The Seeker

Tommy Carr's first career TD pass was great, but Salesi Moa's catch was even better (Rachel Leggett)

I'm looking for me

You're looking for you

We're looking at each other

And we don't know what to do

They call me the seeker

I been searchin low and high

I won't get to get what I'm after

Till the day I die

"The Seeker" by The Who from their 1970 single of the same name.

There's not a whole lot to say about a game where, if the quarter scores were reversed, there would be even less to say.  Michigan looked middling to start, had a couple of costly turnovers, got burned by a clever play design on 3rd and 1 to lead to UTEP's first touchdown and just got beat on a sudden change play for UTEP's second score.  Beyond that, Michigan's defense, when it stopped stalling out, started to look as promised, though clearly harmed by the loss of yet another offensive line starter for the game.  But, whatever adjustments were made at halftime clearly worked, as Michigan set forth a 28-point outburst in the third quarter, capped off by an end of quarter Jonah Lea'ea thicc six. The other highlight was Salesi Moa's touchdown reception in the fourth, providing Tommy Carr with his first career touchdown pass (he looked good, but the backup QB is always extremely popular, moreso when he's the grandson of a pair of program legends.  Tom Curtis was a consensus All-America and a College Football Hall of Famer, and owns Michigan's career record for interceptions, he's a Michigan legend.)

This game should have been perfunctory and it wasn't until it was. Michigan will not be able to sleepwalk through B1G games in the first half if they want to win, and I am hoping that they can learn the correct lessons from this game, because Iowa is on the horizon next week and every goal is still on the table, even if it was a moderately ugly way to arrive here after three weeks.

Tales from the Spreadsheet

• 52-17 is NOT a Scorigami!  It has happened two previous times: 1995 Minnesota and 2022 Rutgers.
• Win 1,024 (2^10 wins!)
• 110,698 were "in attendance" for the game (the forecast for rain dampened turn out), the 97th-largest crowd in Michigan Stadium history.
• Michigan moves to 1-0-0 all-time against the University of Texas El Paso.
• Michigan moves to 8-0-0 all-time on September 19, all eight games in Ann Arbor.
• Michigan moves to 14-0-0 when scoring exactly 52 points (the most recent 52 point effort was 2023 Indiana).
• Michigan moves to 39-16-2 all-time when allowing 17 points to the opposition (This is the first time Michigan has allowed 17 points in a game since...2025 New Mexico).
• Michigan has won 23 games all-time by precisely 35 points, the most recent examples being the 2018 Rutgers game and the 2022 Rutgers game.

Eminence Front

A walk-off sack is a pretty neat ending.  (Rachel Leggett)

It's an eminence front

It's an eminence front, it's a put on

It's a put on, it's a put on, it's a put on

Come and join the party, dressed to kill

Won't you come and join the party dressed to kill?

 --"Eminence Front" by the Who, the second single from their 1982 album It's Hard

I want to be clear: I did not expect this.  I allowed myself to hope it was possible; Oklahoma had offensive challenges, Michigan's defense was a net positive against Western Michigan last week, and it's college football in Week 2; nothing is set in stone.  But knowing that, given the nature of last week's finish, the holiday weekend discourse cycle leading to a sense that the college football world wanted nothing more than to see the Sooners turn Michigan into a fine nutritive paste, it seemed like the universe was going to extract its pound of flesh to pay Michigan back, Final Destination style, for surviving last week.

But it's college football, not a karmic ledger.  As much as we might try to ascribe that role to it.

After Oklahoma and Michigan traded punts, Michigan looked to have a three-and-out, only to get dinged with a running-into-the-kicker call, but still got off the field, only to be pinned inside the ten (in what would become a leitmotif for this game).  But then Michigan put together a drive, despite some penalties, that included two huge plays, a 36-yard completion to JJ Buchanan on third and ten (Buchanan set up shop at the sticks and then got some g  at YAC), Michigan kept moving, aided by a OU pass interference penalty, and then sealed by a great 38 yard run by Bryce Underwood for Michigan's first score.  Not the most elegant drive, and certainly similar to one's last week that were cut down in their primes by sloppy penalties (this is still a concern going into next week.  Not the penalties themselves, the kind of penalties Michigan keeps getting called for all seem to be from the lack of detail orientation and discpline.)

