GRAND RAPIDS, MICH. — Former Michigan Heisman winner Charles Woodson created a buzz when he said he believed U-M didn’t emphasize the Ohio State game well enough the way he and his teammates did 20 years ago.
“I really feel like in recent years there hasn’t been the emphasis I’m used to being put on that game,” Woodson told reporters at The ChadTough Foundation gala in Ann Arbor in May. “Every game has been put on the same level as that game. That’s not the way we were brought up; not the way we were raised around here.
“We had no shame in saying it, and every time I watch our teams in recent years, it’s ‘Oh, it’s another game.’ It’s not.”
Michigan has won only one of the last 14 games with the Buckeyes, in 2011.
“The time is now. We ain’t waiting anymore. … That’s it,” Woodson said, having guaranteed a win over the Buckeyes at U-M’s commencement. "That’s the game. With us, we talked about it all the time. We could go 0-10 but if we won that game, it was a good season. We wanted to win every game, but we all knew that was the big fish, and we didn’t mind saying it.
“When’s the last time you guys have heard that? So you get the picture.”
Harbaugh, however, insisted his players knew how important the game was.
“It’s been emphasized,” he responded when asked if he was aware of Woodson’s comments.
Asked if he took exception to the comments, Harbaugh reiterated. “It’s been emphasized.”
He paused.
“[That’s] from somebody who’s been there for every single day,” he added.
NOTES
• Next spring’s Michigan trip to South Africa is “full speed ahead,” Harbaugh said when asked if it had been finalized.
“Unless there’s some kind of obstacle,” Harbaugh said
“It’s 17 hours from Atlanta to Johannesburg. Hopefully we can make it a little bit longer, tie some course credit into it too, as well. Those are some of the things we’re working out.”
• Michigan has three camps coming up in Ann Arbor, Harbaugh noted.
“One the ninth and one on the 18th, and then a father-son-daughter camp on Father’s Day,” he said. “[The latter] was not my idea— it was [associate athletic director] Sean Magee’s idea.
“I’m looking forward to it. We got a good response. I’m excited to bring my kids over to it.”
• Harbaugh isn’t certain which home games will be night games.
“Whenever they ask me I say noon or one o’clock on a Saturday afternoon,” he quipped. “We play them when we’re told to play them.”
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