Michigan Embarrassed in 38-13 Loss to Illinois

By Sean · Tuesday, November 3, 2009 · 3:38 AM |  Share | Leave a Comment 

(Note: Apologies for the lateness of this post, but I’ve been sick the last few days.  I’m talking actually sick, by the way, not just sick over what transpired in Champaign on Saturday.)

Michigan got off to a slow start against Illinois this past Saturday and only led 13-7 at halftime.  Right at the start of the third quarter, however, it appeared that Michigan was about to get the blowout started.  Roy Roundtree got open in the middle of the field and caught a pass from Tate Forcier, and Roundtree had nothing but open field in front of him and looked like he was going to score a touchdown.  Actually, he did score a touchdown, but a review of the play changed the call to him being down on the 1-yard line.  An Illinois player caught him right before the goal line, and not that you need to be reminded considering how often the announcers mentioned it, but it was all downhill for Michigan from this point on.

Michigan failed to score a touchdown on four rushing attempts from literally feet away from the goal line.  Brandon Minor initially appeared to score on fourth down, but another review resulted in another touchdown being taken off the board.  Illinois quickly turned the goal line stand into a touchdown of their own, and Michigan failed to do anything except make stupid mistakes when it got the ball back.  Repeat this process multiple times during the rest of the game and you have a final score of 38-13 in favor of Illinois.  As if getting beat by an Illinois team that had zero FBS wins this season wasn’t bad enough, Michigan went out and got demolished by the Fighting Illini and just looked awful in all facets of the game.  The offense stunk.  The defense stunk.  And to complete the triumvirate of crappy play, Michigan muffed another punt.  This whole team appears to be getting worse each week (against real competition), and if they don’t turn it around immediately, a bowl streak of a different kind may start this year.

1st Quarter

• From the very start Illinois gave Michigan a reason to be worried.  Instead of the Illinois team that hadn’t won an FBS game all season, the team we saw in Michigan Stadium last year appeared to show up on Saturday.  Juice Williams was making smart reads, shredding Michigan’s defense both on the ground and through the air.  Yes, the same Juice Williams who was benched earlier this season in favor of Eddie McGee.  Williams owned Michigan a year ago, and he played like it was 2008 all over again on the first drive of this game, leading Illinois down the field with ease.  Arrelious Benn eventually capped the drive off with a leaping 3-yard touchdown run to put Illinois on top 7-0.
• Michigan answered with a great drive of its own; one that was very similar to the first drive of the Penn State game a week earlier.  Tate Forcier was finding open receivers, and Carlos Brown was moving the ball by picking up a good chunk of yardage on every run.  A 14-yard pass to Greg Mathews moved Michigan all the way down to the 2, and Carlos Brown punched it in on the very next play to tie the game back up.
• The defense needed to get it together, and from now until the third quarter, that’s exactly what they did.  The ’09 version of Juice Williams showed up and the entire Illinois offense was rattled.  It didn’t help Juice that Michigan was getting defenders in the backfield right after the snap and he didn’t have much time to do anything, but the defense definitely brought the ’09 version of Juice back to life and forced a quick three and out.
• Michigan had done an excellent job of not screwing up punt returns all season long until the Iowa game.  That is when the ’08 version of Michigan’s punt return unit came back to life, and it made another appearance on Saturday when Junior Hemingway dropped a punt.  An Illinois player promptly fell on it, giving the Illini the ball at Michigan’s 41-yard line.
• Juice Williams did manage to run for 14 yards on the first play after the muffed punt, but Michigan’s defense stepped it up and shut down  Illinois’ offense to bring up a field goal try from 38 yards out.  Hemingway was able to let out a big sigh of relief as soon as the ball was kicked, because it sailed wide left by a mile, keeping the score at 7-7.

2nd Quarter

• Michigan moved into Illinois territory and appeared to have a pretty good drive going, but it stalled on a bad play on third down, forcing a Zoltan Mesko punt.
• Mesko’s punt was fair caught at Illinois’ 10-yard line, giving Juice Williams little room to work with.  Mikel Leshoure backed Illinois up even more with a 3-yard loss on first down, but Jason Ford created some breathing room by running for 8 yards on the next play.  Illinois quickly was backed up again, though, as Williams was sacked for a loss of 9 on third down.  Junior Hemingway managed to catch the punt this time, and he actually had a nice return of 12 yards to the Illinois 43.
• Michigan was moving the ball effectively on the ground, but the drive came to a stop when Tate Forcier tried to pass the ball.  He was sacked on first down at the 32, and following a 4-yard pass to Roy Roundtree, he was sacked again, this time for a loss of 11 yards.  Michigan caught a break, though, because the Illinois player who made the sack grabbed Forcier’s face mask, resulting in a 15-yard penalty and an automatic first down.  The drive still went nowhere after the penalty, but Michigan was at least able to get a 29-yard field goal by Jason Olesnavage to take the lead.
• Michigan started its next drive with great field position again thanks to Illinois not being able to do anything offensively.  Illinois’ drive consisted of a holding penalty, two short runs, and Juice Williams getting lit up by Brandon Graham for a loss of 9 yards.
• That field position quickly got even better when Tate Forcier found Junior Hemingway for a gain of 21 on the first play of the drive.  It looked like the drive was about to stall after Carlos Brown lost 7 on the next play, but Forcier scrambled for a gain of 16 to make it 3rd and 1.  Brown moved the chains and picked up 5 and 1 yards on the next two plays to make it 3rd and 4 at the Illinois 15.  Forcier was sacked for a loss of 9, meaning Michigan had to settle for another Jason Olesnavage field goal, which gave the Wolverines a 13-7 lead.
• Illinois again went three and out, but Michigan didn’t take a timeout until the clock ran down to 27 seconds left in the half.  After Illinois’ punt went 65 yards thanks to a big bounce, Michigan decided to just take a knee and go into halftime with a 6-point lead.