It looked, for a moment, like Michigan would hand Oklahoma the ball back and that the Sooners would go down and answer, especially after a John Mateer "pass" attempt was ruled incomplete rather than a fumble (the definition of "his arm is going forward" is still murky, and I think it was just easier to uphold the ruling on the field.)  But the universe decided that Michigan deserved a turnover, which is why Todd Bowles recovered a fumble on the next play and Michigan set up shop  but could not do anything with it (other than recover two of their own fumbles, terrifying in its own way), punting it back to Oklahoma, the ball downed at the one yard line.  The Sooners went three and out and Michigan, hindered by a very ill-timed holding penalty, could only take mild advantage of the field position and put a Trey Butkowski field goal on the board to make it 10-0.  The Sooners did look like they might have something cooking in the two-minute drill, but the Michigan defense stood tall after Oklahoma crossed midfield and the teams went into the locker room with Michigan up 10, a state of affairs that probably surprised almost everyone in the building except possibly the Michigan defense.

An interlude about the Michigan Stadium experience this week.  The LED button lights were gone from the handrails, which felt like an awful lot of work for one week, but nevertheless.  The DJ not only played a Kayne song again but also added "Rock and Roll Part 2" which has pretty much been de factobanned by all sports for decades.  The Google Gemini trivia ad was still terrible, but at least it was coherent this week.  The sound mix is still an absolute mess, but they did actually remember to put up the words for the "sing along" choice winner this week. It's a work in progress, but it's still exceedingly genercizied.

When Oklahoma got the ball back after Michigan's opening three and out and went ninety yards on eight plays, capped by a dreadful coverage bust for the touchdown, you could tell the mood of the stadium was shifting into "Well, it was fun while it lasted" mindsets.  That Michigan's ensuing drive was cut short by a seven-yard sack of Bryce Underwood on third down that looked far more violent and devestating than just a seven yard loss did not help, though another Cam Brown punt downed at the one yard line did raise spirits.  But then Oklahoma got out of the shadow of their own end zone, aided in part by a wholly unnecessary personal foul penalty on Jyaire Hill, and then a great pitch and catch between John Mateer and Rocky Beers, then moved along by another personal foul, though this one far more dubious, a facemask call on Dom Nichols, in part because Mateer's helmet came off in his hands.  If you looked at the replay, Nichols is nowhere near the face mask, Mateer's helmet is on so loosely that it essentially popped off in Nichols' hands as he was attempting to finish a sack attempt.  Alas.  But the defense held the Sooners to a field goal and tied at 10, it felt not like a whole new ballgame, but certainly like the entire direction of the season hung in the balance.

Michigan, unfortunately, was still not having great success on the offensive side of the ball and punted it back to Oklahoma, where many suspected it would lead to the game winning score.  Well, it did, but not the way one would think.  Having been part of the problem before, Jyaire Hill would atone for his football sins with a tremendous pick of John Mateer, returning it 24 yards to the Oklahoma 6 yard line, and setting up a Jordan Marshall touchdown two plays later, Michigan was up 17-10, and had shown some fight finally in the second half. 

With a Michigan Stadium as loud and engaged as I can remember, a tense back and forth ensued where neither side could do what it needed or wanted to do on offense to finish the game on their terms, drives that ended with punts or a turnover on down before culminating in a Nate Marshall walk-off sack and a Michigan victory.   

Before last week's game, I saw the Oklahoma game as the fulcrum of this season.  The challenges of playing defending national champion Indiana, plus road games at Eugene and in Columbus meant that Michigan was going to need to play above what they looked like on paper if they wanted to avoid being a four-loss team in the regular season, which meant beating Oklahoma.  The scoreboard helpfully pointed out that Oklahoma is one of five teams on Michigan's schedule this season that won ten or more games last year (all of the aforementioned, plus Western Michigan), and while that was then, the expectations were much lower after last week where Michigan did not look like they could get out of first gear on offense and spent way too much time on the field on defense as a result.  But college football is not destined or fated.  Oregon and Ohio State both dropped games yesterday while Michigan earned a result few expected from them.  There is a floor to this season, but it's much higher than it felt after last week's game.  The ceiling might still be right where we left it, but for now, the jokes can be made about Michigan being the first team in history to go 2-0 after starting the season 0-1, but Michigan heads into UTEP week with just 30 points on offense and two wins to its name.

