This is the Uniersity of Michigan Football Item for the 1995-1996 season.

Go Blue!

The Wolverines opened the season today, August 26 in the sixth annual
Pigskin Classic. The first one to be played outside of California.
They played the Virginia Cavaliers. 

It was hot. Almost 90F under a burning sun. I had my 25 sunblock on,
so I survived. 

It looked bad for the home team, 17-0 a short way in to the 4th quarter.
The inexperienced QB, Dreisbach, was overthrowing his receivers.
When he did get the passes down, they were dropped. The defense looked
better than I expected, although they gave up a TD on a big running play.

Then, suddenly, they took charge and scored 3 TDS, (no extra points,
as that would have required a decent plackicker) and won the game 18-17.
The final TD was scored on Fourth Down with no time left. Mercury Hayes,
who was absolutely brilliant the whole game, caught the TD pass as he
was going out of the endzone, getting the necessary single foot inbounds
by no more than an inch.

17 responses total.

Hamilton did miss teh 43(?) yard FG but it almost looked like someone
may have gotten a hand on it.  On the first extra point, it looked to me
like the ball was never really set well by the holder.  After the 2nd TD,
the offense attempted a 2-point conversion.  And Virginia left the field
before the final conversion could be attempted.  Not a good day for Remmy,
but it's not like he was responsible for missing 3 conversions.

That's true. He only missed one, but I thought he missed it ugly.
Then I heard the theory that the ball mught not have been held well
for that kick. I can't verift that, though.

Because I'm trying to improve my kicking game, I was paying close attention to
the hold and kick.  I can verify that the ball was  placed about 1 foot too
far back -- enough in itself to screw up a kicker's approach -- and may not
have been held well, to boot (heh!).  What I'm not so sure about is whether
this was Riemersma's fault or if the snap was bad.

I haven't seen any film of this, but Riemersma has been a very consistent
holder for several years. In the absence of info, I would bet on the snap
as the source of the problem.

This weeks game was not a stellar one for the Maize&Blue. the defense
played very well, but the offense sputtered, and then stunk.
They play BC on the road next week. It'll be on TV in the evening.
It should be interesting, but BC is only a shadow of their former selves.

Yeah, but they probably still have what it takes to beat Notre Dame....  (:
[We'll find out on Oct. 28th about that.]

Michigan game is on at 6:30 on ABC.

Michigan started poorly, as is their wont. Then they crushed BC as the
UM defense really made the vaunted BC QB look bad.

No Michigan game this week. Shall we talk about Michigan State?

No, why bother?  (:

Good point. 

Michigan's toughest games are the last two of the season.
Penn State and Ohio State. Can they remain focused and get past all of the
not-so-tough teams without stumbling?  Historically, the answer would be no.

True Wolverine fans always believe that this year the answer will be
different.

Well, a lot of things have certainly been different this year.

The most important thing for a 4-0 team who wants to be 10-0?
To be 5-0.  Luckily we had a week off to prepare for Miami (OH).
Not that I should laugh, at 3-1 their record is much better than
Miami (FL), which is 1-2.

For the 3rd year in a row, Penn State has an off week prior to
playing Michigan.

Dreisbach injured his thumb in practice, and will be out for several
games, maybe a month. This makes things a little different.  I'm now
real glad that we have Miami (O) coming up, as I have been disappointed all
season with the amount of playing time they have seen fit to give to 
Brian Griese. He needs real game experience.

Heh, yeah Miami(FL), I don't feel sorry for them at all.

Right on about PSU. The schedule favors them every year in this way.

The schedule hasn't helped PSU, which just lost to a very impressive NU team
in Evanston. 

While that was happening, U-M was losing to MSU. MSU is not at the same level
of play as Northwestern by a long shot, but they played very very well
today against U-M. 

U-M is now potentially only a spoiler. If they can beat OSU, and NU doesn't 
lose, NU will go to the Rose Bowl. NU and OSU don't play this year.
If OSU is undefeated, they will go due to NU's non-conf loss to Miami(O).

If U-M loses to both PSU and OSU, they will have 4 losses, and will not
be guaranteed of a bowl bid, though they could conceivably get one. 
If they lose to Purdue, Carr will be history.

Dreisbach is to get more surgery, and is lost for the season.
He can't take snaps due to his left thumb.

UVA beat FSU - a great game to watch. Now we need FSU to beat Florida,
Kansas to beat Nebraska, and U-M to beat OSU. (chuckle)

U-M *did* beat Purdue, Carr is *not* history (in fact, he's here to stay),
and even with an 8-4 record, Michigan *will* go to some bowl somewhere.
I look for them to end the regular season 9-3...

Yup that all looks to be true. Now the immediate problem is Penn State.
The game is early, 12 or 12:30, and UM is not favored. I'll go out
on a limb and predict a Michigan victory in snowy Happy Valley.

As we all know by now, U-M lost to Penn State, a fake field goal TD late in
the 4th quarter sealing up the game (27-17).  So U-M has a monumental task
ahead of them, trying to beat an apparently invincible Ohio State squad,
Saturday in Ann Arbor.  About the same task another U-M team had in 1969
with another new head coach, whose first name was Glenn...  :-)

Final Score - MICHIGAN 31 -- OHIO STATE 23

Yes, and it was a sweet victory for U-M and a bitter loss for OSU.

People thought that Biakabutuka's running showed up George, and may have cost
him his chances of winning a Heisman Trophy, but they were wrong. George won
the award tonight.

What I liked was how TD-Tim made OSU coach John Cooper "eat his words":
During an interview on the way to the lockerroom at half, in reference to
Tim's near-200-yard performance of the first half, Cooper said "He's good,
but he's not *that* good."  Biakabatuka's 120+ second half yardage (more 
than George's for the entire game), surely showed that Cooper was wrong -
TD-Tim really *was/is* that good!  :-)

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- Backtalk version 1.3.30 - Copyright 1996-2006, Jan Wolter and Steve Weiss