Blue By Ninety - Business Trip to Minnesota

Episode Date: October 2, 2026

Joel and Justin have recovered from Michigan's lost to Iowa and are optimistic for the Wolverine's first road test of the year!

All right. Welcome back to Blue By 90, presented by Feldman Chevrolet of Highland. I'm here with my co-host, Joel Honingford. It's October, man. It is, I don't know what happened to September and quite frankly August. But we are here in October, got through the first four home games. And now, you know, the boys are headed on the road. You know, I'll be honest, Joel. If I, didn't know better and just went on social media or, you know, checked a couple message boards. You would think we were legitimately 0 and 4 and the worst program in history. And, you know, and you got to burn it all to the ground. It turns out we're three and one with pretty much every goal still in sight. So I don't know if most people need that or knew that. Yeah, man, it's been a roller coaster a while a week to be a Michigan fan.

Yeah, I think it's an amplified version of wanting the backup quarterback. We talked about that a couple weeks ago about how we always have had the tendency to want the backup. When the starter's not performing, how they should do we want the backup. But in this case, it's more, if the team's not as good as you think they should be, there's all hells broke loose. And like, it's the worst situation possible. needs to be fired. If somebody's not, like, if their job is not on the line after one loss, then what are we

even doing here? You know? Yeah. And I think we can dive into this in a little bit, but the reality of the season that we're in right now is nobody has any idea how good anyone is. Like, no. No one has any idea. I mean, Wisconsin beats Penn State at home and we didn't think they were going to be much.

Western's beating Colorado by like 38 points or something like that. Like we just have no idea how good people are, which is I think a great thing for college football. It makes it harder as a fan because it are, it's these close games, right? We sit here watching these close games and is Saturday going to be one of those? I don't know. I think in my way too early prediction here, maybe way too confident, I don't think it's going to be very close.

We're five and a half point favorites. I think we're going to blow it wide open, quite honestly. Five and a half point favorites at home against Iowa and also five and a half point favorites on the road against Minnesota feels very weird. Those are two, in my opinion, completely different games and different teams. Now, being on the road is sometimes weird and, you know, whatever.

But I'm not going to go ahead and say that playing at Minnesota is like, you know, playing at Kinnick at night. you know, a nooner at Minnesota doesn't really scare me very much. I, in general, I agree with you, I do think that Michigan's to have a pretty big bounceback week and win this one pretty easily. Just in general, though, I walked away. I had some conversations. I know you and I yelled a lot on our last podcast on Sunday post-game.

we needed to get some. We were trying to be as positive as we could through three weeks. And then the fourth week, I think, pushed us over the edge of like, all right, some shit really went badly. And we actually took the L. We need to get some, you know, some stuff out of our system. I still talk to some people throughout the week. I had some conversations. I'm like weirdly still in a good spot with our football team right now for the rest of the year. You know, I know a lot of people are jumping ship. A lot of people are sitting here like, you know, oh, just like the season's over with. If we can't beat Iowa at home, we can't beat anybody, you know, don't get me wrong. We have some really tough games on the schedule for the rest of the year. But I'm sitting here after watching

that Iowa game. It's frustrating that all those things did go wrong, right? Let me say that first. but secondly, if like two of them don't go wrong, we probably win the football game and we're having different conversations. Right. And so that's where I'm sitting here like, it wasn't like we got overmatched. We actually overmatched them quite significantly.

It was all personal mistakes that you shot yourself in the foot at one time or another or tip passes bounced their way like four different times. and, you know, and really won them the game or put them in the position to be able to win the game. And so I'm sitting here looking at the rest of the year, like, I don't know in Indiana, a Penn State, an Oregon, I'm sitting here like, why couldn't we match up with them? Right. Yeah, I completely agree with you. You know, the more that I think about it, and on our last podcast, we were very frustrated. but I think the frustration is a great sign because it's not like we sat here and said,

you know what, dang it. Like I wish we would have won the end, but, you know, it's Iowa and they, they, Iowa at us. But rather we sit here and we say, we should have won the game, right? We know that we're a team that's capable of winning a game like that, and we are going to be able to match up against these other opponents. We saw our offense be as proficient as they've been all year. Like, we've saw our quarterback play his best game, arguably, of the season, just statistically speaking.

