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The most interesting thing I heard Ryan Day say Tuesday was he had “an inkling” something might go wrong with his team’s communications system at Michigan on Saturday.
I’m sorry, WHAT?
Yes, yes, I know there is a big game this Saturday for Ohio State. We’ll get to that, but this is pretty wild.
“We lost communication there in the second half, but the good news was that earlier that week, I thought there may be an inkling that that may happen, so we had a plan for it. We had a wristband plan, and then we had to bring Julian over.
And I was just getting us through it until we got the headsets back up and running, which took a little while to get done. But yeah, just by chance, we had a plan for it. And so we were ready to go when it happened.”
OK, so he did not come right out and say he knew there would be shenanigans in Ann Arbor.
Coaches are notoriously paranoid, so the most likely explanation might be that he just assumed the worst and planned backward from there.
He’s already talked about trying to prepare for every eventuality, and I wrote earlier this week he has evolved into a coach who is able to see the problems coming around the corner and prepare for them more so than he was when he first got the big chair from Urban Meyer.
Day knows if he says something like that out loud in that setting that is a leap more than a few people are going to make, so he had to be comfortable with it being interpreted as at least a veiled accusation…
And then he winked at the the end of his follow-up answer in case you had any doubt:
“Oh, we're just ready for everything. You just got to be ready for anything. And when you go into any big game, you're always trying to put continuity plans in place for anything that could possibly happen.
“And so yeah, that was in here on Friday. And I think some of the guys in the staff were looking at me sideways like, why would you think that would happen? I said, I just don't know. We just got to be ready, and be ready for anything.’
“It's funny how your mind works.”
Funny indeed!
This says a lot about Michigan, none of it good.
Either the Wolverines are still known cheaters whose methods are out there, or they are just assumed so strongly to be that everyone has to be prepared for the Wolverines to try something to get over on their opponent just because that is what Michigan does.
Congratulations to Jim Harbaugh for dragging his alma mater down to this level in either case.
I felt they should have their championships stripped — Big Ten and national — from the seasons they were caught cheating (2021-23), but I did read at least one national pundit who said their real punishment was having their image ruined forever.
Well, I walked right by that giant “2023 National Champions” sign up at Michigan Stadium on Saturday, so I am skeptical, but perhaps there is something to that.
Is that Michigan name that sullied? Maybe so…
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As far as Indiana and the Big Ten Championship Game, Day was very complimentary:
“Well, the first thing that jumps out to me is how hard they play, how well they're coached. They play fast. They're an explosive team.
“And just watching them on film, they just run through everybody. I mean, they're just, the scores and the way that they play, they're very efficient. And really they've done a great job.”
Of course, that is to be expected. Coaches are always trying to pump up the next program they play whether it’s a struggling smaller school or the undefeated, second-ranked team in the country.
Funny enough, questions about the opponent usually seem like an afterthought in these things anymore.
That’s because coaches are pretty good at not offering much of an answer, and most of the time it is true Ohio State will be fine if the Buckeyes just do what they are capable of doing.
Will that be the case Saturday?
We’ll see, but check back tomorrow for more on Indiana.
As always, thanks for reading!
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