On Monday afternoon, less than an hour after the Michigan football program confirmed that it had shut down in-person activities due to “presumptive positive” COVID-19 cases, Jim Harbaugh addressed the media.
“Today out of an abundance of caution, Michigan football is gonna hold everything virtually, due to we had an increased number of presumptive positives that are awaiting confirmation,” Harbaugh said.
When halftime ended Saturday afternoon and Michigan’s players gathered around their position coaches, Jim Harbaugh stood by Cade McNamara. The sophomore quarterback had missed two second-quarter drives with a shoulder injury, but he was still the Wolverines’ path to reversing their 17-7 deficit and Harbaugh knew it.
McNamara, though, represented more than that. He was Harbaugh’s only chance to lend a semblance of positivity to a season that careens toward new lows with each passing week.
“We kinda came together and said let’s put this game on our backs and start moving the ball up front, start making them respect the run game,” freshman guard Zak Zinter said Monday.
Deep in the fourth quarter Saturday night in Piscataway, Cornelius Johnson took a screen pass on the right sideline and cut downfield for a nine-yard touchdown. With the play, the sophomore receiver gave Michigan an eight-point lead that ultimately prevented Rutgers from winning in regulation.
He also hit a rare milestone for the Wolverines in recent years: A 100-yard receiving day.
The Jim Harbaugh era is in free fall.
No quarterback switch changes that. Certainly, no overtime win against Rutgers changes that.
In the first overtime Saturday night, senior kicker Quinn Nordin pushed a field goal wide right, leaving Rutgers with the game in its hands. Because it’s Rutgers, that didn’t happen. The Scarlet Knights opted for conservatism at the worst possible moment, settling for a 45-yard field goal that they missed.
It’s a miss that enabled Jim Harbaugh to sing his team’s praises after the game.
“Came up with the big stop when we needed it,” Harbaugh said. “No question about it.”
Despite Michigan’s 11-9 record over its last 20 games, Tristan Bounds and his classmates are confident the program is on an upward trend with its incoming classes.
In Michigan’s season-opening win against Minnesota three weeks and a lifetime ago, the story wasn’t Joe Milton’s first start or a new-look receiving corps. It wasn’t an inexperienced secondary or star defensive ends Kwity Paye and Aidan Hutchinson. It wasn’t even Jim Harbaugh kicking off his sixth season.
If you can shove aside the memory-clogging thoughts of Michigan’s three ensuing embarrassments, you’ll remember that the story was the Wolverines’ run game.
The point of Harbaugh’s message wasn’t to kick his team while they’re down. It was to tell them to take advantage of this adversity.
Thirty minutes before Michigan was set to kick off against No. 13 Wisconsin on Saturday night, senior safety Brad Hawkins walked to the back left corner of the end zone and knelt to offer up a prayer. If it had anything to do with football, it was not answered.
By halftime, the Wolverines trailed, 28-0 — their largest halftime deficit in Michigan Stadium’s 94-year history. When the game came to its merciful conclusion two hours later, the score had ballooned to 49-11 and the Jim Harbaugh era reached yet another nadir with a third-consecutive loss.