And like the reality is, if you take the stat sheet and you say, hey, look at these stats, just tell me which team won. Like everybody, nine out of ten people pick Michigan, right? It just comes down to those stupid mistakes. They're shooting yourself in the foot type of mistakes, which, why are those still happening four weeks in? I don't know. I mean, I think throughout the season, we'll see one here and there and be like,

man, that stinks. It's a little too frequent right now. And it's a little bit too into that detriment. time of the game. But yeah, we're fine. We are going to be just fine. I think the kind of the way that I look at it is we are figuring out different pieces of our team one piece at a time, right? We're not figuring it all out at once. And so we figure out the offense and how can we get the offense to score this last week? And it's like, that's great. Like our offense is where it needs to be. Can we rinse and repeat this? How is this going to look moving forward? But we've talked about it.

the biggest issue right now is just those stupid little mistakes, which you would think is something that can be handled very easily. Yeah. And listen, I find myself arguing with myself a little bit of like, you know, we're only four weeks in and we've got a lot of new guys. But then the other part of my brain is like,

well, we're four weeks in. We should have it figured out, you know? And so like, I find myself somewhere, you know, in between there.

and empathizing with both sides. If you're a fan sitting out there and you're like, man, we're a third of the way through the year and we still are making all these mistakes. You know, like on Sunday, I think we said, at some point that's just who you are, right? And so I still, I think that they do have about two weeks left at maximum for them to decide,

all right, is this who we are or can we be the best version of ourselves? because I'm sitting here. The best version of this Michigan team absolutely is a 10 and 2, 11, and one college football playoff type team. Now, they haven't been the best version of themselves through four weeks. We know that for sure. So it's time for them to sit inside Schenbeckler Hall and say, all right, which version are we going to be? And right now it's not only that version week to week, it's almost throughout the game. Are we the best version of ourselves because we're second half against U-TEP and we're dominating?

Or is it we come out slow? Like all those things, you know, I think that they've put together, they've shown at times the best version of themselves on the field. They just haven't put it together for a full game and then definitely haven't put it together for two weeks in a row. Yeah. And I would agree that two weeks is your maximum. otherwise the identity of the team is just not having one, right?

And you're like, well, I don't know what we're going to get. So halfway through the season, like, you should be very confident in what you are going to do offensively. I think defensively, we're perfectly fine. Those guys are in a great position, just clean up the mental mistakes. But, yeah, I also side with the fan that is frustrated because I'm frustrated, right? I can still sit here and say that I'm frustrated with some of the stuff that's been going on just schematically. But I do not empathize with the fan who has counted out Michigan.

I do not. We are in a fine position, like I already said. It's just a matter of, I'm curious to see how Whittingham will adjust his coaching style. Now, I don't think it'll be drastic. And maybe we won't even see it, at least from my perspective, watching TV. but he's had a sample size of four weeks to test out certain ways that he's been communicating with his players and trying to convey certain messages with them, some of which have stuck, some of which have not.

How is he going to adapt that over time in order to make sure we are a team that is as disciplined as we possibly can be? How are we going to get our special teams to a place where they don't make any mistakes? I think sometimes it does take that drastic measure of having a, a kickoff returned or a punt blocked. Like I think back to 2021 when Rutgers blocked one of our punts and scored it for a touchdown. Like you don't realize how much attention you need to something until it's that bad. Now, my hope is we don't have to get to the point where it's that bad everywhere, right?

But can we tighten these things up? And, you know, special teams specifically has always been a huge advantage of Michigan has had. It has not necessarily been that way all the time this year. I think the word of the year is inconsistency, right? So I am interested to see the coaching style of Coach Whittingham and how he kind of adapts. Do we see him more fired up on the sidelines? Probably not, you know, I don't see him being. He wasn't really ever that guy at Utah.

Plus, he's, you know, nothing against him, but he's in his 60s. So he doesn't have a lot of energy to be expended at yelling at the refs. But I'm encouraged. I'm enthused. I am excited to watch this game on Saturday's Big Noon kickoff. I never had the experience to play in Minnesota with a full capacity crowd. I played with my parents in the stands during COVID, which was a fun game. We were going to win the Nettie National Championship after that game, in my opinion.

