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LSJ not holding back

MSU's latest win over Michigan sets the record straight about Dantonio, Harbaugh

ANN ARBOR – Let me tell you what the savior of a college football program actually looks like.

He turns an embattled program into a national player. He takes his school to heights it never dreamed it could reach. And when his program falls down hard on his watch, just as his world seems to be crumbling, he takes the youngest team he’s ever coached into his arch-rival’s house and reminds us that he still owns them.

“We’ve done it eight times,” Michigan State coach Mark Dantonio said after Saturday night’s 14-10 win at Michigan. “So I don’t know why there’s a lot of doubt.”

Dantonio is a program savior. At Michigan, Jim Harbaugh is not.

If you don’t see it now, it’s a symptom of these times. We all live in our bubbles, retreat to our corners and only hear what reinforces our beliefs. Some believe Harbaugh is superior to all other nouns.

Ever since he took over at Michigan in December of 2014, we’ve heard he was cut from a different cloth, didn’t bleed like the rest of us, saw the game on a higher plane. 

And that Dantonio’s reign over this rivalry would soon meet its rightful demise. It was a fluke. A matter of good coaching, sure, but mostly good timing. Michigan had, by no fault of its own, hired two coaches who weren’t the right fit, Rich Rodriguez and Brady Hoke, opening the door for Dantonio’s little engine that could.

With Harbaugh in Ann Arbor, Dantonio’s six wins in seven years would simply go down as a cute and brief stretch in the rivalry’s mostly one-sided history. 

Except now it’s eight wins in the last 10 years. It’s four wins in five meetings at Michigan Stadium, which is incredible if you think about what this rivalry once looked like. It’s twice in three seasons against Harbaugh.

“I’m not going to say anything like (Mike) Hart said,” MSU quarterback Brian Lewerke said Saturday night, responding to a question about Hart’s “little brother” comment in 2007. “Coach D has done a great job of playing against these guys. He’s definitely had their number.”

He did again Saturday, beating Michigan as a double-digit underdog for the first time. The Wolverines were ranked No. 7, a College Football Playoff hopeful, in their third season with the Quarterback Whisperer as their coach. Dantonio, considered an offensive dolt compared to Harbaugh, beat Michigan Saturday in large part because he had a better quarterback — a young kid, a redshirt sophomore, Lewerke

Dantonio is 8-3 against Michigan. Harbaugh is 1-2 against the Spartans and 0-2 against Ohio State — his two rivals. Whatever the Buckeyes are to MSU, Dantonio is 3-5 against them. Harbaugh took over a program that brought in top 10 recruiting classes twice in the three years before he arrived. He didn’t take over some misfit outpost. Dantonio did that.

A decade later, perhaps we can finally see it. All of us. Not just those who view life through a green-and-white prism — all of us who watched what transpired Saturday. All of us who’ve seen this rivalry play out since 2007, Dantonio’s first season, and since 2014, when Harbaugh became his adversary.

Harbaugh is a fine coach. He did wonders for the NFL’s San Francisco 49ers and did the impossible for Stanford. At Stanford, he’s a program changer, if not savior. At Michigan, he’s the latest guy who can’t figure out how to beat the Spartans or Buckeyes. 

Dantonio might have the stronger team this year. Certainly a more well-rounded one than the Wolverines. We couldn’t see it until we saw these teams on the same field. Then it was clear. 

As was this: Dantonio is the standard in this state, brother.

He is kinda taking a beating in the media today. All of the twitters and antics are coming back to haunt him because the mediots are using it to poke at him for a lack of results and such.

I wish Twitter would not exist. Especially in a certain house that is white.

Michigan's OL is the underlying fundamental problem to all of Michigan's woes on offense.  Benching Ulizio at the half and putting JBB in at RT gave me some hope.  O'Korn, like Speight but to a lesser extent, seems to be playing scared and runs out of the pocket prematurely for some reason...as if he's afraid for his life.  O'Korn and wet footballs are a bad combination.  Michigan's WRs are not getting the job done; they would have been better off just putting a couple more clueless O linemen out there in the down pour and running the damn ball.  Higdon ran the ball the best...why wasn't he out there the whole second half?  Isaac's fumble do to the strip was preventable and trying to run Evans inside over and over was baffling.   Anyway, Michigan's defense is good but the offense has to score points to win games.  Right now I don't see that happening very much against the better Big Ten teams.  This spanking at the hands of Sparty at home on prime time might be just what this team needed.

why wasn't Higdon out there more? Because he cannot pass protect. At all. His hold negated an excellent TD pass by O'Korn and an excellent route by Crawford where he smoked the MSU DB and get wide open. Higdon is a small guy, but so was Mike Hart and he was excellent at protecting the QB. Hell two of the greatest RB's ever -Barry Sanders and Emmitt Smith were of smaller stature- and they were expert at going low and taking out the legs of incoming pass rushers. Size isn't an excuse.

He is kinda taking a beating in the media today. All of the twitters and antics are coming back to haunt him because the mediots are using it to poke at him for a lack of results and such.