Tales from the Spreadsheet

• 17-10 is NOT a Scorigami!  It has happened three previous times: 1964 Michigan State, 1980 Northwestern, and 2006 Penn State.
• Win 1,023
• 111,240 were in attendance for the game (a lot of Sooners in there), the 57th-largest crowd in Michigan Stadium history.
• Michigan moves to 1-2-0 all-time against the University of Oklahoma, having previously lost the 1976 Orange Bowl and last year's meeting in Norman.
• Michigan moves to 3-3-1 all-time on September 12 (Losses to Wisconsin in 1981, Notre Dame in 1987, and Syracuse in 1998; a 1992 tie in South Bend; and the 2009 win over the Irish and 2015 win over Oregon State)
• Michigan moves to 19-17-2 when scoring exactly 17 points (the previous 17-point effort was 2024 Oregon, MOVING ON).
• Michigan moves to 59-10-1 all-time when allowing 10 points to the opposition (This is the first time Michigan has allowed 10 points in a game since...2025 Wisconsin).
• Michigan has won 54 games all-time by precisely 7 points, the most recent example being the 2024 Michigan State game.

I Can't Explain

And now the maize jerseys are forever immortalized, just not in the way we thought.  (Exceptional photo by Rachel Leggett.)

Dizzy in the head and I'm feeling blue

The things you've said, well, maybe they're true

I'm gettin' funny dreams again and again

I know what it means, but

"I Can't Explain" by The Who (from the band's 1964 single release, the first under the name The Who)

I don't like believing in omens, but I'm a Michigan fan; omens are ignored at one's own peril.  So when the drum major dropped the mace after tossing it over the goalpost in pre-game, my mind immediately went to the other time we know it happened in a season-opening game, 2007 Appalachian State.  Michigan comes out wearing the all-maize monstrosities, a new scoreboard graphics package that feels like a hustling of people who have already spent far too much money to be there, and it all feels worse, cheaper, and less authentic than it did in the past.  But we're here, another season, a new year, and a new era.  So we can hope.

Michigan lost the toss and got the ball first, and if you only looked at the first drive in isolation, Michigan's scripted drive was pretty solid.  Some excellent passing early, including a play where Bryce lost the snap long, recovered it, and scrambled outside to hit JJ Buchanan for 20 yards. The illegal formation penalties were annoying (and as Seth Fisher noted, might be a new point of emphasis this year for things that had been previously uncalled), but Michigan went down, and after an iffy replay review on Bryce's audible to a naked boot to the corner (FORESHADOWING) but Michigan punched it in next play, 7-0 Michigan and everything feels solid and good.

Reader, it was anything but after that.

Western Michigan mounted a 42-yard drive that ended in a field goal, and I sort of felt OK if Michigan's defense could keep the Broncos to three points on their fall camp drive.  But Michigan went 4 plays and a punt (including a ghastly near interception where everyone in the building is begging Bryce to just throw it out of bounds, only to have the pick overturned because the WMU player was out of bounds first), then held the Broncos to a three-and-out, only to have Andrew Marsh just straight up have the punt drop through his catch radius.  But Michigan's defense held Western to four plays and a turnover on downs.  I noted at that point that well, the turnover sucked, but at least the defense, oh crap, Michigan with a three-and-out where it only gained two yards, defense forces a punt, Michigan with a three-and-out that only gains five yards, defense forces a punt, Michigan with a three-and-out that only gains ONE YARD, defense forces a punt, Michigan with another terrible AND NEEDLESS interception where everyone in the building is begging Beck to just run the clock out and get to the locker room, Western gets a field goal and we head into the half Michigan 7, Western Michigan 6.

This is where I make my interlude about the continuing decline of Michigan Stadium's in-game presentation.  

1). Adding the weird little LED buttons to the aisle handrails makes the whole place seem cheap.

1a). Not adding them in the student section because you know they would be stolen. 