Joe Milton. Joe Milton and Donovan Jeter, I believe, with the fumble. taking back for a touchdown. I mean, Zach Charbonnet, shout out. Shout out. Yeah, that was Blake Horm's freshman year. I remember how small he was, and I was like, holy smokes. Here he is, you know, playing on Sundays for the freaking Los Angeles Rams.

So, yeah, man. So I think that this is an opportunity. To be honest, this is a great situation. for Michigan. You get to go on the road, but you're not in a dog fight against, you know, if this is at Indiana, we're all sitting here like, man, we are probably not feeling really good, you know, going on the road. Or if you got to go to Austin Stadium against Oregon, you know, even without Dante more, right? Like, you know, I think that we'd be a lot more worried. I think that you have a chance to play some road games. We talked about getting out of

Schembeckler Hall a little bit, getting out of Ann Arbor. Sometimes it's good to shake up the system. And you go on the road against, let's be honest, an inferior opponent. They are statistically and on paper. They are not going to stack up against you, you know, from a recruiting star rankings, from, you know, just where they're at as a program, you know, you are the better program. And so I think that they have the chance to now, all right, let's go out there, let's play tough. let's go on the road and be the road warriors.

But then get the chance to, like, let's tighten all those things up exactly what you're saying and play a fundamentally sound football game, right? I don't need them to go for 600 yards this week to prove to me that they're a good football team. If they can do that, great. I more so want them to prove to me that they're a good football team by not turning the ball over, being sound on special teams, no illegal formation bullshit. All of those things are still what I'm looking for for me to be convinced that this can be a team that makes a run at a Big Ten title or a college football playoff.

Yeah, I want to touch on your point about the road game aspect of this. And let me help paint a picture here. I think the road game is exactly what we need. And the reason is, let's say, I know the roster, limited to 105, but they probably have some guys who were grandfathered in. So it's probably sitting around 115, 120, something like that. All those guys are on the sidelines at a home game, right? The sideline is crowded.

If you're playing in the game, you're staying at the hotel. You're still close to the stadium. There's, I guess, a lot of distraction, right? You get the Wolverine walk now. There's a lot that goes into it, a lot of fanfare that goes into a home game. When you are playing on the road, you are taking, well, we at least took 73 guys on the road. So it's essentially your starters, your backups, any special teams guys,

and then maybe a third string guy here or there. But it is your main guys who are playing ball. And there's something about it that is just so businesslike, where there's not going to be a lot of fanfare. They're going to be people there. A majority of that stadium will be actively rooting against us. So it is solely about how we handle business on, Saturday. There's not, you don't have the opportunity to think about, man, am I going to

ricks or skeeps tonight? Like, you just don't. You'll be flying back and going to bed. That's the reality of it. But it just, it eliminates all of that distraction. And it is truly an opportunity for you to just lock in on what you are doing. I think it'll play to their advantage. I always enjoyed playing on the road. I do think, and I think people are not going to like this. But when you play four home games in a row, I do think that there are some players who take advantage of that and maybe lose the excitement for the big house. I do think that that happens. But I think a road game is, I want you, hold on a second. I want you to say that, though. Like, I know people won't, but like these are the, the realities that I think people are interested in hearing from a player's

perspective of every time I go to the big house very often, more than the average fan. You know, I, but there are a lot of people that come there once a year, maybe once every five years. And so every time that we step into the big house, it's freaking awesome, right? It is literally one of my favorite places on the planet. Even when we lose, I never have a, like I still just get a different feeling when I, when I'm in there. From a player's perspective, you guys, in Now you've become a bit of a fan as an alum because you cheer for the team, right? There's a different point of view for you. But when you are a player, it is your job.

You aren't there for the allure, you know, you want to feed into, you know, Mr. Brightside or when the crowd goes, you know, playing Seven Nation Army. But I'd love for you to dive a little deeper into that of like the viewpoint of the stadium from a player's perspective. Yeah, I mean, there's a lot going on that you're not a part of, right? You're just focused on winning the game. And I think, you know, an interesting perspective is a TV timeout. Like, if you're a fan, you pretty much despise TV timeout. Like, this is the worst.

