2B — Monday, December 2, 2019
SportsMonday
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

W

hen it all ended, 
when the blowout 
was codified and 
the Michigan football team 
was taking a 
never-ending 
walk up the 
tunnel, Ohio 
State ran to 
the nearest 
end zone. 
They linked 
arms and 
swayed, the 
band giving 
the music, a 
sea of fans 
clad in red — the only ones still 
left in Michigan Stadium — 
supplying the vocals to “Carmen 
Ohio.”
It all felt like a repeat, because 
it was. A repeat of last year, when 
“Harbaugh sucks” chants rattled 
around the Horseshoe after a 
62-39 Ohio State blowout win. 
A repeat of the year before that, 
when the Wolverines let Dwayne 
Haskins take control after 
coming into the game as a backup 
and walk out with a 31-20 win. A 
repeat of the last eight years, over 
which Ohio State has outscored 
Michigan a combined 331-216 
without dropping a single edition 
of this now-annual ruination. A 
repeat of the last 16 years, over 
which the Buckeyes have won 15 
of these, the only loss coming in 
a transition year between scarlet 
and gray dynasties.
This is what this rivalry is. 
This is what Ohio State is, and 
this is what Michigan is. A 56-27 
drubbing. Jim Harbaugh sitting 
at one podium saying, “They 
played better today.” Ryan Day 
sitting at the other saying, “In 
games like this, it comes down 
to players. Our big-time players 
played well.” The Wolverines 
slowly walking off the field. 
The Buckeyes linking arms and 
singing their alma mater.
If you think it’s any different, 
you haven’t been paying 
attention.
This isn’t a Jim Harbaugh 

problem, a Shea Patterson 
problem or a Don Brown 
problem. Harbaugh brought 
Michigan to 10 wins in three 
of his first four years and still 
has a chance to do it for a 
fourth time — more than on 
par with what the Wolverines 
did regularly before a six-year 
Rich Rodriguez/Brady Hoke 
odyssey sunk the program to new 
depths. Patterson set a record 
on Saturday for the most passing 
yards a Michigan quarterback 
has ever had over three games. 
Brown’s defense has been top-
10 in SP+ every year since he’s 
come to Ann Arbor, and even 
after Saturday, it’s on pace to do 
so again.
Since 1969, the start of the 
Bo Schembechler era, Michigan 
has averaged 9.44 wins per year. 
Harbaugh has 47 in five years 
— 9.4 per year. You want him to 
restore this program to what it 
was under Bo? Check. Harbaugh 
has the Wolverines right where 
they’ve always been.
It’s not Michigan that’s 
changed. It’s Ohio State.
In that same 50-year span, 
the Buckeyes have averaged 9.78 
wins per year. Since Jim Tressel 
took over the program in 2001, 
that number has rocketed up 
to an even 11. Since Harbaugh 
took over Michigan in 2015, that 
number is at 11.8. It’s a whole 
different stratosphere than 
Michigan, and it’s been borne out 
on the field.
“It’s just kind of the same 
thing every year,” senior tight 
end Sean McKeon said. “Gotta 
execute better, and yeah it gets 
old, but just gotta play better 
against them.”
But the gap goes beyond 
execution and just playing 
better. In the Harbaugh era, the 
Buckeyes have out-recruited 
Michigan in all but one year, per 
247Sports’ composite rankings. 
They’ve landed four top-five 
classes (including 2020). The 
Wolverines have landed one, 
in 2017, and failed to get the 

production they could have out of 
it. Want to find the difference on 
the field Saturday? Look there.
On defense, the Buckeyes 
landed five-stars Chase Young 
and Jeffrey Okudah, two future 
top-10 picks in the NFL Draft. 
Young didn’t fill the statsheet on 
Saturday, but set an Ohio State 
record with 16.5 sacks this year 
and will likely be a Heisman 
Trophy finalist. Okudah held 
Nico Collins, Michigan’s best 
receiver, to two catches for 42 
yards. On offense, the Buckeyes 
also landed J.K. Dobbins, who 
ran for 211 yards, and three 
starters on an offensive line that 
paved the Wolverines all day 
long.
Michigan got two five-stars 
in that class: Donovan Peoples-
Jones, who caught three balls 
for 69 yards and accounted for a 
number of second-half drops on 
Saturday, and Aubrey Solomon, 