2). They played "All of the Lights" even though it had largely been agreed that they were no longer going to play songs by that artist and had not for several years.

3). The allegedly improved cell service still left me without a signal until most of the students had bailed before the end of the game. Even weirder was the fact that it kept showing that I had five bars of signal, but nothing would connect to send/receive.

4). The got-danged Google Gemini "trivia quiz" promotion, which featured a question so convoluted there's no correct way to answer it.

4a). In retrospect, that's actually probably a perfect advertisement for what Google Gemini will do. 

5). Some very weird entrance choices leading up to taking the field.

6). Putting up the lyrics for "Mr. Brightside" but not for the "pick the sing-along song" choice later in the 4th- why would you not do that? 

As a whole, the last five years have been an effort to "modernize" the game day in-stadium experience that has only succeeded in making the whole of it feel cheap and hokey in the pursuit of "modernity."  I get that things need to evolve, to some degree, but it just feels like it's a scattershot attempt by people who don't fully understand what their fans want or what makes Michigan Stadium special and cherished by generations of fans. 

Back to the game.

I felt like Michigan needed to come out of halftime and hold Western Michigan to a three-and-out if it wanted any chance to win the game, and I suppose, on the long arc of history, I was right.  I also presumed Michigan would take its first possession of the second half and do something better than lighting downs on fire, but after seven plays and 29 net yards, including a holding penalty on the quarterback(?!?!?), Michigan punted the ball back to Western with nine minutes left on the clock and would not see it again for the remainder of the third quarter.

If deserving to win had anything to do with the actual outcomes of sporting events, this drive would be the evidence: 20 plays, 13:40 off the clock, three third-down conversions; it's all there.  But it is worth noting, it did not end in a touchdown, just a field goal.  

Another interlude:

For years, my sports fandom has informed me that the best choice in any sporting event, when given one, is to leave no doubt, to take the potential result out of the hands of the officials.  If we're looking for a positive from the Michigan side, it's that the defense did not allow a touchdown yesterday.  Yes, they had trouble getting off the field, and that is deeply troubling for the rest of the season, but they did not allow a touchdown.  If even one of Western Michigan's drives ends in a touchdown, they take this upset all the way back across I-94 and forever become the first Michigan MAC school to have taken down Michigan.

Michigan got the ball back only to go three-and-out after just seven measly yards and a well-earned chorus of boos from the 110,879 announced crowd.  The defense once again did its job, forcing a punt that pinned Michigan deep on its own 7.  A nice Jordan Marshall run, the first real sign of life in the offense in the entire second half, was followed by a one-yard run that featured Marshall trying to do too much and bouncing to turn a three-yard gain into a one-yard gain.  Then Bryce scrambled and, as he was going down, lost the ball.  A fumble, a turnover, and all looked lost, and Michigan fans were left to contemplate just how long this season was going to be.  Michigan's defense almost broke, allowing an 11-yard run on first down, but managed to hold Western to another field goal.  It was, admittedly, a curious choice as to why WMU did not just try to get a first down on fourth and four, but the field goal at least forces Michigan to go get a touchdown to beat you, and what exactly in the second half would have led anyone to believe Michigan could go the length of the field in under a minute.

About that...

After two incompletions, Underwood found JJ Buchanan for 28 yards, stopping the clock for the first down, and getting set up at the Western Michigan 47 at 0:11.  Bryce spiked the ball, and somehow, three seconds came off the clock.  The officials put a second back on to set it at 0:09, setting Michigan up for a Hail Mary attempt.  (I would have thought they were going to do the ten-yard out to the sidelines to try and make the Hail Mary a little more manageable, but they did not).  My family and I walked down the stairs of Section 7 to the main level portal, watched the Hail Mary fly out of the back of the end zone, and I began contemplating how long a season this was going to be and how many points Oklahoma was going to put up on Michigan next week.

Then a curious thing happened.  As we walked from Section 7, we were joined by some people, but not enough people to indicate that the game was officially over.  We heard that there was a replay review, but it kept lingering.  We did not hear the official say that there was one second left on the clock.  Eventually, around Section 41, we ducked back up a portal, just in time to see Bryce uncork a second Hail Mary throw, find JJ Buchanan, who amazingly held on to the ball, and suddenly, impossibly, Michigan had won.  It did not make any sense in the moment; it doesn't make any sense twelve-plus hours later, but Michigan won.  How?  I can't explain.

