The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Sports
Wednesday, November 4, 2020 — 19
Secondary
exposed in
loss
Saturday afternoon in Ann Arbor,
beneath a green gaiter that served to
maintain his poker face, Mel Tucker
wouldn’t reveal whether he intentionally
designed a game plan to pepper Michigan’s
cornerbacks with targets deep downfield.
He didn’t need to. The proof was there
for three hours Saturday. It resided outside
the visiting locker room, down the white
stucco hallway and on the Michigan
Stadium field.
That’s
where
Michigan
State
quarterback Rocky Lombardi — fresh off
a three-turnover performance against
the Big Ten’s perennial doormat, Rutgers
— threw for 323 yards, 196 of them to
freshman receiver Ricky White, who saw
a 40-fold increase in his career receiving
yardage.
“We’ve got a bunch of playmakers,”
Lombardi said. “You’re gonna have to
cover all of them.”
On Saturday, Michigan opted for the
opposite.
White was the primary benefactor,
connecting with Lombardi eight times.
Junior Jalen Nailor — with his 328 career
receiving yards — was another, going for 68
yards. Running back Connor Heyward was
there too, only catching two balls, but both
for touchdowns.
At the end of it, the Wolverines’
cornerbacks could only look up at a
scoreboard that read: Michigan State 27,
Michigan 24, and wonder how they got
there.
“Each person, we gotta look at that,
every single guy, what they can do and
what they can do better,” Harbaugh said
when asked about the unit. “And every
coach, too.”
For Michigan, the performance stood in
direct contrast to everything it showed a
week ago in Minneapolis. Back then, seven
days and a lifetime ago, junior cornerbacks
Vincent Gray and Gemon Green held the
Big Ten’s reigning receiver of the year,
Rashod Bateman, out of the end zone on
101 yards, most of them in garbage time.
On the first drive of the game Saturday,
it looked like the Wolverines could be in for
a repeat. Green, who was lauded all week
for his performance as a first-time starter,
forced a three-and-out with a well timed
pass breakup on the left sideline.
That would be the highlight of his game.
On the next drive, Green made the
mistake he carefully avoided against
Minnesota, failing to turn his head in one-
on-one coverage against White on a go
route down the left sideline. Instead, Green
only stared towards White, who streaked
past him into the end zone, catching
Michigan State’s first touchdown of the
game.
The Spartans’ next touchdown came
from the two-yard line, but it too was
sparked by the deep ball. This time, it was
Gray getting beat on the right sideline.
Fooled by a rudimentary stop-and-go
move, he stopped in his tracks at midfield
as Nailor ran free under Lombardi’s
53-yard pass.
Five plays later, Michigan State was in
the end zone.
“We really didn’t expect those (deep
throws) because the gameplan was to hone
in on the run,” sophomore safety Daxton
Hill said. “But they threw some shots in
there so you just have to adjust.”
So at halftime, that’s what Michigan
tried to do. Defensive coordinator Don
Brown dropped his safeties deeper into
coverage, attempting to provide help for his
outmatched cornerbacks. Midway through
the third quarter, he opted for a personnel
change, replacing Gray with sophomore
Jalen Perry.
“We were making adjustments and they
were…” Harbaugh said, letting his voice
trail off with the knowledge of what came
next.
What came next was a second half in
which Lombardi threw for 227 yards,
including 121 on downfield passes into one-
on-one coverage. Perry, for his part, joined
the struggles, falling over his own feet on a
31-yard completion to White at the three-
yard line that all but sealed the game.
The most damning play, though, came a
quarter earlier, with Lombardi backed up
against his own end zone. Facing a second-
and-9 with a heavy rush from Michigan
and White lined up against Gray on the
right sideline, he dropped back and hurled
a pass 40 yards downfield, hoping his
freshman could come up with it.
There was no double move or play-
action. There were no suppositions about
what else Michigan State might do. The
Spartans were dialing up what had worked
all game: Make Michigan’s cornerbacks
win a battle.
And with the opportunity to shift
momentum in the Wolverines’ hands,
they couldn’t do it. Gray got beat, senior
safety Brad Hawkins couldn’t get over in
time and Michigan, for the third time in
the Harbaugh era, walked off its own field
with a loss to its in-state rivals.
S
ame. Old. Michigan.
Maybe even a little bit
worse.
A
week
after
the
Wolverines defied expectations, went
on the road and beat a ranked team
and looked like a Big Ten contender,
they suffered the
worst loss of Jim
Harbaugh’s tenure
as head coach. One
step forward. Two
steps back.
