Wolverine Watch: Defense Shines In A Close One
Alex Hornibrook knew it was going to be tough. He couldn’t have imagined it would be this tough.
After all, he’d made his starting debut just a week earlier, in “The Woodshed,” so dubbed by Michigan State football personnel. He’d held up pretty well versus the defending Big Ten champions.
He probably wasn’t expecting another 30-6 wood shredding by the Badgers, but there’s no way he anticipated this backside full of splinters.
Hornibrook completed barely a third of his passes in Wisconsin’s 14-7 loss at Michigan. He covered 88 yards on nine completions and hooked up with Wolverines on one-third as many throws as he did his own Badgers.
Michigan sacked him two times, surrendering only one touchdown drive directed by the redshirt freshman. That one covered 31 yards, set up by a long interception return.
On a day when the Wolverines’ offense stalled out on touchdowns and the home team couldn’t kick the bucket with Dr. Kevorkian in attendance, U-M’s defense wouldn’t let a loss happen. When Wisconsin’s understated head coach Paul Chryst summed it up, he gave a nod to an old nemesis — Michigan defensive coordinator Don Brown.
“They’ve got a good defense,” Chryst said. “I’ve always had a lot of respect [when] going up against Coach Brown. It’s a good scheme, with really good players. It presents some challenges. They played us a ton of man. How many did we win? Not enough.”
Not nearly enough. Not enough to cover one length of the field in an afternoon’s worth of throws. Not enough to make 160 yards of total offense. Not enough to keep Michigan’s defensive backs from a trio of interceptions, just like the Badgers pulled off on MSU quarterback Tyler O’Connor a week earlier.
One of those goes into the all-time highlight vault. With the Wolverines clinging to a one-touchdown lead and the final moments ticking away, Hornibrook unloaded a hope and a prayer. For a split second, it appeared far more than that.
Wisconsin wideout George Rushing didn’t enjoy much separation at all from U-M All-American senior cornerback Jourdan Lewis. But anything can happen on a 50-50 ball, including a swing and a miss by the defensive back and a breakaway touchdown to tie the game.
“No. No. NO,” Lewis insisted, waving off the notion like it involved a meteor hitting Michigan Stadium to intervene. “You have to react. I knew I was going to get my hand on the ball, so why not go up there and try to snatch it down?”
Snatch it he did. Lewis elevated — make that levitated — for what seemed several seconds, then one-handed the pickoff, bringing it into his body while crashing to the turf.
“It was me reacting,” Lewis said. “I caught a one-handed interception in practice, but I wasn’t in the air that long. It was crazy. It was definitely crazy.”
Never mind that had he merely knocked it down, Michigan would have taken over inside Wisconsin’s 10 on the fourth-down play. This represented sheer athletic brilliance, a midair Rudolf Nureyev act with a little Willie Mays thrown in for good measure.
“I’ve seen [New York Giants wideout] Odell Beckham Jr. do that,” Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh marvelled. “It looked like that kind of play. The most impressive thing about it was he jumped a little early. I was a little nervous he was going to come down, and the ball was just going to go over his fingertips. But he was able to hang in the air and come down with it and made a spectacular play.
“Then I was thinking, it was fourth down. It would have been better had he not intercepted it. But I’m really happy he did because it was a spectacular, spectacular football play, athletic play and really unbelievable.”
It marked the signature capper on a game tape worthy of a ceremonial burning by offense-minded Wisconsin fans.
Make no mistake, the No. 4 Wolverines come away from this showdown with issues. They weren’t exactly unstoppable in the red zone, going 1 for 3 on TDs. They went 0 for 3 on field goals, and they’re conducting kicking tryouts this week.
Worst of all, they lost their starting left tackle, sophomore Grant Newsome, to an injury Harbaugh acknowledged will require surgery.
But at 5-0, with an on-field bye (Rutgers) next week, an actual bye the week after and a defense telling QBs bye-bye week by week, Michigan isn’t cracking anytime soon.
Everyone was looking by a statement game by the Wolverines in a showdown between top-10 teams. The defense made one, and intends to just keep talking.