About 13 or 14 years ago, I found myself substitute teaching for a 3rd grade class in a small elementary school near my hometown of Middletown. I wasn't psyched about the assignment, mostly because I was fairly certain at least one of the couple dozen eight year olds in my care would get eaten by a coyote at some point in the day, but to make matters worse I arrived at the school to find that the power had somehow gone out in like half of the classrooms.
The school's solution to this dilemma was to herd multiple classes of kids into one the few rooms with power (mine), and wheel in an ancient CRT monitor to play literal VHS tapes of Reading Rainbow until lunchtime while administration drew straws to decide who was going to have to run the boiler or siphon gas from cars to start the backup generator or whatever the hell.
We're screwed, I thought. There is no way in hell these kids are going to watch Geordi LaForge talk to them about Foxes in Sockses for four hours. They're gonna get bored and eat me alive.
But they did not! Those kids freaking loved watching nerdy little squirts like themselves review books that were published in 1991. Everything went fine, and that was probably the last time in history that specific tactic ever worked in a classroom, anywhere.
Times have changed, and people aren't entertained the way they used to be. Michigan beat Iowa in an ostensibly close contest, 27-14, that wasn't actually close because this isn't 2009 and you do in fact have to field an offense to win a football game. I should've been excited by this one, watching with the same rapt attention that those kids gave Reading Rainbow back in the day.
That did not happen.
THE OFFENSE
Folks, have you heard about this Iowa defense? An absolute murderers row, they are. The '85 Bears look like trash when stacked up against these monsters, who have dominated the likes of, uh, Nevada, South Dakota State, Iowa State, and Rutgers since the beginning of the season. What chance did Michigan have when facing probably one of the best, nay, the best defense in the history of collegiate football?
A decent one, it turns out. Michigan largely did Michigan things on offense, which by this point you should know means "running the ball six hundred times and hoping not to screw up too badly in the passing game." Is it weird that J.J. McCarthy's talent (18/24, 155 yards passing, only 6.5 YPA) is being forced into a Cade McNamara-sized box? Is it concerning that receivers Ronnie Bell and Roman Wilson have been AWOL for a few weeks now? Yeah, a little, but this was a road game that Michigan wanted to win the surest way possible, and that meant leaning on running back Blake Corum (29 carries, 133 yards).
When the running game was effective, the Wolverines scored. When it wasn't, they punted. These are normal things for a football team to do against a talented defense, and it really only becomes a concern if you're also playing a talented offense.
Guess what?
THE DEFENSE
You're all probably well-aware by this point of exactly how bad the Iowa offense is, and this game was no exception to that rule. We'll talk about quarterback Spencer Petras in a second, but the Hawkeye running game is particularly bad; the unit as a whole is averaging less than 2.8 yards per carry on the season and against Michigan managed only 35 yards on 24 attempts.
By the time the end of the 3rd quarter rolled around, the Wolverines held a comfortable 20-0 lead, but Iowa was driving. Petras, who frankly played pretty well for most of the game (21/31, 246 yards), took advantage of a J.J. McCarthy fumble that Michigan recovered but pinned them deep and lead Iowa to a touchdown to get them on the board.
The Wolverines went three-and-out, and Iowa came right back at them, launching a 13 play drive that... ended up turning the ball over on downs at the Michigan five yard line.
And that was pretty much it. The Hawkeyes added a meaningless touchdown at the end of the game, but several sacks from a resurgent Michigan defensive line (Mike Morris had two sacks) meant that nothing was going to come easy when it actually mattered.
WHAT DID WE LEARN?
I think Harbaugh has confirmed that despite a clear talent upgrade at quarterback, he's going to be content to try and win games exactly the same way that they did in 2021; lean heavily on a running game, trust the QB not to turn the ball over, and generate short fields with a stifling defense.
It's not a bad way to win games if you've got the talent to do it, and by game five I'm ready to say that yeah, they probably do. Might some offensive lapses and a downgraded defensive line come back to bite them in the ass against Penn State? Sure, it's possible. But before that they'll play and probably beat the Indiana Hoosiers, and as a result the Threat Level remains HIGH.