who transferred to Tennessee 
before the season. Of its 19 four-
stars in 2017, just three — Collins, 
cornerback Ambry Thomas and 
center Cesar Ruiz — started 
and made a tangible impact on 
Saturday. Eight are no longer 
with the program.
The 2016 season and that 
next recruiting class was 
the Wolverines’ chance to 
narrow the gap, to capitalize 
on two years of building hype 
around Harbaugh and position 
themselves as real contenders to 
the Buckeyes. Instead, they were 
inches from beating Ohio State, 
failed to get everything they 
could from the next recruiting 
class, and now, this is just reality.
Ohio State is one of the best 
three or four programs in the 
country every year. Michigan 
is one of the best 14 or 15 every 
year. Harbaugh is a very good 
football coach who got the 

Wolverines back to this level. But 
there’s only so many Jim Tressels 
and Urban Meyers.
Before them, both programs 
could count themselves in that 
tier of programs good enough to 
get nine or 10 wins annually and 
compete for a title every so often. 
Then the Buckeyes took a leap. 
The Wolverines couldn’t make 
the same jump.
Saturday is just what generally 
happens when a top-four team 
plays a top-15 team. So is nearly 
every iteration of this game in 
the 21st century.
“We knew we had the athletes 
and the players to get the job 
done,” former Ohio State receiver 
Parris Campbell told The Daily a 
month ago.
He was talking about the 2018 
game, when the Buckeyes gashed 
Brown’s corners with crossing 
routes for 396 passing yards. He 
might as well have been talking 

about most of the 15 games prior, 
or predicting the future.
This isn’t a gap that gets 
bridged in one year. It’s one that 
takes a recruiting cycle, and 
maybe more than one, to mend. 
And to get that kind of recruiting 
cycle, the kind it takes to beat 
Ohio State, Harbaugh needs to 
… beat Ohio State. Thus is borne 
the never-ending cycle Michigan 
finds itself facing. Get lucky once, 
or find itself unable to meet an 
impossible expectation.
“We didn’t really put them in 
a position to be of pressure on 
them,” Harbaugh said. “And they 
played really well. They made 
those plays, they made those 
drives, they got those stops.”
If he wants to fix that, it’ll take 
far more than a few adjustments 
on a whiteboard.

Sears can be reached at searseth@

umich.edu or on Twitter @ethan_sears.

This is what Michigan is

ETHAN
SEARS

ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily
The Michigan football team lost its eighth-straight game against Ohio State on Saturday, a marker of the level of both programs over the last 15 years.

Offense goes quiet in second half

Shea 
Patterson 
took 
the 
snap at Ohio State’s 16 early 
in the second quarter, hoping 
to convert third down and 
potentially 
bring 
Michigan 
within two points.
But he dropped the ball, and 
a Buckeye fell on it. You’ve seen 
that before.
What happened next should 
be familiar, too.
After staying with Ohio State 
in the first quarter, trading 
blow for blow, the offense 
went quiet. Mistakes piled up. 
The Wolverines scored just 
11 points in the second half. 
Jim Harbaugh spent nearly 
two minutes after the game 
diagnosing the problems: red 
zone issues, lack of momentum, 
not making plays.
But the phrase everyone who 
spoke to the media used more 
than any other was we didn’t 
execute. That about summed it 
up.
When the dust cleared on a 
56-27 loss, Michigan’s eighth-
straight to the Buckeyes, it 
was clear: the Wolverines may 
have had a new look offense 
complete with a flashy hashtag 
and some gaudy stats against 
mid-tier teams, but it wasn’t 
good enough to keep up with 
Ohio State. Again.
“It was in just the second 
half, a few errors,” Patterson 
said. “ … You just gotta play the 
same way for four quarters, not 
just two or three.”
At the end of the second half, 
Patterson found junior receiver 
Donovan 
Peoples-Jones 
in 
the end zone for a would-be 
touchdown — would be, if 
Peoples-Jones hadn’t dropped 
it. Michigan was forced to kick 
a field goal.
Peoples-Jones had two more 
drops in the third quarter. 
Sophomore 
receiver 
Ronnie 
Bell had one, too, when a catch 
would’ve 
converted 
third-
and-16. Even when Patterson 
tried to put the team on his 
back, the receivers didn’t hold 
up their end of the deal.
“Just 
made 
too 
many 
mistakes. Too many drops,” 