3rd Quarter

• As mentioned at the start of this post, Michigan came out at the start of the second half with a big play.  On 3rd and 7, Tate Forcier found a wide open Roy Roundtree for what was originally a 77-yard touchdown.  Replay overturned the call and spotted the ball at the 1, which turned out to be the turning point in this game.  Carlos Brown was stuffed for no gain on three straight plays, so Brandon Minor came in on 4th and goal.  Minor, like Roundtree, appeared to score a touchdown.  Replay again overturned the call, though, as Minor’s elbow was down before the ball crossed the plane of the goal line.
• Illinois got the ball back after the goal line stand and had all of the momentum on its side.  The team that had struggled to move the ball ever since the first drive of the game no longer could be stopped.  After four running plays and a 17-yard pass by Juice Williams moved Illinois out to the 30, Mikel Leshoure officially got the ass kicking by the Illini started.  Leshoure got the ball, burst through the first wave of defenders, and was gone.  There was no second line of defenders, and Leshoure ran into the end zone for a 70-yard touchdown.
• Michigan went three and out on its next drive, and Illinois picked up right where it left off.  Leshoure ran for 27 yards on the first play of the Illini’s next drive, and then Juice Williams found Jeff Cumberland for a gain of 34.  A pass interference penalty on Stevie Brown in the end zone moved the ball down to the 2 a couple plays later, and Juice quickly turned that mistake into points by throwing a touchdown pass to put Illinois up by a score of 21-13.
• Michigan continued to unravel when it got the ball back, as Tate Forcier threw 3 incompletions, David Moosman got a personal foul penalty, and Zoltan Mesko punted the ball only 24 yards.
• It took Illinois only six plays to get into the end zone, which Juice Williams did on a 3-yard run.  That came after a 37-yard pass to Chris James, which set up the touchdown.
• Michigan finally pulled its head out of you know where and remembered how to move the ball.  Carlos Brown went for 17 yards on two different runs, and Tate Forcier found Kevin Koger for a gain of 22 in between.  Brown followed up an illegal participation penalty on Illinois (finally Michigan got this call) by running for a gain of 9 down to the 10.  He was dropped for a loss of 6 on the next play, though, which is how an awful third quarter came to an end.

4th Quarter

• Following an incompletion, Michigan faced 3rd and goal from the 16.  Tate Forcier dropped back to pass, tried to step up, and had the ball knocked loose by Clay Nurse.  Corey Liuget fell on it, giving Illinois the ball and stopping Michigan’s comeback before it even got started.
• Illinois slowly moved the ball down the field this time around, and Michigan did manage to keep Juice Williams out of the end zone.  Illinois made a 23-yard field goal, though, making the score 31-13.
• Michigan provided a glimmer of hope that a comeback was possible when Tate Forcier completed a 66-yard pass to Junior Hemingway on the second play of its next drive.  Forcier then found Roy Roundtree for a gain of 4, making it 2nd and 6 from the 10-yard line.  For a brief moment I thought to myself, “This is Illinois.  18 points isn’t that big of a deficit to overcome.”  Forcier proceeded to throw a pair of incompletions, and much to my dismay, the offense stayed out on the field to go for it on fourth down.  A field goal would have made this a 2-touchdown game, but Michigan attempted to go for it instead.  Forcier threw another incompletion, and Michigan turned the ball over on downs.
• Illinois only moved the ball 30 yards but took about 4 and a half minutes off the clock.  It looked like this was going to be a quiet finish, but Brandon Graham blocked a punt for the third week in a row.  Like last week against Penn State, it took a bad bounce and wasn’t returned for a touchdown, but Michigan suddenly had the ball on the 15-yard line.
• Tate Forcier gave the ball back to Illinois just as quickly by fumbling for the second time in this game.  A comeback was unlikely anyway, but this was the nail in the coffin for Michigan.
• Illinois appeared to be content with simply running the clock out, but Michigan used up its timeouts and Jason Ford eventually broke free for a 79-yard touchdown run.  The second big run of the game put Illinois on top 38-13, which is what the final score ended up being.  (Denard Robinson came in on Michigan’s final drive of the game, which also ended on a failed fourth-down conversion.)

So, where do we go from here?  I’ll admit that I was ready to flat out jump off the Rich Rodriguez bandwagon after Saturday’s game, and although I’m still extremely pissed off over Michigan losing to Illinois and how it happened, I’m going to wait to see what happens the final three weeks of the regular season before I jump off any bandwagons.  If Michigan continues to play horrible football and loses out, for example, then the bandwagon will be pretty empty and I will certainly will no longer be on it.  On the other hand, if Michigan somehow gets things turned around and beats Purdue and upsets Ohio State, all will be well again in Ann Arbor.  I know it’d be easy to make a rash decision after such a crappy game, but let’s wait a few weeks and see if Rich Rodriguez can pull a rabbit out of his hat.

Looking at the rest of the schedule on a realistic basis, Michigan is going to be playing for a bowl game on Saturday against Purdue.  Michigan is simply not going to go on the road to Wisconsin and upset the Badgers, and the chances of beating Ohio State don’t look good at all if the offense can only muster 13 points against Illinois.  The difference between another boring holiday season and a short drive to Ford Field for the Pizza Bowl really comes down to what happens on Saturday.  If Michigan can’t beat Purdue, it is probably going to be another long, long offseason for the football program and its fans.