With a few minutes remaining in Saturdays’ game, as writers were jotting down notes for their game story or looking at statistics or typing up tweets, a thunderous commotion drowned out the quiet clacking of keyboards in the press box. Michigan’s assistant coaches slammed things and started screaming as they left their rooms in the middle of the Michigan Stadium box and headed to the elevators to get to the field in time to celebrate with the team as the clock ticked toward zero.

Any win over an archrival should engender that kind of response from a coaching staff, but there had to have been a little extra enthusiasm due to the way Michigan won the game. Not only did the offense put up points and the defense put up stops, but Michigan was able to impose its will on Ohio State. It turns out that was part of the gameplan all along.

“We stayed true to our identity. I think when you commit to something, you become good at something. And that’s what we’ve done. We committed to wanting to run the football better, so we spent our whole offseason doing Beat Ohio drills is what we called them. Just commitment there where we’re just going to run the ball at them and create the physical presence in the game and take that part over on the lines,” offensive coordinator Josh Gattis said on Monday night’s Inside Michigan Football radio show.

Michigan’s offensive line was able to do just that. Michigan passed 20 times on Saturday, its lowest number of passing attempts since throwing 16 times against Rutgers at the end of September. On the other hand, Michigan’s rushing attack acquired 297 yards on 41 carries, which is the most rushing yards gained since the game against Northern Illinois in mid-September. Just as they had early in the season, Michigan’s staff decided to emphasize the running game.

It wasn’t that they couldn’t pass the ball. They could, and they have; see the 40 pass attempts and 352 passing yards against Maryland or 48 pass attempts and 402 passing yards against Michigan State for proof of this team’s ability to air it out. What Gattis and Michigan’s coaching staff were looking to do against Ohio State was double down on the identity they had forged over the last 11 months.

“When everyone said we can’t do anything, it’s not that we can’t do anything, it’s that we were choosing to do things differently, and I think that’s the biggest narrative that needed to be changed,” he said. “A lot of people thought we couldn’t throw the ball just because we didn’t choose to throw the ball, not because throwing the ball wasn’t successful. A lot of people thought we couldn’t throw it deep. It’s because we were choosing not to. We were doing what we were doing best. That allowed us to create an identity. That allowed us to build the team that we wanted to build, that we knew could go out and win and put us in position to play for a Big Ten championship.”

That opportunity now awaits. Michigan’s coaching staff saw opportunity against Ohio State as well, as they felt they could set the tone on the game’s opening drive. Michigan got the ball first and used 4:48 to go 10 plays and 75 yards for a touchdown. Two big Hassan Haskins rushes, one for 16 yards and one for 17 yards, moved Michigan down the field, and a 14-yard touchdown rush on a Statue of Liberty play finished the drive. Gattis didn’t hesitate when asked about the importance of that drive.

“It was huge. Starting fast and setting the tone for the game and really creating the identity for the game, that we were going to dominate on both fronts, not just offensive line but defensive line as well. Just being able to smash them however we could and really set the tone. You know, they’re a good team. They’re a good team. They’re a finesse team. They’re not a tough team, and so we knew that going into the game that we can out-physical them, we can out-tough them, and that was going to be the key to the game. That’s what we’ve prepared for all year long. You saw it previously, earlier this year, in the game they lost to Oregon. Oregon was the most physical team on the field. That’s the way they lost and we committed to that recipe, and it paid off.”

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