On Sunday, the No. 2 Michigan football team learned its postseason fate: A trip to Miami to face No. 3 Georgia in the Orange Bowl. While the Bulldogs’ recent loss to Alabama toppled them from their long-held No. 1 spot, it’s hard to picture a National Championship game without them in it. But, as the Wolverines have said all season, they aren’t flinching. “We’re gonna be looking forward to it,” junior quarterback Cade McNamara said Sunday. “We know that it’ll be a challenge for us, and they have a good defense, but I think we’ve got a solid team ourselves. So I know that we’ll be confident, and I know we’re gonna be looking forward to it.” While the team will take a short break to regroup before resuming practice, McNamara — known for his meticulous preparation — said he would start watching tapes later that afternoon. For much of the season, it looked like Georgia was in a league of its own. The Bulldogs have averaged close to 200 yards on the ground and 250 yards through the air en route to a 12-1 record. They have a defense that’s held four teams to a touchdown or less and three more absolutely scoreless, giving up an average of 9.53 points per game. They opened the season by holding then-No. 3 Clemson to just a field goal and followed it up just under a month later with a 37-0 thrashing of then No. 8 Arkansas, performances that were good enough to snatch the No. 1 spot early in the season and hold it tight up until the conference championship week. But after Georgia’s blowout loss on Saturday, many in the Wolverines’ camp were hoping the dominant win against Iowa would be enough to propel Michigan to the top. “I thought we should have been No. 1,” senior edge Aidan Hutchinson said. “I mean, we just beat the number two team in the country and the number 13, but it is what it is. I mean, we’re in it. And we’re all so excited to play in Miami.” While the seeming nonchalance could be hiding a greater sense of disappointment, it might just be genuine gratitude for how far the Wolverines have come. They started the season with mediocre expectations, many outside the facility anticipating a 7-5 ceiling for their season. Now, they’re the only team in history to make the College Football Playoff after starting the season unranked. Still, when asked whether there was any point in the season where they realized a Playoff berth could really be in their future, each player gave a similar response: “I never actually gave up on this team,” sophomore receiver Roman Wilson said. “I thought we could be one of the best teams in the nation. Even when I committed here, I still believed that. And I want to say I’m not surprised but really happy with what this team has done.” Added graduate defensive back Brad Hawkins: “After the Michigan State loss, we all had a player-led meeting. We didn’t let that game define us. We continued to push. We continued to move on as a unit. The leadership in this building is amazing. We just kept hammering at it, kept grinding at it. We didn’t get satisfied. We continue to just grind it out. We knew that to come to this point we’d have to win out and we did that. We just continued to believe in each other, we stayed together. “And we got it done.” Now, the Wolverines have a national semi-final clash with Georgia to show for it. INDIANAPOLIS — A Big Ten Championship, a 17-year title drought and a chance at the College Football Playoff lay on the line Saturday. There was absolutely no need for extra motivation. And yet, the shoulder of every Michigan football player, coach and staff member bore a patch: a block ‘O,’ with the initials ‘TM’ and the number 42. It was to honor Tate Myre, a 16 year old high school student who played football and wrestled. A student that passed away in the shooting in his high school on Tuesday in Oxford, Mich. After the tragedy, this game found far more meaning than championship hopes. It was about being there for a family in its time of need, and this team — like it has on the football field nearly every time this season — rose to the occasion during its title-clinching victory over No. 13 Iowa. “You know, it’s a community that needs all of our prayers, every one of them,” Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh said. “And we just, we wanted to offer that up. We wanted to offer our prayers. They’re a community that desperately needs it and offer them up to the one who conquered death and also honor Tate Myre and his bravery, his courage.” Besides just wearing the patch, the Myre family was also in Indianapolis and joined the team for the coin toss. So, with the biggest game of its season coming up, Michigan had its eyes focused on something else: the Myre family. And, as always, the Wolverines’ leader stepped into the foreground. Senior edge rusher Aidan Hutchinson, less than a week after making a Heisman Trophy statement game, thought the team needed to honor Tate. So he went to Harbaugh. “And so, you know, when the players — when Aidan came to me — and wanted to dedicate this game to Tate Myre, (I said), ‘You know, yes, let’s do that,’ ” Harbaugh said. “Let’s do that. That was, that was huge.” These Wolverines have never needed