Like, I got to wait two minutes and 45 seconds. Like, what am I going to do right now? The guy with the red, you know, glove is the worst guy in the entire stadium. Yeah. But as a player, like, you love them, right? They're your opportunity to take a break. That's just a little side note. But yeah, I do think these guys get to a point, unfortunately,

where they take advantage of the big house, right? And especially maybe during like a U-TEP game where the student section is practically empty by the end of the game and the stadium's not full. Now, Iowa energy is definitely up a little bit, but they need a change in perspective. They need the opportunity to be rooted against in the majority, which is exactly what they're going to get at Minnesota,

because Minnesota absolutely thinks that they can win this game, right? And they should. They just beat Washington, who is, you know, we think a good team. But, like, it is going to be a hostile environment, which is what the players thrive off of. Like, there's nothing better than somebody actively rooting against you, and then you going out and whooping their ass. Like there is truly nothing that feels better than that.

So that when you do come back home, right? When you play Penn State for your homecoming game, it just feels good to be back in the big house and you have a greater sense of pride for that. Like you have spoken multiple times on the pride to put on the winged helmet, but there's also a pride that you have to have to be in the big house. Like the biggest stadium in the United States, the third biggest in the world,

but it gets taken advantage of. And I think we lose our intensity and just the overall pride in the game. And a road game is exactly what these guys need to get that back. Yeah, I mean, listen, I've also gone on the road as a fan. It's a different type of, speaking of pride, like, it's a different type of pride that you have when it's just you in your little section that they put you in the shittiest section of the stadium. And it's either in the corner or the top row or whatever. and there's a pride.

There's a, of all right, it's just us against the world, you know. I obviously, like, are they still TCF Bank Stadium? I don't even know what their stadium is. I think they're Huntington Bank now. Honey, wow, wow. I mean, Comerica to fifth third, TCA, to Huntington, so much is happening. But, but yeah, I mean, I mean, TCRF Bank Stadium is not going to be the same

as walking into Ohio Stadium, you know, when in back in 2022. But you and I were both there in 2022 walking into Ohio Stadium. You had a lot different, you know, viewpoint than I did. But to be honest, not really. Like, it was still me in a sea of red. And every fucking person there hates me, you know? And like there's just a different, you know, viewpoint of like walking out. to booze and getting pushed and shoved.

And, you know, everyone's talking to you the whole time. You know, like, I think there are a lot of guys that feed off of that, right? And I know it's not going to be the same, quite the same, but you still are going to have some of that because you're Michigan and everybody will do anything to beat you. And so everyone hates you. Everyone hates you. Minnesota fans are pumped up.

Their coach has smeared blood all over his face. they're jacked up after beating a Washington team, and they're going to be out to get you. And I really do agree with you. I hope that our guys, like, find a different, like, again, I hate to say, like, love for the game. Like, you shouldn't have to re-learn how to love the game four weeks into the season. But, like, just a little bit of a different juice than going through the same motions that you did the first four weeks.

Right. I mean, if you look back to the 2021 team, lost to Michigan State. at Michigan State, really a game we shouldn't have lost, right? But it happened. And that was ultimately the catalyst that took us to a Big Ten championship and then ultimately college football playoff. And it's exactly what they need. I think, you know, as I sit here and think about it now, the chippiness of our, I guess, defense specifically would tell me that they want to be rooted against, right? They want to have that opportunity where they are down and out. And it switches now, right?

Because now the offense is going to be playing with crowd noise and the defense is no longer. Because our fans, I mean, they'll be there, but they're not going to be loud enough to interfere with their offense. So the defense is going to have a quiet playing field where the offense is going to have to deal with a bit of crowd noise. We're going on the silent cadence now. I mean, we've definitely operated that in practice this week. If we haven't, then we got a huge issue on our hands. But, you know, practice weeks for away games were also fun because, at least for me, because we didn't have music during practice unless it was in a way of game.

And that was the only time we brought out music. And we would play it so loud that your mom would probably yell at you, realistically. But there's just a different sense about the fact that you are getting on a plane with 73 guys who are expected to play in the game. That's all you have. That's all that's going to be on the sideline. It's way more empty on the sideline. And you just got to go and get it done. And I can't enough.

I think it is exactly what this team needs. I agree with you. I agree with you. And I think that internally, like, they, I don't want them to lose the faith either, you know, because I do think that that's easy to do as well is, you know, they've had a couple tough games, right? And we know how easy it is when you're winning and everyone gets along and everyone's happy and you leave Shem every day.

