touchdown.
“The pocket awareness,
finding where the quiet spot
is — he looked as good as he’s
ever looked tonight in the
pocket,” Harbaugh said of
Patterson. “Not panicking,
moving suddenly, getting to
the quiet spot.”
The Scarlet Knights ran
a trick reverse pass later in
the quarter which landed
into the arms of backup
quarterback
Giovanni
Rescigno for 17 yards.
Then
Rutgers
fumbled
the ball away the next play.
Then it punted the following
series. Then it punted again.
Between
these
series,
the Wolverines found the
endzone off a 10-yard, back
shoulder fade to Collins and
a 61-yard run up the middle
by Chris Evans.
“It
was
a
one-on-one
matchup,” Collins said of his
second
touchdown.
“Shea
just trusted me to make
a play and that’s what we
did. We like the matchup,
and we’re gonna take that
chance.”
A runaway win was hardly
out of the question, even if
the result and gameplay was
uninspiring.
The
defense
allowed
just
59
passing
yards, but 193 rushing yards.
The
offense
dropped
42
points on the road, but was
hardly reminiscent of the
78-0 victory from 2016.
Lessons from the game
can
be
interpreted
any
which way, but one thing
still stands — Michigan just
had to get through this game
as it awaits its next big test
at the end of the season in
Ohio State.
“I feel like we need to stop
coming out slow, but we still
got the win,” Collins said.
It’s the perfect explanation
of Saturday’s game.
The Michigan Daily Top 10 Poll
Each week, Daily sports staffers fill out ballots, with first-place votes
receiving 10 points, second-place votes receiving nine and so on.
1. Alabama: “If you wanna crown ‘em, then crown their ass!” - Dennis
Green
2. Clemson: Trevor Lawrence has two first names.
3. Notre Dame: Ian Book? What a nerd.
4. Michigan: Not even Rob Ash could stop this team.
5. Georgia: All this effort to get smoked by Bama in the SEC Champion-
ship.
6. Oklahoma: Sooner rather than later, imo.
7. West Virginia: Will Grier would be a household name if he had be-
come a Vine star like his brother
8. Washington State: Every single fraternity in the world has a kid with a
name like Gardner Minshew, and they all have that moustache.
9. UCF: Back-to-back national championships soon cometh.
10. Ohio State: Definitely DON’T check Zach Smith’s Twitter timeline.
ETHAN WOLFE
Daily Sports Writer
MIKE
PERSAK
And they’re not
normal road
trips, where you
stop at a hotel...
We got back to
Ann Arbor after
the sun had
already risen.