HOUSTON — It had almost started to fade.
Victors valiant. Conqu’ring Heros. Champions of the West.
Words that had once invoked so much, slowly dulling to a blunt edge. They certainly hadn’t lost all their shine, but the punch those lauded lyrics packed was perhaps no longer the same. The antiquated Michigan football program had stumbled its way into the new millennium.
No Big Ten Championships since 2004, a 3-17 record against Ohio State in the 21st century, a 6-12 bowl game record and a 2-4 finish in a rock bottom 2020 season.
But by 2023, everything had changed.
Asked by some to step down, Jim Harbaugh doubled down. Jeered for being antiquated and old, the Wolverines went full bore — full Big Ten. Starting in 2020, they built from the lines out, establishing a dominant ground-and-pound style that harkened back to football of old. Even as Michigan fell in two difficult CFP semifinal losses, something had changed within the storied walls of Schembechler Hall.
If they were going to go all the way, it was only going to happen one way.
Running into Houston, the first-ranked Wolverines didn’t skip a beat. Thrashing No. 2 Washington’s (14-1 overall) run defense, Michigan (15-0) summited the Huskies 34-13 on the back of none other than a good, old-fashioned 300 yard, four touchdown rushing attack en route to winning a 12th national championship in grand fashion.
“Dominance — (offensive coordinator Sherrone Moore) say every day we gon’ smash some,” sophomore quarterback Alex Orji said. “And I think he showed exactly who he is today. We got the best back duo in the nation, we got the best O-line in the nation. I promise that.”
For a moment, it looked like the Wolverines would run away with it.
On their first two offensive drives they found the endzone with ease, courtesy of two 40-yard home runs by junior running back Donovan Edwards. Scoring 17 points on its first three offensive drives, Michigan throttled the gas pedal as the Huskies spiraled.
But three stalled offensive drives later, the Wolverines went into the halftime break up just 17-10. A once red-hot rushing attack sputtered, and Michigan allowed Washington to hang tough. The yard differential was large, but the margin for error small.
“Sometimes, when you break the runs like that early, you tend to think that you may not need to block as hard throughout the rest of the game,” graduate center Drake Nugent said. “… But in reality it’s kind of the opposite because the defense is gonna get more stout.”
Those same frustrations carried into the second half as the Wolverines struggled to get anything going offensively. Michigan secured just three points on its first four offensive drives of the second half — with the single field goal coming off an interception by quarterback Michael Penix Jr. that set up the Wolverines with plus field position.
That slow churning was all in a classic fashion though.
The antiquated, hard-nosed, traditionalist style of football may have died years ago amid the air-raid offenses of bustling cities out West, or conferences down South. But three years ago, Michigan had decided to double down. Jim Harbaugh had decided to double down.
And the Wolverines wouldn’t stop now.
“We started fast. They slowed us up a little bit,” senior running back Blake Corum said. “But when we needed to start fast again, we started fast.”
Up 20-13 with just over nine minutes left in the fourth quarter, Michigan’s offense found its footing. As a ground and pound playstyle gave birth to an electric play action completion to sophomore tight end Colston Loveland, the Wolverines strung together an offensive drive that punctuated in a fashion befitting only of the latter Jim Harbaugh era.
Making a cut in the backfield before surging up the middle, senior running back Blake Corum sprinted into the endzone for six points, giving the Wolverines an insurmountable 26-13 lead.
And then he did it again.
Just eight plays later, after graduate defensive back Mike Sainristil returned an interception to within the Washington 10, Corum needed two carries to gain eight yards, and drive the final stake into the heart of the Huskies.
“Now we’re in the history books forever,” Nugent said. “We’re legends.”
Victors valiant. Conqu’ring Heros. Champions of the West.
By 2020, they had faded, crushed under the duress of losing seasons and long-remembered anguish. By 2022, they had found color, attaining glimpses of the exceptionalism that had defined Michigan seasons of years past. But on a January evening in 2024, they found vibrance.
The Champions of the West have become the champions of the rest.