anyone to motivate them externally, but, as their repeated exclamations of ‘2%’ and ‘6-6’ came bursting out of the locker room on Saturday night showed, a little outside motivation couldn’t hurt. To play for a community in Michigan, in a team made up of leaders from Michigan, that dedication pushed the Wolverines to play as best they could. “We talked about it last night,” Harbaugh said. “What more, how much more can we pile into one game, the importance of one game.” Graduate student center Andrew Vastardis added: “And on top of it, we wanted to play for 42, all those that tragically lost their lives in that community and everything.” After beating Ohio State, Saturday’s game became about tempering emotions: Following such a high where Michigan finally threw the monster off its back, how would they respond and focus on the next game? Then, the tragedy in Oxford added even more to that emotional turbulence. So, when Donovan Edwards dove over the top of a pile to score the Wolverines’ sixth touchdown of the game and Jake Moody hit his sixth extra-point down the middle of the uprights to make the score a 42-3 statement, it meant more. “Goosebumps,” Hutchinson said. “Chills,” Vastardis said. Now, instead of 42 just on the shoulders of Michigan to honor Tate Myre and Oxford, that number will be written into the history books. KENT SCHWARTZ Managing Sports Editor The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com Sports Wednesday, December 8, 2021 — 11 In Saturday’s championship game, Tate Myre became a part of history LANE KIZZIAH Managing Sports Editor Michigan looks forward to Georgia despite not receiving No. 1 ranking SportsMonday: Don’t doubt Michigan anymore On Dec. 31st, Michigan will play for everything. In a season that began full of doubt and low expectations, it beat Ohio State. It beat Wisconsin and Iowa. It’s overcome every obstacle and trial sent its way so far, including rebounding after its late game collapse against Michigan State. On New Year’s Eve, in the College Football Playoff, the Wolverines will play Georgia. Alabama or Cincinnati await, should they win. And, after the past two weeks, Michigan could very well be the best team in the country. It’s certainly shown its weaknesses: Cade McNamara won’t blow your socks off, and its defense lets up yards to talented offenses. But the rest of those teams have weaknesses, too. In its biggest test of the year, Georgia allowed 536 yards of offense, with 421 through the air. Its previously unflappable defense showed glaring holes. Stetson Bennett IV can manage and lead the team to victory, but he struggled coming from behind. “General impressions are rugged,” Jim Harbaugh said of Georgia on Sunday. “It’s a rugged, tough, tough squad that plays extremely well on all sides of the ball and special teams. Gonna be really excited to dig into it and study them. But yeah, that’s the word that came to my mind.” Alabama struggled against Auburn and at Texas A&M with a young Bryce Young looking overwhelmed and the offense looking stagnant. Perhaps after walloping Georgia, the Crimson Tide has found itself. Perhaps not. Then there’s Cincinnati, which possesses the nation’s longest unbeaten streak. They’ve squashed nearly every team they’ve faced this season, including No. 5 Notre Dame, but the same questions have persisted throughout their season: What happens when they play an opponent like Alabama that’s incredibly talented? Through the last 14 weeks, Michigan has established itself as the No. 2 team in the country, and there are few who would argue it. It’s outperformed every expectation that those outside the program have had for it, and on New Year’s Eve, the expectation is a loss. Georgia opened as a one-touchdown favorite, and very few outside the program would expect the Wolverines to win. But Michigan knows how good of a team it is. “I think when we beat (Ohio State), we knew we can — we’re a really good football team — and we got a really good chance to win (the semifinal), because Ohio State was a really talented team,” senior defensive lineman Aidan Hutchinson said. Michigan has the best rushing game of the remaining four teams, gaining 30 more yards on the ground than the next best team in the playoff — the Bulldogs. It has the second-best 3rd-down conversion percentage, with 45.1%, and the second-best 3rd-down defense, with 32.3%, both behind the Crimson Tide. This year, where talent and coaching are even, it seems that what matters most is an identity and dedication. The Wolverines have mastered both over the course of the season. “Toughness is something that we take to heart and that we have made our identity,” Michigan quarterback Cade McNamara said. “And I really — I just love the identity that we’ve created, no matter what the style of football is at this day and age.” The last two games, in its toughest stretch of the season, that identity has worn down opponents and led to second-half explosions. McNamara has been clinical, hitting his targets and making the plays he needs to. But above that, there’s the element that is perhaps most surprising: Michigan’s big plays. Saturday’s double pass for 75 yards and