Nobody's pissed off. But when things haven't gone right, pretty much every game, right? Like, it's been a, you know, there have been mistakes that have been made. And now, you know, it bubbles over and turns into an actual loss. There's a lot that can happen in terms of finger pointing. You know, the, you know, the defense is looking at the offense like, man, we held them to whatever. you couldn't put more points on the board. Then, you know, everyone's looking at special teams.

How could you let a touchdown go? Then the offense is like, well, you know, you let them drive 91 yards down on the last drive of the game. You know, so there are a lot of things that can happen there. And with young players, that happens quite often. So I'm really looking for them to, who's going to step up? Is it, as we talked about on Sunday, is it the Rod Moore's on this team that are going to to say, you know what? Yeah, we've all fucked up, right? But guess what? Let's put those aside and help the guy next to us when he does make a mistake. Let's lift him up and make sure that he

doesn't do it again. So that's definitely one thing that I'm looking for on the social side of this, on the personal side. I think that going into this game from a football standpoint, I'm really looking for our offense. I mean, Joel, we have to run the ball. Yeah, we do. I think that's one thing. I don't want those guys to lose the faith. I know they've scored touchdowns, but like, if you look at a 58-yard carry game, it's not one that you're calling your grandma about and saying, hey, grandma, I just ran for 58 yards, right? And so, but like right now, that is what we have needed from them. like you've said this before it's a matter of four yard run four yard run until you get one to pop for 35 and a touchdown like i need those guys to stay in the pocket because obviously they have all this media about them

about the one two punch and maybe one two three punch with cuzdall but i mean you could say that it hasn't lived up to the hype i suppose um i don't want those guys to lose a faith like they are our integral part to this team. And yes, we are running Bryce more than we did week one, but that's also a necessity for our team right now to gain more yards. And Jordan Marshall, we know, we absolutely know, is the type of guy to rally people. Like when everything went down at the end of the season last year, we saw him rallying the team saying, you know what, no, we're staying here, like this is our spot. And that's what I need from him on the offensive side the ball. He doesn't have a C on his chest, but he doesn't need one to do something like that.

How do we see Bryce respond? Even though he played well, see, this will be interesting. Even though he played well against Iowa, how is he going to respond against Minnesota? Like, is he going to be complacent and just kind of, you know, pity party? I don't think so. I think it will come out firing because we've seen it that he cares about the team and he cares about his teammates. So yeah, I hope we come off the stool fast and we punch him in the mouth. My prediction right now, and take this with a grain of salt, is that I think Minnesota will get a score early, but I think that'll be it. I think they will really struggle to score points after that, maybe get a field goal. We could be talking like 35 to 10. That's just my gut instinct.

I could be overly optimistic, but I'd rather be that than say, I don't know, we're going to make it out there okay. I don't know what you think, what your your prediction is. Well, I think that I honestly, I don't see them really being able to move the ball at all, to be honest with you. I think our defense is still that damn good. To be honest, I was still shocked how good that Iowa offense. I mean, Hank Brown did a lot better than I thought he would, even though my prediction was that he was going to be in hell all day. He was, and he still got out of it with a win. and played well and made some really big throws at the end.

Right. I just don't know that Drake Lindsay's going to have the same type of, you know, ability to continue to push forward for Minnesota. And then they're going to try to run the ball. Their starting center, I believe, just went down this week and is out for the year. And so I have a hard time thinking that they're going to, you know, be able to move the ball on Michigan. Now, what I want to happen for Michigan on offense is be aggressive.

I want us to act like we need, I know I said that I don't need to for them to go score or put up 600 yards. I want us to act like we have the urgency that we need to score 31 points to win the football game. And not just be okay if we go and win this 17 to 7. you know, or 24 to 3. Let's go and try to put up some big points. Like, I know that we're all frustrated in the first half of that U-TEP game, but then I was like, all right, I felt the urgency in the second half of like, let's go break this one open.

I want to feel that again because I know that Iowa's defense is one of the best defenses that we've seen so far and probably one of the best in the big 10. But there was never urgency of like, man, if we don't go score this drive, we're going to lose this ball game. We were constantly playing to just get to the next drive and our defense will take care of it. And by the end of it, it bit us in the ass. And so I want us to think, all right, you know, the final drive of the game specifically for Michigan on offense where you go three and out essentially, you run it twice. I think they ran it on second and six.