Everything
about
Saturday’s
loss was avoidable
and self-wrought.
There
was
no
talent deficit in
this
game.
The
Spartans are in transition, in their first
year under a new head coach after a
season in which they were lucky to
make the Pinstripe Bowl. They lost to
Rutgers just a week ago. This might
well be their only win of the season.
That it came in Ann Arbor, against
their in-state rivals, in a game where
the Wolverines were favored by over
20 points, is a stunning indictment
of everything about Jim Harbaugh’s
program in year six of his tenure.
“Feels unreal, honestly,” junior
running back Hassan Haskins said. “I
can’t believe it right now. It don’t feel
real right now.”
The Wolverines gave up 86 penalty
yards on Saturday. They gave up 323
yards in the air and five plays of 30
yards or more, as a Michigan State
passing attack that has been ridiculed
across the state was too much to handle.
In the fourth quarter, with the game
on the line, they looked too gassed to
compete on a 92-yard touchdown drive
then proceeded to take five minutes off
the clock, dinking and dunking their
way to a meaningless touchdown with
all the urgency the situation would
have required in the blowout this game
was supposed to be.
Michigan State 27. Michigan 24.
It’s rock bottom for the Wolverines
under Harbaugh, and it’s time for this
fanbase to start reflecting on what it
wants out of this arrangement.
“Team
is
gonna
own
this,”
Harbaugh
said.
“Congratulations
to Michigan State but we gotta own
the loss and come back and find out
where we can improve. This is a high-
character team and I believe they’ll
do just that. Each person looking at
themselves, player, coach, all of us and
strive to be a lot better.”
After past disappointments against
Ohio State, bowl opponents and even
Michigan State, it was easy for locals
to dismiss the national voices calling
for Harbaugh’s removal. Competing
with Ohio State every year might not
be realistic for this program right
now. The Spartans were a bona fide
contender when Harbaugh came in.
But right now, they’re a bottom-feeder
in the midst of a rebuild.
Michigan simply cannot lose to
them.
Harbaugh is the fourth-highest paid
coach in college football, according to
USA Today’s annual salary disclosure.
A $7.78 million salary demands more
than butts in the seats, donations and a
high graduation rate. Especially, by the
way, if Harbaugh is marching on the
school president to demand a season.
At a bare minimum, it demands
taking care of business as a three-
touchdown favorite over your in-state
rival. Not messing around with the
wildcat in the red zone when you
have a running quarterback, costing
yourself four points and then losing by
three.
“Close, thought it was a good
playcall,” Harbaugh said, “and just
needed a little bit more pipe on the
throw.”
Of course, the quarterback might
have been able to make a better throw.
Those gimmicks fly when you’re
winning. But when you need to pull out
a win, getting cute with the wildcat,
with two kickers on the field for an
onside attempt, with last season’s
doomed two-quarterback package,
is overthinking at best, desperate at
worst.
The offense, as Harbaugh said,
never found a consistent rhythm.
After
a
first-quarter
touchdown
drive in which everything hummed,
reminiscent of last week at Minnesota,
the Wolverines struggled to put
together another drive.
“I
was
thinking
too
much,”
quarterback Joe Milton said. “I was
too busy with my feet. It was all on me.
O-Line did great.”
It’s admirable that Milton would
take the blame, and true that there
were clear areas in which he needs to
improve. But Michigan, up and down
the roster, didn’t come ready to play.
And for that, the blame lies at the top.
Harbaugh is due for an extension
after this season — his contract is
already past the point where most
coaches would have negotiated one.
After this, is Michigan supposed to
give him a raise? In the midst of a
pandemic that’s seen layoffs in the
athletic department?
Surely not.
It’s time to think long and hard
about whether this is what the
Wolverines want to be. Eight or nine
wins every year, sometimes 10. Little
chance of beating Ohio State. More
disappointing losses than upset wins.
And no chance — none — of a Big Ten
title.
Michigan will likely never be
a yearly CFP contender in college
football’s current environment. But it’s
no longer true to say that no other coach
can get the Wolverines to where they
are now. Tom Allen nearly has Indiana
there with far fewer resources. Kirk
Ferentz’s Iowa finished a game better
than Michigan last season. And that’s
just coaches within the Wolverines’
own conference.
Harbaugh deserves plaudits for
pulling Michigan out of Brady Hoke’s
abyss. Much of the sniping over the last
six years has been unwarranted. And
maybe it’s all different if a call goes
their way in Columbus four years ago.