Blake Corum’s run for 67 yards, are just the beginning of an offense that repeatedly gains large chunks of yards. The Wolverines totaled eight plays of 15-plus yards in the Big Ten Championship Game, breaking open a defense that is one of the best in the country. Michigan has been doubted week after week, including by me, but with just two weeks left, no one should doubt the Wolverines. Because they may just win the National Championship. MILES MACKLIN/Daily Sophomore running back Blake Corum rushed for a 67 yard touchdown in the Big Ten Championship Game. BECCA MAHON/Daily The Michigan football team scored 42 points on Saturday, the jersey number Oxford student Tate Myre wore. BECCA MAHON/Daily Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh won his first Big Ten Championship a year after going 2-4. Josh Gattis made a mad dash for the elevator. For the second straight week, the Michigan football team had done something that, a few months prior, seemed unthinkable. Even before the confetti fell from the rafters following the Wolverines’ 42-3 throttling of Iowa, Gattis and his analysts had begun their descent, anxious to join the celebration of the program’s first Big Ten Championship since 2004. For Gattis individually, though, the win meant even more. His offense’s performance — a complete, 42-point dismantling of one of the nation’s top defenses statistically — represented the full realization of a vision that, in prior years, had failed to materialize. It was abundantly clear: The efforts of Gattis, Jim Harbaugh and the entire offense had fully borne fruit. “I think (it’s) just the commitment from both sources — coach Gattis and then us believing in him,” sophomore running back Blake Corum said. That commitment has taken time. The program Gattis joined in 2019 — one that was entering its fifth season with Jim Harbaugh at the helm — ran an archaic, uninspiring offense that had visibly reached its ceiling. Gattis had the potential to fix that; he brought promises of modern schemes and a catchy “speed in space” slogan, a refreshing message for an offense that, up to that point, looked anything but modern. In Gattis’ first two years, though, the offense lacked an identity. At times, it made little sense, featuring gimmicky two- quarterback systems and wildcat packages that only helped it get in its own way. Soon, it became a question whether the same fate that doomed promising Michigan offenses of old — the “innovations” of Rich Rodriguez, of Pep Hamilton, of offensive coordinators dating back to the Wolverines’ last conference title — would come to meet Josh Gattis. It didn’t. Where other coaches in Michigan’s past had doubled down on their failures, Gattis adapted. Instead of forcing his offense into a pass-first system with personnel not suited to it, he looked at the talent in his running backs room and on his offensive line and worked with Harbaugh to accentuate it. “He committed to the run game early,” Corum said. “In the interview (prior to the season), he said last year he didn’t really focus on the run game. He’s been a tremendous play caller.” Harbaugh, too, learned from Gattis. The head coach’s fingerprints are all over the Wolverines’ offense — they’re most visible in the old-fashioned power runs that have opened up space for the backs all season. But he’s also allowed Gattis’ own creativity to flourish. On Saturday, that was evident in Michigan’s multiple big plays, in the double pass for a touchdown from freshman running back Donovan Edwards, in the flea flicker that’s called basically every week and in the endless jet sweeps and end arounds that — yes — put speed in space. The results are easy to see. The Wolverines have gone from tallying 381.3 yards per game last year to 451.9 this year. In both of their biggest two games of the season — against Ohio State last week and the Hawkeyes on Saturday — they’ve put up 42 points and over 450 yards. From the eye-test standpoint, the offense is playing with as much confidence as any team in the country and having fun while doing it. “Toughness is something that we take to heart and that we have made our identity,” junior quarterback Cade McNamara said. “I just love the identity that we’ve created, no matter what the style of football is at this day and age.” Truthfully, the offense that Gattis and Harbaugh have crafted together has been a long time coming. When Gattis first arrived on campus, he struggled to live up to the expectations placed upon him to shape a championship-caliber system. Now, with a Big Ten Championship under his belt and as a finalist for the Broyles Award — given to the nation’s top assistant coach every year — Gattis has proven that he belongs at Michigan. Through the speed bumps the program has hit along the way, both he and Harbaugh have managed to adapt and help build a true contender. “We’ve really had the mentality of ‘Michigan versus everybody,’ ” McNamara said. “I just don’t know much to say other than I love these dudes. Like, really.” That mentality has lifted the Wolverines to new heights. Soon, we’ll see if they hit a ceiling. Gattis, Harbaugh realize their vision KENT SCHWARTZ BRENDAN ROOSE