Oans, zwoa, drei, g’suffa! The Oktoberfest Tailgate Pictures
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It's Not a Meritocracy: Michigan 19, Iowa 20
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Michigan played probably its best game on both sides of the ball on Saturday.
Offensively, Bryce took another pretty substantial step forward. His 276 passing yards in a Big Ten game is a mark that JJ McCarthy hit only four times in conference play in his career. Michigan had two 100-yard receivers in the same game for the first time since the national semifinal against TCU in 2022. This wasn’t just Bryce looking a little better. This was legitimately good Big Ten quarterback play.
The defense stuffed Iowa in a locker all day, right up until the very end, when their two touchdown drives were kept alive by a series of (horseshit) penalties, fortunate bounces, dropped interceptions, and a terribly timed injury that stopped a clock that just wouldn’t run out.
Michigan dominated and lost.
Iowa is garbage, and teams more prepared to keep their foot on the gas will be knocking them off their pedestal soon enough. Michigan was better at football for most of Saturday. Iowa just did Iowa things, and Michigan let them.
Michigan fell asleep on a kickoff, committed too many penalties, lost the turnover battle, and eventually got too conservative trying to protect its quarterback from making a catastrophic mistake. The result was long drives that ended with no points, followed later by an inability to run out a clock that desperately needed running out.
And that might be the most frustrating part of the whole thing. Michigan finally got the kind of performance from Bryce that we’ve been waiting to see. They trusted him enough to throw for 276 yards against a Big Ten defense. But with the interception coming out of halftime, when it came time to actually win the game, Michigan seemed to coach as though the primary objective was preventing him from throwing another one.
I understand it. I don’t like it. Bryce sure didn’t appear to like it. But had it gone the other way and Bryce turned it over again, we’d probably be spending all week talking about Tommy’s turn.
And I guess that’s where we are right now.
I genuinely can’t remember Michigan losing a game in which it so clearly owned both lines of scrimmage. That’s supposed to be the formula. Control the line. Get good quarterback play. Hold the other team’s offense underwater for most of the afternoon. Do all of those things and you’re supposed to win the damn football game.
They did all of those things.
They lost.
And the world rejoiced.
The people received their pound of flesh for their misconceived notion of clock impropriety in the Western Michigan game, and the Wolverines take a costly loss that could very well become the “what if?” we point to when the calendar turns to December.
There are great things ahead for this team, and I suspect at least one win none of us expects right now. But they’re not going to win them all. And after giving this one away, the margin for error has become painfully thin.
Which makes Saturday hurt even more, because Michigan had already done the hard part.
They were the better football team.
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Photos From The Old El Paso
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The Scoreboard Will Never Know: Michigan 52 - UTEP 17
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There’s nothing quite as fulfilling as a wire-to-wire victory where your team comes out strong and dominates. Relaxation sets in. Stats are padded. Young reserves come in and get experience. The final tallies may trick the casual score-ticker watcher into thinking Michigan did just that.
Alas, they did not.
UTEP 2-Step
And it’s much less fulfilling when it’s well into the 2nd quarter and you are down 14-7 to one of the worst teams in FBS, best known as the alma mater of Tim Hardaway Senior. Michigan ended the game on a 45-3 run, which was nice, and some of those benefits (oh, hello Tommy) were felt. But halftime felt like Week 1 all over again. Only Western would dog walk the Miners if they played, and last week’s dispatching of #11 Oklahoma had given us a glimmer of hope. So in many ways, this felt worse.
The expected dominant run game wasn’t there, and while right tackle Andrew Sprague’s super-late scratch and subsequent reshuffling of the offensive line is an excuse, it is not excuse enough. Toss in two more first-half fumbles lost and the waters are really chummed-up for our future opponents, who will no doubt be targeting the football with every tackle.
photo by frydaddy
But ya, the bright spots were there. Hiter is a beast, and if some consistency can be patchworked out of the O-line, we should be seeing century marks for him each week. There were a couple of Bryce throws and Marsh catches (and YAC porn) that were about as good as we’ve seen in many a year here in old Ann Arbor town…and one absolutely spectacular passing TD from Carr to Moa in mop-up time. Bryce’s celebration with him was pretty great too.
So is the non-conference slate of 2026 a success? On paper, decidedly so. 3-0 is all that matters, with a ranked win that was a 60/40 shot before the season and probably a 20/80 shot after Week 1’s debacle. And it looks like there is improvement in places, flashes of brilliance in others. Buchanan, Marsh, Hiter…these fellas are going to be stars.
Bryce remains a question mark. I think he can make some throws. I think he can take off and change a game with his legs. I’m not yet convinced he can win a game when everyone in the stadium knows Michigan needs him to. And I’m not sure he can avoid the catastrophic error when that pressure is on.
Fortunately, this team is currently led and motivated by a defense that was crazy dominant, especially in the second half. Three games in, I don't know if Michigan has a championship offense. I'm increasingly convinced it has a championship-caliber defense. And maybe that's enough.
Hiter doesn't need 200 yards. Bryce doesn't need 350. They don't need to score 45 every Saturday. Protect the football. Establish Hiter. Get Buchanan and Marsh involved. Hit a couple explosive plays. Make opponents respect the possibility that Bryce can beat them. Get better. Also, stop handing the other team the goddamn football.
3-0. A ranked win. Some emerging stars. No catastrophic injuries. And a whole lot we still don't know. I guess that's about as successful a non-conference schedule 3 games into a coaching regime as you could ask for…or that you should ask for. — Side note: I like Whit. I think he’s going to be good, maybe great. However, and maybe it’s just me, I DO NOT LIKE HIS SIDELINE FACE. I worry that when things go south there’s gonna be a plethora of Mitch McConnell and/or Uncle Leo memes. “I’m an old man, I’m confused!”
Anyway, onward…
Michigan moves on to Big Ten play, where problems tend to be magnified. A sloppy half will lead to a loss. Iowa is coming to town to play some Iowa football. Disciplined, physical, mistake-free…and almost completely devoid of anything resembling an offense.
Go Blue.
Way Back When-sday Was Tired
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September 17, 2005: In honor of this weekend’s return of Fry Daddy Frank, here’s a couple of fellas that looked bright-eyed and bushy-tailed at the start of the tailgate, but sometimes you just need a nap before your team unloads on a directional school.
Michigan defeated Eastern Michigan 55-0. Chad Henne had 3 TDs and Max Martin had 117 yards and two touchdowns of his own. Game page lives here. Rest of the photos from the day are below.
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