I wish Twitter would not exist. Especially in a certain house that is white.

what media? I haven't seen it. That Lansing State Journal article was complete horse shit, but you'd expect nothing less from a publication like that. I hardly count that as "media"- who outside of a bunch of Michigan State nutjobs even read that?

Harbaugh is doing the best with what he has. Hoke with the 2015, 2016, or 2017 teams roster and they probably win 6-7 games a year. They've had an elite defense the last two years under Harbaugh, but they will not get over that hump until they fix the offensive line talent and the offensive coaching.

Michigan's OL is bad. Like really, really bad. There is a complete dearth of tackles. Grant Newsome won the job at LT as a RS Frosh and did so well they moved Mason Cole to the interior where he is a more natural fit. How many elite OL's start LT's that are 6'4, 300?  Not many. Usually tackles that size are freakish athletes. That's not Mason Cole. Cole is a really solid player, but against the longer, quicker DE's he struggles. Newsome was looking like a guy that could one day be a 1st round pick- great athleticism in a 6'7, 318 pound frame. And then he literally nearly lost his leg because of a low hit to the knee by a Wisconsin defender. Who knows if he'll ever be able to play football again? 4* OT commit Devery Hamilton switched to Stanford at the last minute in 2016. He's the back-up LT at Stanford as a rs frosh. He's the starting RT at Michigan if he's there now. Harbaugh dismissed LTT- if all he cared about is winning he'd have never done that. LTT is a starter at LT or RT this year if he's on the team. You just can't lose 3 quality tackles like that and expect to field the kind of OL that Harbaugh wants to.

There are only 3 tackles left on Michigan's roster that aren't true freshmen. SR Mason Cole, RS Jr Juwann Bushell Beatty, and RS Soph. Nolan Ulizio. Ulizio got benched and Juwan Bushell Beatty hasn't played much better. Mason Cole is playing out of his natural position.
OT's JaRaymond Hall, Andrew Steuber, Joel Honigford, Chuck Filiaga, and James Hudson - all true frosh. Filiaga is probably the only one of that bunch physically ready to play, the others all need physical development. LT or RT isn't a position you really want to play a true freshman. So far all of them have been slated for a redshirt. If the piss poor play of Beatty and Ulizio continue- they have to try something to shake up that OL. Either play true frosh Cesar Ruiz at LG and move Bredeson to RT or burn Filiaga's redshirt and play him at RT. Ruiz' redshirt has already been burned- so it might make more sense to play him at LG and move Bredeson to RT. Ulizio and Beatty are not startable tackles- both have been getting whooped.

Harbaugh should hand the reins over Brandon Peters. O'Korn panics in the pocket too much and this is his last year here. Speight broke 3 vertebrae in his back- and he broke his collarbone last year and he had two major shoulder injuries in HS- which probably explains his velocity on the ball- or lack of velocity I should say. Bc for a 6'6, 240 pound kid he sure does have a pretty weak arm. Usually kids that size throw it with some real heat. I kinda doubt Speight's back next year or ever plays football again to be honest. Might as well groom Peters now so he can go into 2018 with some real experience.

After 31 games as Michigan coach:

Harbaugh: 24-7; 1-4 in rivalry games (1-2 vs MSU, 0-2 vs OSU)

Hoke: 24-7; 4-3 in rivalry games (1-1 vs both MSU and OSU, 2-1 vs ND) 

http://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/university-michigan/wolverines/2017/10/08/jim-harbaugh-rivalry-offensive-rankings/744115001/

Michigan is now 1-4 during Harbaugh's first five meetings against rivals Michigan State and Ohio State. Brady Hoke, a man who was fired for, in part, his inability to beat MSU and OSU, was 2-2 in his first two seasons. Harbaugh is 24-7 through 31 games, same as Hoke. 

Who is ultimately in charge of the offense? Is it Jim, Drevno or Jay or even Pep?

Or from a UM blogger

Last night was a turning point. It happens in all our lives. Whether it be at work (when you realize you need to make a change) or in your personal life (when you finally accept that no matter how hard you try, your marriage is irreparably broken).

I tried to convince myself that Harbaugh was our savior. Our savant. I was fooled by his looks. By his talk. By the aura of the prodigal son returning home to deliver us what his father figure, never could: a National Title.

But, alas, all that was an illusion. A mirage. Jim Harbaugh has always proven to be an extremely stubborn, flawed football coach. A good coach? Certainly. The best Michigan can do? Yes.

But a savior? A savant? Elite? No. That question has been answered.

We all want our children to be the best. The reality is that they aren’t always going to be......

Jimmy is our son, and I’ll always love him.

But I know who he is now. We ALL do.

So let’s accept that. And MOVE ON. Every now and then we will have a season like last year. Where we are allowed to dare to DREAM. But those will be few and far between.

We are who we are. A program that dreams of being the leaders and best.

But the reality says that we are merely good.

Like Jimmy. Just good. And sometimes, good, is the best we can get.