The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: http://read.uberflip.com/i/998618
28 ■ THE WOLVERINE 2018 FOOTBALL PREVIEW gan, on and on and on. These were good football players." Brandstatter added guard Cecil Pryor, halfback Glenn Doughty, line- backer Mike Taylor and more to the list. Beyond talent, Brandstatter pointed out, Schembechler and his staff saw seniors willing to get with their pro- gram and lead enthusiastically. "He inherited some really quality players, and yet he felt it was impor- tant that he put his stamp on every one of them," Brandstatter said. "I give credit to the seniors — the Dick Caldarazzos, the Garvie Craws. "This was their team. This was their senior year. They had a guy come in here and shake their world. If they hadn't stuck with it, those seniors and juniors in the leadership group of up- perclassmen, if they hadn't done all the drills and tried to revolt, it might have turned out differently. "I give all the credit in the world to those guys. They were great soldiers. They were great Michigan Men." "You don't come in and turn a pro- gram around unless you have players to do it with," Hanlon assured. "I'll always be grateful to Bump and his staff. They left us with some awfully good football players. We had to get them to believe in what we wanted them to do." Believing drew immediate confirmation in the opening two games of the '69 season. Schembechler's crew buried Vanderbilt in the opener, 42-14, and then crushed Washington, 45-7. A third straight home game brought Mis- souri to town. The Tigers punched Michigan in the nose, 40-17, on their way to a 9-2 re- cord, a Big 8 championship, an Orange Bowl berth against Penn State and a final No. 6 ranking. The setback stunned the Wolverines, de- spite their acknowledgement of Missouri's prowess. "The Missouri loss really stung, but that was really a fluke deal," Dierdorf said. "That game was 24-17 in the third quarter. There was a blocked punt, a long touchdown run, and all of a sudden …" Michigan bounced back to beat Purdue in the Big Ten opener, 31-20, and it wasn't any small achievement. The Boilermakers went 8-2 in 1969, losing only to the Wolverines and Buckeyes, and featured an All-American, 12-year NFL quarterback. A Rivalry Intensified A week later, the Wolverines traveled to East Lansing to take on Michigan State. Head coach Duffy Daugherty and the Spartans lay in wait, having secretly switched from an I- formation squad to a wishbone offense during the week. They set a trap for the Wolverines and sprung it on game day in a 23-12 win. The coaching crew from Ohio absorbed a slap in the face they'd never forget. "When we came up here, we knew the team you had to beat if you were going to win the championship was Ohio State," Hanlon stressed. "We geared everything we did to wanting to win the Big Ten championship. "Not that we didn't take Michigan State seriously. We just put so much emphasis on Ohio State." The Spartans put a loss on Michi- gan that reverberated for years. "I was playing the short corner," Pierson recalled. "They had decided to roll out with their quarterback and attack us with the run. They messed us up pretty good that day." "We knew we were better than Michigan State," Dierdorf growled. "I don't know how that happened. "It's bad for everybody. I'm one of the Ohio guys on that team, and there were a lot of them. We never looked at Michigan State the same way we looked at Ohio State. We didn't grow up looking at the Michigan-Michigan State game as the end-all, be-all. "You can't blame us for that. When you were born and raised in Ohio, anything connected with Ohio State is a big deal. But that game really stung." It stung everyone, and served as a reminder for Schembechler and his coaches over the next two decades. Don't lose to Michigan State. "We found out, if you want to live in this state, if you want to be part of this Michigan situation — not just the University of Michi- gan, but the state of Michigan — you'd better be able to put your head up high when you play your rival upstate," Hanlon said. "Michigan State became a big, red-letter game from then on. It is still today. When you play them, and you live in this state, you'd better beat them. It's not very pleasant to live in this state when you get whacked by the op- ponent up north." "That game nailed it for Bo and Jerry, and all the guys from Ohio," Brandstatter con- curred. "They knew to win the Big Ten cham- pionship, they had to beat Ohio State. Ohio State was their focus, the entire year. "At some point, in every practice during the season, we prepared something to do against Ohio State, whether we were playing North- western or whoever." On his arrival, Schembechler switched Michigan's offense to Ohio State's, just to be that much more prepared to face the Buck- eyes. But someone else's mid-stream offen- sive changeup bit the Wolverines. "It paid dividends against Ohio State, clearly," Brandstatter noted. "But the fallout from that Michigan State game showed those guys that this in-state rivalry thing is a pretty big deal. "The papers and everybody back then Defensive back Tom Curtis (above) joined tight end Jim Mandich as Schembechler's first All-Americans at U-M. PHOTO COURTESY BENTLEY HISTORICAL LIBRARY "Michigan State became a big, red-letter game from then on. It is still today. When you play them, and you live in this state, you'd better beat them. It's not very pleasant to live in this state when you get whacked by the opponent up north." 1969 ASSISTANT COACH JERRY HANLON ON LOSING SCHEMBECHLER'S FIRST GAME AGAINST THE SPARTANS