Naturally, the entire sports world is angry, outraged, disheartened, and conspiratorial about how the Big Ten "magically" found one second on the clock to protect one of its big brands.  Even the video the conference released showing the conversation among the replay officials has been dismissed by those who want to dismiss it.  But having been on more than my fair share of "questionable" calls from Big Ten officials (The Spot, Spartan Bob, Hutchinson's Strip Sack overturned in the 2021 MSU game, to name three off the top of my head), I'm not going to question it.  It may be a worthless miracle, but it's a win.  It's arguably the ugliest win I can remember in Michigan history, but it's a win.  There's a LOT of work to do before the Sooners get here on Saturday. Michigan gets to move back into the villain role for a minute, but while I may not be celebrating the win, no one's making us give it back either.  Sometimes the drum major drops the mace and you don't lose.  Who knew?

More like win improbability chart, am I right? (ESPN)

Tales from the Spreadsheet

• 13-12 is NOT a Scorigami!  It also happened against Chicago in 1937.  Since I was asked, 7-12 also would not have been a Scorigami, as it happened against a MAC school in 1913, except the MAC in question was Michigan Agricultural College (now MSU).
• Win 1,022
• 110,879 were in attendance for the game (hilarious that the last three numbers line up with the founding of Michigan football), the 81st-largest crowd in Michigan Stadium history.
• Michigan moves to 9-0-0 all-time against Western Michigan University (including one game when they were Western State in 1917).  Michigan remains, barely, undefeated all-time against Western Michigan/Eastern Michigan/Central Michigan.
• Michigan moves to 2-1-0 all-time on September 5 (A loss to Notre Dame in 1998, a win over Western Michigan in 2009)
• Michigan moves to 20-17-1 when scoring exactly 13 points (the tie is against Ohio State in 1991, one of the greatest victories in Ohio State history).
• Michigan moves to 16-4-2 all-time when allowing 12 points to the opposition (This is the first time Michigan has allowed 12 points in a game since...2002 Western Michigan).
• Michigan has won 27 games all-time by precisely 1 point, the most recent example being the 2014 Northwestern game, aka the M00N game.

Light On

The end that was.

Would you believe me now if I told you I got caught up in a wave?

Almost gave it away

Would you hear me out if I told you I was terrified for days?

Thought I was gonna break

Oh, I couldn't stop it

Tried to slow it all down

Crying in the bathroom

Had to figure it out

With everyone around me saying

"You must be so happy now."

--"Light On" by Maggie Rogers, the final song written for her 2018 debut album Heard It In a Past Life

It was always going to end this way.  Not because we wanted it to be, not because we deserved it, but because it is the way it has been for nearly three decades.  Michigan has a hockey team good enough to make the Frozen Four, and, unless it shuts its opponent out, loses the national semi-final, usually in overtime.

Oh, if you keep reaching out

Then I'll keep coming back

And if you're gone for good

Then I'm okay with that

If you leave the light on

Then I'll leave the light on (Light on, light on, light on)

"Light On" is a dreadfully ironic choice of title and theme for a post about the conclusion of another hockey season that, like most do, ended with a loss.  All Michigan had to do was turn the (goal) light on one more time, and they would have assured the Big Ten its first NCAA men's hockey championship since 2007 and the first since the league began sponsoring men's hockey.  They took shot after shot after shot, all of varying quality, and at one point right before the bitter end, Michigan was outshooting Denver 52-25.  The consensus of the media, fans, and the Michigan team itself was that Michigan was largely the better team in the second period, third period, and both overtimes.  But as college hockey so frequently reminds us, the best team is not the one that plays the best over the course of the game, rather it is the one that finds a way to score more goals than it allows.  Yes, it is the entire point of the game: score at least one more goal than your opponent, and you are declared the winner.  Once again, Michigan, which by several metrics looked like the best and most complete team in the country over the course of a regular season, will not get to hang a banner honoring the completion of that journey.  There are no banners for "#1 NPI" after all.

