Tag: J.J. McCarthy

Big Ten Championship: Michigan 42, Iowa 3

BIG TEN CHAMPS!!! A lot of people doubted this Michigan team – including yours truly – but they’re right where almost everyone wishes they could be. They beat the brakes off Ohio State and then the Big Ten West opponent, and now they’re headed to the playoffs. I thought they would be 8-4, so I certainly didn’t think they would be 12-1 and in this spot, but I also never lost faith in Jim Harbaugh’s ability to coach. That 2-4 season in 2020 made a lot of people forget that this guy turned around two other college programs, returned the 49ers to the Super Bowl, and made a 5-7 team into a 10-3 team immediately upon arriving in Michigan. He now averages 9.8 wins per season at Michigan if you give him a full year.

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Michigan 29, Indiana 7

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Eat your vitamins. My biggest takeaway from this game is that Michigan needs to get healthy. Going into the game, Michigan was missing RB Donovan Edwards and TE Erick All. And here are the players who got injured during the game: QB Cade McNamara (lower body), RB Blake Corum (lower leg), CB Gemon Green (shoulder), WR Andrel Anthony (unknown). Luckily, the Wolverines had a big enough advantage in this game that it ended up not affecting the outcome, but the toughest stretch of the schedule is coming up, with Penn State next week and Ohio State in three weeks.

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Michigan 33, Northwestern 7

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FIRE MCNAMARA! OR DON’T! After the game yesterday, I hopped on Twitter and came across a tweet saying “Cade [McNamara] has missed almost everything today.” I found that to be a very odd statement, considering he completed a season-high 74% of his passes. McNamara finished 20/27 for 129 yards, 0 touchdowns, and 0 interceptions. He averaged 4.8 yards per attempt, which is a pitiful number. After I called the Twitterer out for being factually incorrect, he relented and lamented the fact that McNamara missed the deep shots down the field. Which leads me to my next thought.

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Michigan 32, Nebraska 29

Even a broken clock is right twice a day. I predicted a 34-28 victory for Michigan (LINK), which was only 3 total points off. And if Michigan hadn’t whiffed on their two-point conversion attempt, it would have been even closer. Essentially, the game went almost exactly how I thought it would. I thought Michigan would be ahead late and then force a turnover, stopping a final drive, much like what happened against Rutgers. Instead, Michigan and Nebraska were tied late, and Brad Hawkins forced a fumble, leading to the game-winning field goal. Nebraska is a tough place to play at night – which we learned back in 2012 when Denard Robinson hurt his elbow and Russell Bellomy entered disastrously. Escaping with a victory this time feels good.

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Michigan 38, Wisconsin 17

Michigan’s defense won the day. The scoreboard says 38 points for Michigan, which is a good amount of points, but the Wolverines won the game with their defense. They held the Badgers to 43 total rushing yards, which is their lowest total since they had -26 yards against Northwestern in November 2015. Wisconsin’s leading rusher was freshman Braelon Allen, who ran 5 times for 19 yards. Those overall numbers were aided by -13 yards from backup quarterback Chase Wolf and -21 yards from starting quarterback Graham Mertz, who were sacked a total of 5 times. Wisconsin’s only real sustained success was a drive near the end of the first half when Mertz was 5/5 and threw a touchdown to wide receiver Chimere Dike.

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