First they stole Wisconsin’s juice. Then Nebraska’s. And then, in a week in which Jim Harbaugh talked about thriving in Penn State’s raucous environment by pretending their music was Michigan’s, stealing from the home team got perilously close to being a months-old memory.

Over the course of five plays ESPN’s win probability percentage took a nosedive that would make theme park operators around the world envious. Late in the fourth quarter, Michigan had a 80.9% chance of winning the game with Penn State facing 3rd-and-goal from Michigan’s 5-yard line. Penn State quarterback Sean Clifford found wide receiver Jahan Dotson for a touchdown on that play. Three plays into Michigan’s ensuing drive quarterback Cade McNamara was sacked and fumbled. Penn State recovered the ball on the edge of the red zone, and with that win probability percentage flipped to 77% PSU. Michigan’s defense stepped up, though, holding Penn State to a field goal and allowing Michigan’s offense the chance they needed to march down the field (or, in Erick All’s case, rumble) and score.

At a time where they easily could have folded, Michigan came together and did what was necessary to win. It wasn’t the easiest path to victory, of course, but both sides of the ball did what they had to do to get out of Happy Valley with their goals still in front of them. “I know when I'm there on the sidelines, just the togetherness that our football team has. They're for each other,” Harbaugh said. “And I'm sure it probably comes through on the TV, at least (for) people that watch the game, so that they saw the same thing coming through the TV, the excitement that our team has and the togetherness.”

When asked today about what the highlight of the season has been, quarterback Cade McNamara didn’t answer with a single play or even a single moment that stuck out to him. “I think it’s just the way this team’s come together. A lot of pressure was put on us with how we were going to deal with adversity at times and how this team would respond and I think we’ve done nothing but responded well in those situations,” he said. “Just going through gritty wins like we had last week and Nebraska and even just the experience at Michigan State, what I love about this team is just how close we are together and that’s something that I appreciate and I know the boys do too.”

The bond Michigan’s players have makes it easy to write about them as being on the same page, but that single-mindedness is something that they see as essential, as a championship trait. “We have a lot of great players on this team. We have a lot of great leaders. We have a lot of guys trying to win,” linebacker Michael Barrett said. “We have a lot of guys that like to play together and just like Coach says, that togetherness, having all those guys together, coming together, buying in, just locking in to it, that’s a championship team to me.”

The atmosphere around the football building is different, and that didn’t happen overnight. It wasn’t even the road victories at Wisconsin or Nebraska that were the catalysts in the change. “You can feel it, just with all the new changes, just everybody coming together," Barrett said. “It feels like a brotherhood. It’s a little different than it has been before.”

“Knowing your brother off the field helps you when you’re on the field just because you know how he works, you know how his mind works, you know how to talk to him in the hard times and it helps a lot just being tight on the field and being able to play off each other,” defensive tackle Christopher Hinton said.

If ever there was a question of how this team plays off each other, that was answered Saturday. McNamara summed up the way the team has unified their mindset to focus on a common goal: “We definitely have enough talent, and I think overall our mentality as a team has shifted and I think this team is ready to finish this season, and I think by the end of it we should be competing for a championship if we do what we’re supposed to do.”

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