And I am finding out

There's just no other way

That I'm still dancing at the end of the day

If you leave the light on

Then I'll leave the light on (Light on, light on, light on)

The natural tendency after a season-ending loss is a combination of sadness, regret, lamentation, bitterness, and doubt.  Perhaps because there were so many stats at the ready showing the futility of Michigan in the NCAA tournament since it won its ninth title in 1998, coupled with the frustration of a game that ended around 12:50 AM EDT, there seemed to be a lot of questioning by fans in the Michigan hockey hive on Bluesky as to why we do this to ourselves, invest emotionally in a team that seems to get up to within view of the summit, only to fall all the way down the mountain in a painful, but often predictable way.  

And do you believe me now that I always had the best intentions, babe?

Always wanted to stay

Can you feel me now that I'm vulnerable in oh-so-many ways?

Oh, and I'll never change

But we love it.  Hockey is the best because it is the worst.  Hockey shows you so many tremendously skilled things on any given night, coupled with exceptional physicality, that makes it so compelling to watch.  There is no other sport quite like it.  That the NCAA tournament is single-elimination does not make hockey bad; it just allows a significant amount of randomness to enter the sample.  As I explained to my son on Monday when he asked me before the men's basketball title game if I was more nervous about that game or Thursday (meaning the Frozen Four game), I said Thursday without hesitation.  He looked at me and asked why, and I explained that dozens of things have to go wrong for a team to lose a basketball game.  One thing and only one thing has to go wrong to lose a hockey game.  And I've seen it happen a dozen times and more.  Obviously, this is an oversimplification of an emotional truth.  One could easily argue that every shot Michigan took last night that didn't go in was something that went wrong, for instance.  But it doesn't feel that way when the overtime winning goal goes into the net for the opponent.  That's what went wrong; it was all over for another year.  

Oh, I couldn't stop it

Tried to figure it out

But everything kept moving

And the noise got too loud

With everyone around me saying

"You should be so happy now

Yes, let us acknowledge that it is understandable if folks outside the Michigan fandom would like to give us a bit of side-eye for being sad about this loss, given that Michigan won the men's basketball team, something so many of us deeply enjoyed and celebrated literally earlier this week.  We should be so happy now!  It's a valid argument.  I thoroughly enjoyed this year's men's basketball team and the title run was amazing and unforgettable.  But at the same time, Michigan hockey has always been my second-favorite Michigan sport, and it honestly might be my co-favorite with football.  Every spring for the past thirty years, I have geared up to watch Michigan make a run in the NCAA tournament, and after feeling very good about the two titles in three years at the start of that, the next quarter century, give or take, has been season after season of frustration in various ways, shapes, and forms.  That so many of those shapes and forms look similar, I think, is what makes it so challenging emotionally.  We're watching a new movie, but we recognize the tropes.  We know what the doombringer generally looks and sounds like, and we're just waiting for it to come.  But we want to believe it will be different because it can be different.  After all, it has been different.  But it hasn't been that way during the 21st century.  This is not a case for giving up or abandoning the thing you love; it's just acknowledging that it's not necessarily going to bring you the ultimate joy that you long for.  And maybe that's OK.  And maybe it isn't, but only you can make that choice.  

Oh, if you keep reaching out

Then I'll keep coming back

And if you're gone for good

Then I'm okay with that

And if you leave the light on

Then I'll leave the light on (Light on, light on, light on)

And I am finding out

There's just no other way

That I'm still dancing at the end of the day

If you leave the light on

Then I'll leave the light on (Light on, light on, light on)

Maggie Rogers might be my favorite musical artist whose entire output is from the 21st century.  In the decade since her Masterclass moment with Pharrell at NYU went viral, she has put out a significant amount of absolutely banger indie pop/folk/rock.  In a 2018 tweet, Maggie herself explained that "Light On" was a note to her fans and her friends and loved ones who supported her before and after her sudden fame, that she had to understand everything that had happened to her, how it had changed her, but also how it had not, and how that could alter relationships with people known and unknown.  The future is unknowable; all you can do is chart a course for yourself and hope that people will want to join you on that journey.  The past is not destiny any more than the future is predetermined.  Maybe next time will be different, because it can be different.  We'll leave the light on.

Next year in Washington.