"Who are we?" "The Wildcats!" "Who are we gonna beat?" "The Wildcats!"

Yeah, you're not going to win when you're playing Michigan and you give up five turnovers. Combine that with -13 yards on the ground, and you're not going to do much with the ball, period. Still, this was a closer game than it should've been. Poor execution by our offense kept this game from being a complete blowout. On Michigan Replay, Lloyd confessed his displeasure with the passing game. The ground game was much better, but without a passing threat they were running into stacked fronts all day. With even a little more success in the air, we're up 17-0 going into halftime. It's not that the game was in question – not with the ridiculous dominance of our defense – but with a bigger lead we could afford to give the backups more playing time. As it was, Mike Hart was on the sidelines for long stretches of the game (Carr called him "banged up"), and it was little-heralded Jerome Jackson who had the most success in his stead.

The weather for this game was absolutely miserable. I've heard more than one person call it the worst weather since '95 Purdue, where the game ended 5-0 in a sloppy, snowy mess of a game. The water in the air was all liquid this time, but the windchill was down to 30°F at kickoff. I ski, so I'm not unused to cold, wet conditions, but even I went inside Crisler Arena after halftime and stayed there for much of the second half. I'd used my poncho to keep the water off my knees, so my supposedly waterproof coat was soaked through. My gloves were so wet that they didn't dry off until last night. Once I could tell from the TV that the sun had come out, we went back into the stadium. Out in the parking lot after the game, the sun stayed out, but was accompanied by an even stronger wind. Not really conducive to a post-game celebration.

The Band

Being homecoming, everyone marched halftime. Simple formations, not a lot of movement. The music was all early rock 'n' roll; the MMB did "Great Balls of Fire" and "Rock Around the Clock". The alumni band then joined them for some Elvis before moving on to traditional Michigan songs. They did "Temptation", "Hawaiian War Chant", "I Wanna Go Back To Michigan", and maybe a couple others. I heard a rumor that Jean-Luc Picard will be involved in next week's show. Maybe something to do with Patrick Stewart being in town with the Royal Shakespeare Company.