You know, there's, and again, it's a unique situation that you're in there. You don't, you absolutely can't turn the ball over, right? So I know that that's a factor. But I want them to play freely and say, all right, let's go and try to put up 50 points. Now, you've still got to be disciplined when you do that. But let's try and put the pedal to the metal a little bit here. One thing, you know, with all that you said about the productivity of the team, we have to look at the injury report right we saw john henry daily go down obviously

blake fraser was hurt um so blake fraser is probable we have Andrew marsh John Henry daily Dom Nichols Andrew Sprague Manuel Beagle I don't know bigel bagel I like to call him bagel I don't think that's right but yeah bejell I don't know yeah they uh they are all questionable which um literally means nothing like they know and of the facility if those guys are playing or not. Right. I am of the viewpoint right now that we don't have time to save. Like if you can play, you need to go.

Like we can't lose another game. We can't afford that right now. We need to get this train rolling. And then, you know, you take your time off during the week and practice a little lighter. But we'll see out of those six. Let me ask you, though, when you say we got to go, what is the mindset of both the players and the coaching staff when you have a buy week on the other end of this?

Because I think sometimes people think, oh, well, let's just sit, it's, you know, it's a, it is a must-win game, don't get me wrong. But it's not like a top-tier game that you have circled on the schedule. Is it ever a thing where you say, all right, let's not have him go, and then he gets two weeks straight of rest so that for the last six games of the season, he can be good. If it is too much of a risk, they won't do that, right? They will sit them out.

But if it's a Blake Frazier who's had an ankle sprain, they're going to find a way to tape that thing up so that he can go. and if at some point in time he definitely can't go, then they'll take him out. Or if we get up by enough, they'll take him out. The one thing about having the buy week is the outcome of this game will determine the quality of your buy week. At least that's how it used to be. If you win this game and you win it convincingly, you're probably going to enjoy your biweek. You're going to get some more time off, maybe some light practices. They give you from Thursday through Sunday off.

You can fly home and see your family, right? Yeah, you can watch your high school team. But I've also been on the other side of it where we lost before the by week. And those are not fun by weeks. To be honest with you, it's almost back to fall camp. Like, that's what they do. At least that's what Harbaugh did. So that's also, I guess, a little incensed.

as a player because they all understand that, right? Plus, I mean, you have another week to think about a loss, right? And you don't want to think about a loss. You want to think about a win and then move into the following week. So, yeah, I just think that these guys are at a point in time right now where it's not solid enough. Like our team is not solid enough to where we can say, hey, listen, take the week off, use the biweek to get healthy, and then we'll roll.

Like, we have got to go now. The urgency is high. and Minnesota is a team that, yes, I do believe we're going to win, but if we let them in the game, they are going to play in the game, right? Which we've seen with anybody that we've played this year. If we let them play with us, they're going to. So we need our questionables to play. You know, we need those guys in the game.

And if it's bad enough and it's affecting them enough, then pull them, right? We don't need to inflict injury on ourselves. but if you can go, take a little vitamin T, a little tort all, and get in the game. Yeah, I mean, I think that is one thing also that determines the identity of a team. Is when push comes a shove, if guys are, you know, if guys are like, all right, I probably could go, I don't want to. Yeah. Right? versus there are guys that are like,

you're going to have to kill me to get me off this football field. That's Max Redison. Right. Like he literally had to break his foot to get out of the game. Right. You know, and I think if it was up to him, he probably still would have went.

You know, and so I think that that's where I, you know, you start to wonder a little bit. I'm not trying to start any rumors here, honest to God. But when you start seeing the questionable, you know,

that list starts lengthening, then you start wondering, okay, where are we at mentally with toughness here down the stretch? Are the, you know, is it, all right, how many of these are legitimate injuries and how many of these are guys like, yeah, I just don't want to like worsen it, you know, or are they going to get in there and be like, all right, fuck it. I'm going. You know, so I wanted to ask you as well, you know, we talked about, needing to get the running game going, and we talked about the running backs.

