Wolverine Watch: Brown Says Put OSU On Him

One of the most stand-up coaches in college football wanted to jump right through the screen to make his point. He couldn’t, because even Don Brown hasn’t learned that much Zoom technology.

But he got the message across. Don’t blame his players for recent Ohio State results. Put it all on him.

Brown did everything but draw the bull’s eye on his chest.

“I don’t blame players for anything,” Brown emphasized, in an emotional moment with reporters on Thursday. “You blame the old guy, right here. I’ve got to do a better job of getting our guys ready, and I promise you, I’m going to.”

Some are more than willing to oblige, after Michigan hemorrhaged 56 points against the Buckeyes last year in The Big House, a combined 118 the past two years. It’s a confounding, season-killing challenge, one that holds the key to all of the Wolverines’ ultimate dreams.

Beat the Buckeyes, you go to the Big Ten championship game. You’ve got a shot at your first conference title since 2004 (in itself, a surreal drought). You more than likely make the College Football Playoff.

How urgent is it? Well, it prompted head coach Jim Harbaugh out of his “every game’s a championship game” mode a day earlier. Harbaugh knows what beating Ohio State means. He’s always known.

He just wanted to do it, rather than talk about it.

He’s talking now.

On Wednesday, Harbaugh told NBC’s Mike Tirico: “We’ve got to beat Ohio State. Nothing makes us angrier than that … or me. But that’s what we’re working toward every day. We’ve beaten everybody else, but we haven’t beaten them.

"That’s what we have to do — beat them, win a championship, get ourselves in the playoff, win a national championship.”

Brown decided he couldn’t put it any better than that.

“Coach addressed the Ohio State issue yesterday,” Brown said. “He’s the boss. That’s what he said. That’s what I’m going to try to do. I’m getting in line, right behind him.”

Michigan has been in line behind the Buckeyes for a while now. Well before Brown’s tenure. Certainly before Harbaugh’s.

Ever since the dark powers that be in Columbus decided they’d had enough underachieving via John Cooper, and that they’d win by any means necessary under Jim Tressel and any successors, things changed. Now, from a Michigan point of view, they’re worse than ever.

That one game tears away so much good that Michigan — including its defense — has done in recent years. The loss to Alabama in the subsequent Citrus Bowl did not compare, and Brown pointed that out.

“We had the bad play on the first play of the game,” Brown said, referring to Alabama’s 85-yard touchdown pass to wideout Jerry Jeudy. “Then late in the second quarter, we have a key sack, and they call roughing the passer. Whew. That was a killer.

“We had done a great job after that first series of really stemming the tide. I thought we played pretty darned well in that game, now.”

Michigan trailed just 21-16 until 10:01 remained in the game, ultimately losing, 35-16.

“We’ve got good players,” Brown said. “WE’VE GOT GOOD PLAYERS, TOO. I thought we played toe-to-toe with them. It was what, 21-16, in the fourth quarter?

“I feel very strongly that at times we played really, really well in that football game. Our guys were certainly up to the challenge, and we fell short. I take the positives from it.”

Throughout the season, the Wolverines showed plenty of positives, he felt. After an early rout at Wisconsin — the result of a handful of plays — Michigan accomplished a lot.

“We had four to five bad run fits, two bad plays in the pass game, and we’re out of the football game,” Brown observed. “Then we play Iowa. Guess what? Iowa is pretty good.

“We had eight sacks, 14 TFLs, and they had one yard rushing — and they run the ball like Wisconsin does. As poor as the outcome was at Wisconsin, the work our guys put in going into the Iowa game was obviously well done and resulted in what I think was the turnaround for our season, defensively.”

It stayed strong until Ohio State, despite a gut-grinding loss in Happy Valley.

“The first half at Penn State, there are two bad plays, but we hold them,” Brown recalled. “You go in at halftime, make your adjustments, and you hold them to 72 yards in the second half. That’s good football.

“We beat Notre Dame during that stretch. We beat Michigan State during that stretch. We beat Indiana, who was in the top 25, pretty handily.”

But it all goes to ashes in the memory when the regular-season finale burns up before your eyes. Brown won’t dwell on it … he insists.

“Once again, the Ohio State game was a huge negative for us,” he said. “I’m not going to live in that world. I don’t want the players to live in that world.

“We acknowledge it. We move on from it. Hopefully, I do a better job.”

A moment later, he wasn’t hoping. He was vowing. The mission remains clear, even if the way to achieve it isn’t.

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