Football Saturday, October 4, 2019
8B
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In the last week, it’s come
from captains Khaleke Hudson,
Ben Bredeson and Carlo Kemp,
but it’s also come from Josh Uche
and Jordan Glasgow and anyone
else who’s had a chance to speak
to the media.
“It’s not a single person’s
effort, it’s everybody’s effort,”
Uche said. “You don’t even have
to be a senior, just everyone
stepping up, keeping the morale
up and keeping the energy up.
This is a team, this isn’t an
individual thing, this is a team
effort.”
Bredeson — one of those
senior leaders at the heart of this
team’s identity — said, “It’s more
stabilizing everything. Khaleke,
Carlo and I, we’ve been here a
while, we’ve seen the ebbs and
flows of the season so just trying
to maintain and control things.”
They’ve seen a season-opening
loss, last year at Notre Dame —
something that’s been repeated
ad nauseam since Wisconsin —
and a lifeless 8-5 season in 2017.
What they haven’t seen is a start
quite like this, with an utter
embarrassment just three games
in.
Before
2016,
neither
had
McSorley, then in his first year as
a starter.
“At that time, we had only had
one Big Ten loss so we knew,
again, anything could happen
in that conference,” McSorley
said. “So we just wanted to come
out and be competitive and win
games and focus on us, not worry
about all the other things that
would have to happen.”
That’s a lot easier to say now,
from his spot on the Baltimore
Ravens’ 53-man roster, than it
would have been amid the fire
of September 2016. But the point
remains — everything was ahead
of Penn State, just as it is for
Michigan now.
They escaped an overtime
win
at
Minnesota
the
next
week, before an uninspiring win
over Maryland took them into a
matchup with No. 2 Ohio State at
4-2.
“It was honestly just (a chance
to show people who we were),”
McSorley said. “Just another
opportunity
to
go
out
and
compete and show who we were.
That’s the kinda group of guys we
had, just prideful, competitive
dudes that wanted to go out and
win games.”
All these years later, Harbaugh
called
Michigan’s
upcoming
game against No. 14 Iowa a chance
to turn good performances into
a “trend.” According to Kemp,
it’s the Wolverines’ opportunity
to show they can “perform on
Saturdays.”
Of course, Iowa isn’t Ohio State
— even if Harbaugh carries a
.000 winning percentage against
both.
Beating
the
Hawkeyes
won’t be the sort of afternoon
fans remember years later, like
Penn State’s eventual 24-21 win
over the Buckeyes.
What it would be is the same
type of confidence boost that the
Nittany Lions got from that win.
As McSorley puts it, a sense they
could “compete with anyone”
— something they carried into a
nine-game win streak.
“That was one of those times
where you almost had to do it and
see it to be able to know exactly
what it felt like,” McSorley said.
“And then once you got it, you
were able to repeat it over and
over again in the coming weeks
and games.”
For Michigan, those coming
weeks and games will bring
tougher tests than Iowa. The
2019 iteration of Penn State is one
of them. The 2016 iteration can
show them how to get through it.
From Page 7B
FILE PHOTO/Daily
Former Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley led the Nittany Lions back from a 2-2 start in 2016 to the Big Ten title.