What was your assessment on Saturday of the offensive line? Because I actually, despite the injuries that were happening, and despite us not being able to run, I didn't think they had a bad game. No, no, I agree with you. I was pleasantly surprised considering the amount that they've been moving around, and then obviously Blake Fraser goes down. And I mentioned this on the last podcast, but this is such like an old person thing to say, like an old coach.

But like I can tell a lot about your offensive line by the push after like the initial tackle. Right. We saw early in the game, I think it was, I think it was Savion, ends up getting held up. And the whole offensive line surges behind him. Like that is what I want to see. Like those are guys who actually care about their running backs because your running backs. taking a hit every single play. Like, can you not get in there with,

pleasantly surprised with the offensive line? I thought they looked a lot better. We had our tight ends in their blocking, which I like to see. Zach Marshall always does a great job. Let's keep that going. But, yeah, I was pleasantly surprised. I thought they looked good.

I think it's just so hard because you haven't been playing with the same offensive line all year, really in any of the games. It's been switched around. been hurt. And now Blake Frazier, you know, we'll see if he goes. It says he's probable, so he'll most likely play. I mean, the fact that he went back into the game was a good sign. He was still limping a little bit. But I was impressed with them. And I think they'll continue to grow, right? As we solidify where they are going to be playing for the rest of the season,

like I said before, they'll understand each other and those double teams, different things in the past game, like any sort of defensive stunt. They will, understand how each other work with that and communication, who needs what. So, yes, I have, I have, I guess, brought to light the lack of elite offensive line play. I'm trying to think of the right way to word this. And on this past Saturday, I, like, I didn't walk away saying, oh, we need to do this, this, or this. I was pleasantly surprised with our offensive line,

and I hope we continue to see that progression. Yeah, I mean, I wasn't thinking that even after the second half of U-TEP, to be honest, I still had a lot of concerns just of missed assignments, and guys, there was no push. It felt like, you know, thankfully it was against U-TEP, and, you know, we were able to just be stronger than them and better than them at times. But I just, in general, I have this weird feeling.

We lost the game. You felt like shit about it. But it felt like every group made progress. Yeah, I know. Like every single position group, if you're like in a vacuum, if you're looking just at their position group, you're like, okay, they played a great game.

And I felt like they took a step forward. D-Line played phenomenal, in my opinion. The secondary, you know, they had, I mean, they were on the field all game. And in Iowa of all teams, through the ball 35 times. Yeah, right. Like, I think they held up their end of the bargain. The O-line, I felt like, played well.

The running backs did what they could with what they were given. I didn't feel like they were given huge holes. I mean, Bryce took a huge load on his back. Pause, I actually. That's tough. That's tough. That's tough. he shouldered a lot of the weight of the game,

not only by running the ball, but by he threw it well and played well. That was really tough. Oh, my God. I don't know if we're going to cut that or leave it in, but you know what? We'll take a look on the back end. Yeah, but now you're right.

And it was a confusing long. And like what I said earlier is the statistics were as good offensively as they've ever been. And our defense did not play a bad game. So coming out of that with a loss is confusing. I mean, obviously the special teams and the turnover, right? We mentioned that before Iowa was going to be a big part of it. But you're right. Bryce did take a huge load on his back.

He looked good out there. So if he, I mean, if he wants to keep taking a big load on his back from week to week here, We're going to be in a really good position. Oh, God. In all honesty, in all seriousness, if we play that exact same game against pretty much everyone else throughout the year, we're going to win a lot of football games and we're definitely going to be in each game in a position to win. Right.

And so, you know, it's just, it was the timeliness of the mistakes. It's tip balls that just so happen to work out. You know, I think it's, you know, you look at Bryce's interception. Again, in a vacuum, it's not a huge deal. But unfortunately, it took three points off the, at least three points off the board for us. And then they didn't score, but it, you know, we just weren't able to punch it in when we needed to. And probably should have put at least 14 points more on the board, right? And so, you know, if you can just, there's like a little bit like change that game completely.