said senior tight end Sean 
McKeon. “ … Just gotta be 
confident in catching the ball. 
Gotta make the tough plays, the 
one-one-one matchups.”
Other times, the Buckeyes 
simply 
made 
plays. 
The 
Wolverines’ receivers are big, 
strong, athletic.
But they hadn’t faced a 
secondary like Ohio State’s, 
either. And when it came to 
50-50 balls, for the first time all 
season, Michigan 
was on the wrong 
side of the coin.
And that’s not 
even to speak for 
the 
run 
game. 
The 
Wolverines 
rushed for just 
91 
yards 
and 
struggled 
to 
get 
anything 
going 
on 
that 
side of the ball 
the entire game. No play was 
more emblematic of that than 
an 
attempted 
fourth-and-1 
conversion 
in 
the 
fourth 
quarter, 
when 
Michigan 
attempted to run a wildcat play 
and opened a gaping hole for 
Hassan Haskins — but Haskins 
didn’t see it and got stuffed.
With the run game struggling 
to get off the ground and the 
Wolverines down big in the 
second half, the Buckeyes could 
focus their game plan on trying 
to stop Michigan’s receivers. 
They did just that.
“Just gotta find a way to get 

on top and play with a lead if 
they allow you to on offense,” 
McKeon said. “… Can’t afford 
to throw the ball every play. It 
closes off half our offense.”
Meanwhile, on the other 
end of the field, Ohio State 
put star running back J.K. 
Dobbins in a position to run 
wild. Quarterback Justin Fields 
picked his spots and took his 
shots and converted every time.
The Buckeyes were a more 
talented team, 
yes 
— 
with 
three 
legit 
Heisman 
candidates and 
a glut of five-
star 
talent. 
They didn’t get 
ranked No. 1 
in the College 
Football 
Playoff poll for 
nothing.
But on Saturday, they were 
also the better team. The team 
that made fewer mistakes.
“They definitely made deep 
shots when we didn’t, took 
more deep shots, coverage on 
those, it was kinda deflating 
to our defense,” McKeon said. 
“They converted on all of their 
red zone drives, converted 
touchdowns. We didn’t.”
Ohio State executed, plain 
and simple — and in doing so, 
showed 
Michigan 
what 
its 
offense wants to be, but has 
never quite actually been.
You’ve seen that before.

ARIA GERSON
Daily Sports Editor

ALEC COHEN/Daily
Shea Patterson said Michigan struggled to keep the same level all game.

Just made too 
many mistakes. 
Too many 
drops.

