The Wolverine Now

sept. 8, 2013 A Fine Finish Wolverines Throw Last Punches At Fighting Irish, 41-30 21 of 33 passes for 294 yards and four touchdowns, while loping away on 13 runs for a team-leading 82 yards and another touchdown. He ultimately out-dueled Notre Dame's senior quarterback Tommy Rees (29 of 51, 314 yards, two touchdowns and two big interceptions) … including when it counted most. Michigan led just 34-30, with 9:15 remaining, after entering the fourth quarter up two touchdowns. Gardner had a hand in the Irish revival, throwing the ultimate oh-no pick-six. 41 Redshirt junior quarterback Devin Gardner completed 21 of 33 passes for 294 yards and four touchdowns, while also rushing for a team-leading 82 yards and another touchdown. photo by lon horwedel T By John Borton here just wasn't any way the penultimate game in the foreseeable Michigan-Notre Dame series wasn't going to be a fight to the finish. The Wolverines simply needed to make sure they didn't take the last haymaker on the chin. They didn't, valiantly victorious ultimately because they couldn't be stopped on offense and picked off Brian Kelly's team when they desperately needed to. When the smoke cleared from a 41-30 shootout win over the Irish, it was almost too much to comprehend. "It's 115,109 — that's how many people were there, not to mention the people that were watching on TV," marveled U-M jet engine Devin Gardner. "It's amazing to be able to participate in something like this." Gardner proved amazing himself, the redshirt junior quarterback connecting on 30 But when it came time to finish, he gave the Irish a shillelagh to the teeth. Gardner drove the Wolverines 75 yards in 10 plays, hitting senior wideout Drew Dileo on a four-yard slant for the TD that put the Wolverines in control with 4:18 to play. Aided by a pair of key pass interference penalties on the Irish, the drive left Notre Dame desperate. Their return trip down the field left them dead in the water. Rees, who helped Notre Dame rack up 410 total yards to Michigan's 460, took the Irish from their own 35 to the Michigan 6. But he fired a ball that U-M junior cornerback Raymon Taylor kneed into the air, the pigskin tumbling into the hands of Michigan's Blake Countess in the end zone. The redshirt sophomore cornerback's second interception of the night left the Irish deader than a chicken with its neck wrung.

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