And so I feel this weird confidence in us throughout the rest, you know, throughout this season looking forward. And I think, Joel, if you can get through this game and feel good about a 41 to 14 win or something like that, that's what this should be, in my opinion, when you go there. at the levels of the programs, that's what it should be, right? If you can do that, even at 31.14, I'd still feel really good about it. And then you get into the biweek, all right, we've got a ton of time to get healthy, make some adjustments, fix our mistakes. And then you go into the back half of the season. Like, I'm going to feel not as bad as what it seems like on the surface,

if you listen to social media and, you know, the message boards. Yeah, absolutely. I think my key for Saturday and what I really want to see is the special teams. Like I want to see those guys hawk in the ball. I don't want to see any returns. I want to see us pinning them deep. Like you don't realize the importance of special teams until it bites you in the butt, right? Did.

It very clearly. So I want to see special teams turn it up to another level. And because we know the offense can do it, right? We've seen the offense do it. The defense has been unbelievably consistent. But the special teams is going to be such a big indicator for the rest of the season. How are they going to respond? Because likely their meetings this week were not a lot of fun.

I can't imagine Kerry Combs was patting them on the back after the performance that they had against Iowa. But that is going to be my biggest indicator for what's the rest of the season going to look like? Because it is such a game changer. You talk about timeliness. Like we score touchdown immediately after they take one to the house. Like all of your momentum is completely gone. And we have to, that can't even be a possibility with teams. We can't let them in the door through special teams, right?

It's not a time for us to take a play off, which doesn't make sense to me because typically on special teams, Michigan plays a lot of true special teamers, guys who are simply there for special teams and guys who have pride in it, like your Nico Androgato's of the world. So that's my biggest key. I want to see those guys just hawking the ball. And as Jay Harbaugh would say, having a party on the returner's chest. Oh, I like that. Also, could be a pause as well. Yeah, it could be. I like it. So my key to the game, I think, is create your own energy. I think that we became a little reliant on, all right, the big house is going to have our back.

You know, we're fine with being just like, let's get through this game and win instead of, let's put the pedal to the metal here. Let's go try and play our ass off for four quarters and go win a football game by kicking their ass. Right? Like I think that, you know, I, it's so hard for me not to compare to 21 through 23 because it's the best football of Michigan that I probably have ever watched in my lifetime. But, you know, I just think about those teams and you were a part of them. And you guys had this mentality of when they're, when you smelled blood, it was over. It was absolutely over. And right now, I just don't know that this team has that.

And I'd love to see that on Saturday where they're going to a team that has some momentum coming off a big win at Northwestern, right? That's a ranked win for them that's huge. They were on the road, I believe. And so I think that this is a time where, you know, you're a better football team. Right. Go smell the blood in the water. Go take what's yours. Instead of being like, all right, we're pretty good.

I don't know how good we are. But let's go see how things go. Instead, I just need somebody to step on and be like, no, this shit is ours right now. Let's go win a freaking football game. Yep, I couldn't agree more. And, you know, 11 a.m. game if you're playing in Minneapolis. So a little time change for the fellas. Big noon kickoff.

which, you know, we're not sponsored by Fox or ESPN, so I can say this. Definitely the inferior college football game day show. But nonetheless, it is a big game. And you know what would be nice would be to watch a dominant Michigan victory at 12 o'clock, and then I flip it over, and I watch a dominant Iowa victory in Kenick against the Buckeyes. I like that. I will be rooting for them 100%. We had a great time, like I told you, with the Iowa fans this past Saturday. They're a classy group.

You know, even in victory, they weren't giving anybody shit, which I always enjoy that. So, I mean, nothing would make me happier than Ohio State being, what, three and two, five games into the season. I mean, and talk about. meltdowns. At the beginning of the show, we started with, you know, our fan base melting down of, you know, of the whole world is burning. Eleven warriors and the whole Buckeyes faithful on their message boards will actually melt down. So I would love to see that. So all right. Well, I will also be sipping on some Woodson whiskey on Saturday. So go check out Woodsonwhiskey.com. They've got some new stuff up there. We've got the National Champs bottle, which is unbelievable. It's a really, really cool bottle. I've got to go get one and put it up in the background

here. But yeah, I'll be sipping on that on Saturday while I'm watching football. It might be like a watch outside type of day. Like take the TV stand in the back, you know, in the backyard, have a cooler full of, full of some beverages and enjoy a nice 60 degree day. So. Yeah, absolutely. All right. For us, you can follow us at Blue by Night. on Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, add Blueby 90 podcast on YouTube and Blueby90.com. We appreciate you.

Go Blue. Go Blue.