But this is on the verge of stalling out.
And if Harbaugh can’t fix it, maybe
it’s time to think about giving someone
else a chance.
Sears can be reached at searseth@
umich.edu, or on Twitter @ethan_sears.
THEO MACKIE
Managing Sports Editor
ALLISON ENGKVIST/Daily
Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh has lost at home to Michigan State three times in his six years as head coach of the Wolverines.
ALLISON ENGKVIST/Daily
The Michigan State football team scored an upset win on Saturday, beating Michigan 27-24 at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor.
‘M’ learns
not to
discount
rival
The leadup to rivalry week couldn’t
have gone any more different for the
two teams.
Jim Harbaugh, as always, answered
questions diplomatically. The Spartans
weren’t going to turn the ball over seven
times against Michigan, he said. His
team would be ready. But the questions
about
the
rivalry
seemed
almost
farcical. Michigan State, after all,
had just lost to Rutgers, snapping the
Scarlet Knights’ 21-game conference
losing streak.
Mel Tucker, the new kid on the
block, needed to show how much this
rivalry meant to him. He took a page
from Ohio State’s playbook, referring to
the Wolverines as “the team down the
road.” At the time, it seemed desperate,
like a coach trying to prove he cared
about the game he was almost certain
to lose.
For a week, you could talk yourself
into believing this rivalry had lost its
luster. Yes, it was still a big game, but
this felt like two teams in two different
places. Michigan, which had won its
road opener decisively, and Michigan
State, which had just shown how bare
Mark Dantonio left the cupboard when
he retired in February.
But it’s hard to imagine a better
introduction to the rivalry for Tucker
than this one, because it proved that the
thing that makes this rivalry one of the
best in college football is still as true as
ever: Anything can happen when it’s
Michigan and Michigan State.
So maybe it shouldn’t have been
that shocking when the Spartans were
the team doing jumping jacks on the
sideline, the team that ran into the
tunnel celebrating after a 27-24 win.
“We expected it,” Michigan State
quarterback Rocky Lombardi said.
“I know we were three-touchdown
underdogs but everybody on this team
knew going into the game that we had
a chance and we had a good chance.
So that was part of the reason why we
played with so much confidence and
ended up getting the win.”
Most of these games are punctuated
by the strangest plays imaginable —
botched snaps and monsoons and
pregame antics and turnovers. This one
felt almost normal by comparison, as
normal as any game played without fans
due to a pandemic can be. Neither team
turned the ball over, the special teams
were fine, the weather was a perfectly
crisp 45 degrees.
The Wolverines can’t put this one
on a handful of once-in-a-lifetime
plays. They got outplayed on their
own turf. Their secondary had no
answer
for
Lombardi’s
downfield
heaves. They committed too many
penalties, got too cute with their goal-
line wildcat packages and couldn’t find
success in their running game. Here,
their biggest mistake may have been
underestimation.
“We wanted to win, bad. Beat them
up by a lot,” junior running back Hassan
Haskins said. “There wasn’t no” —
Haskins emitted a deep sigh — “no lack
of confidence or anything. We wanted
to get in there and do our job and do
it well and just smash them for real.
Anything can happen.”
When junior quarterback Joe Milton
spoke after the game, he blamed
himself for the result and noted that the
Spartans didn’t do anything he didn’t
expect. This, he said, was a simple lack
of execution. But when asked what
he’d heard about linebacker Antjuan
Simmons — a second-year starter and
All-Big Ten honorable mention last year
— Milton asked, “Who?” When given a
description, Milton said that he “wasn’t
really worried about him, man. He’s a
heck of a player but wasn’t on my radar.”
Simmons, of course, had a clapback.
“It don’t matter, Pauly B’s back with
us, so I don’t know what those guys do
over there but we study our opponents,
we know who we’re playing against, so
I don’t care if I’m on Joe Milton’s radar
or not.”
Of course, the loss can’t be blamed
on just one player. Milton wasn’t nearly
as good as he was last week against
Minnesota, but the real issue was that
the whole team came out flat. The team
that won in Minneapolis last week was
crisp, prepared and ready to play.
Somehow, against the Spartans, it
didn’t seem that way.
“We had confidence. We knew we
had the game, it’s just lack of focus
or something,” Haskins said. “I don’t
know. We had it, we just, we beat
ourselves.”
ARIA GERSON
Daily Sports Writer
State of Disrepair
At rival’s hands, Harbaugh suffers worst loss at Michigan
Read more online at
michigandaily.com
ETHAN
SEARS