Once again, ‘M’ defense falls flat

Jim Harbaugh brought his 
hands to hips, an empty stare 
glued to his face.
If he had looked forward, he 
would’ve seen Ohio State running 
back J.K. Dobbins leaping into the 
end zone, sparking pandemonium 
from the sea of red behind him.
Instead, 
Harbaugh 
looked 
down, training his eyes toward his 
playbook, seemingly in search of 
answers.
For the eighth-straight year 
— and fifth in Harbaugh’s five 
seasons — there were none. Just 
a 56-27 defeat, further cementing 
the balance of power in a rivalry 
that leaves Michigan searching for 
its soul every November.
It’s a program that, as long as 
Harbaugh has been here, has hung 
its identity on its defense. Every 
year, its defense is lauded as one 
of the nation’s best. Every year, 
its defense is the reason it thinks 
it can beat Ohio State. Every year, 
the stats back those assertions up 
through 11 weeks.
And then this game comes, 
obliterating those misconceptions 
and exposing the talent gap that 
the 
Wolverines 
spend 
three 
months dismissing.
“They’re a very talented team, 
obviously, (have been) throughout 
the entire year,” said fifth-year 
senior linebacker Jordan Glasgow. 
“But we’re just as talented, I feel 
like.”
Minutes 
earlier, 
sophomore 
defensive end Aidan Hutchinson 

sat in the same seat, rejecting the 
notion that defensive coordinator 
Don Brown’s scheme was at fault.
“It’s not scheme, we just gotta 
execute,” Hutchinson said. “That’s 
it.”
The answer most likely lies 
between scheme and talent. Per 
247’s composite rankings, Ohio 
State’s roster has 13 former five-
star recruits to Michigan’s four. 
For four-stars, the gap is 47 to 36. 
None of that is insurmountable, 
but it creates an uphill battle.
A year ago, that talent gap was 
evident when Dwayne Haskins 
shredded Michigan for 396 yards 
and six touchdowns. In that game, 
though, Brown stood at the center 
of criticism for his inability to 
scheme against the Buckeyes’ 
crossing routes. This year, there 
was no single weakness that stood 
out so glaringly.
Dobbins piled on 211 rushing 
yards, quarterback Justin Fields 
passed for 301 and four scores 
and, once again, Ohio State 
did whatever it wanted to the 
Wolverines.
By the time the Buckeyes 
congregated in the south end 
zone, dancing on the maize ‘M’ 
while Michigan trudged down 
the tunnel, they had scored more 
points than they did against 
Florida 
Atlantic, 
Cincinnati, 
Indiana, 
Nebraska, 
Michigan 
State and Northwestern.
“We gotta dig down next year, 
see what we got,” Hutchinson said. 
“You’re not gonna win ballgames 
when you’re letting up 50 to 60 
points. It’s not gonna happen. So, 

we gotta be better.”
It’s an eerily similar sentiment 
to 
the 
one 
the 
Wolverines 
preached a year ago, with an 
identical silence enveloping Ohio 
Stadium’s auxiliary media room.
“We’ll come back motivated and 
make darn sure it doesn’t happen 
again,” Harbaugh said then.
To make sure he stayed true 
to his word, Harbaugh went 
out and hired a young, forward-
thinking offensive coordinator, 
relinquishing the keys to his 
offense for the first time in his 
coaching career. But on the 
defensive side, his only changes 
came when his hand was forced 
by these Buckeyes poaching two 
of his most respected assistant 
coaches.
So a year later, when a near-
carbon copy of that game unfolded 
in Ann Arbor, there were more 
questions than answers.
“I’m 
not 
going 
into 
the 
criticizing, 
and 
blaming 
and 
things like that,” Harbaugh said.
He doesn’t need to — the stat 
sheet does it for him. Ohio State’s 
composite offensive line over 
these past two versions of The 
Game: 118 points, 1,144 yards.
Minutes later, as Hutchinson 
stared at that stat sheet, all he 
could do was pause and shake his 
head in disbelief.
“It’s 
hard 
to 
look 
at,” 
Hutchinson said. “We’re just a 
better defense than this, we’re a 
better team than this.”
For the second year in a row, 
they’ll have to wait 12 months to 
prove it.

THEO MACKIE
Daily Sports Editor

ALEXIS RANKIN/Daily
Michigan’s defense gave up 56 points to Ohio State on Saturday a year after giving up 62 to the Buckeyes.

