Michigan 68, Oregon 69: End of the line

After 20 minutes, Michigan trailed by two -- but it felt like it should have been much more. 

After 40 minutes, Michigan lost by one -- but it felt like it should have been much less, another outcome, a different narrative track. 

Michigan led 68-65 with 2:04 left in the game when Oregon's Dylan Ennis stepped up to the line for the front end of a one-and-one. He missed, but Jordan Bell (16 points, 13 rebounds), who helped Oregon dominate the interior all game, grabbed the offensive rebound and scored to cut Michigan's lead to one. 

If Michigan grabs the rebound there, maybe the game selects a different path down the Plinko-esque road to the finish. 

Tyler Dorsey (7-for-15, 20 points) scored what proved to be the winning bucket with 1:09 to play. DJ Wilson's three-point attempt fell off the mark on the next possession, and, on the final play, senior Derrick Walton took the last shot of his Michigan career, one he's taken, and made, many times before. 

Between the legs, hesitation, stepback. Start, stop, go go go. The Walton waltz is a familiar dance, one that lulls defenders to sleep with its suddenness and precision, both horizontally and vertically. 

His final shot looked like so many others in his Michigan career, which was four years long but felt like 10. The seconds ticked off, one by one. He made his move and fired, the same way he had so many times before. 

Only this time, it fell just short, hitting the front of the rim and falling toward the floor as the final tenths of a second of his Michigan career ticked away. His hands went up around his temples, up to the source of quickly rushing memories, estuaries feeding into a sea of emotion. 

Michigan's run had come to an end. 

The seniors, Walton and Zak Irvin, came to play in their final game. Walton finished with 20 points, eight rebounds and five assists, a remarkably unsurprising stat line from him during his two-month run through opposing defenses. Irvin scored 19 points, 14 of them in the second half. 

The first 20 minutes were mostly notable for how poorly Michigan played without getting blown out. 

Despite a typically strong do-it-all half from Walton -- who scored eight points and assisted seven of his teammates' nine field goals in the opening 20 minutes -- the Wolverines shot just 39.3 percent from the field. Luckily for them, Oregon wasn't much better (41.4 percent), and struggles from the free-throw line also hurt the Ducks. 

While the seniors stood tall, Michigan's sophomores showed their inexperience. 

Days after notching a career high in points against Louisville, Moritz Wagner (3-for-10, seven points) seemed lost. He struggled on the block defensively, and never found his rhythm on the offensive end in a half that featured several bad misses from beyond the arc. Similarly, although Wilson hit back-to-back treys in the opening three minutes, he scored just six more points the rest of the way. He attempted just two shots inside the arc all game (he missed both, including a crucial one late on a bunny that probably should have been a dunk). 

Add an underwhelming performance from Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman to the mix (1-for-6, two points, three turnovers), and it's a wonder Michigan was able to keep it so close. 

Despite scoring at a measly rate of 0.89 points per possession in the first half, Michigan trailed by just two at the break, 35-33. On top of that, the Wolverines limited the Ducks' transition game and strong defense from Zak Irvin helped keep Oregon's Dillon Brooks mostly in check (2-for-6, four points in the first half). 

The second half didn't go much better, but given the nature of the game, Oregon's 50-44 lead with 12 minutes left felt insurmountable. Of course, it wasn't. 

Michigan answered with a 7-0 run, but Oregon scored the next five to lead 56-51. A bucket from Irvin cut the deficit to three. Not long after, Walton followed a fadeaway two with a triple to give Michigan a 61-60 lead with 4:15 left in the game. 

Seemingly everything was going wrong for Michigan, but Walton and Irvin kept their team afloat. Even in defeat, the senior from Fishers, Ind., and his teammate from Detroit gave their careers a worthy coda. 

A Michigan free-throw boxout could have been the difference in this one. Or, it could have been Wilson's biffed layup. Or, it could have been any number of other things, big and small. 

In reality, it's not all that complicated. In a close game, Oregon made one more play at the end than did Michigan. End of story. 

The story of this team, however, is so much more than this game. It started with a roar in New York with blowouts against Marquette and SMU, then took a shaky turn at the start of conference play. At one point, making the NCAA Tournament was no certainty. Many fans expressed disappointment in the team's, especially that of Irvin and Walton, whose play was not matching their recruiting rankings or seniority. 

Gradually, Irvin found his level, and Walton picked his up, fast. Michigan went screaming through the home stretch, only bested twice, both in difficult circumstances at Northwestern (miracle buzzer-beater) and at Minnesota (overtime). 

Then, the airplane, the run in Indianapolis, the Sweet 16. You know the story. You'll never forget it. 

While any loss is disappointing, know this: this team took what was becoming a disastrous season and turned into a major success. Four wins in four days gave the Wolverines their first Big Ten Tournament title since 1998. On the petty side, Michigan somewhat avenged its 2013 national title game loss against Rick Pitino's Louisville to advance to tonight's matchup against Oregon. 

All in all, the memories, not to mention the championship banner that will go up in Crisler Center, greatly outweigh the disappointment of tonight's loss. 

Oregon won, by the slimmest of margins, but Michigan had its shot at the very end. For all its struggles throughout the game, Michigan went out on a note of self-determination: its best player with the ball in his hands and a chance to stay on the ride. 

Exactly the way it should be. 

Michigan 73, Louisville 69: The rematch

Almost half the time Louisville missed a shot today, a Louisville player grabbed an offensive rebound for a second-chance opportunity. Against most teams, that kind of an overwhelming advantage on the boards would have been enough to win.

But it was not enough today against No. 7 seed Michigan, which marches on after a 73-69 victory Sunday afternoon in Indianapolis.

In almost every respect, Michigan played the quintessential John Beilein game today against No. 2 seed Louisville, all the way from the precision of its tactics to the Super Soaker-wielding coach in the locker room after the game. Say hello to my little friend, he says, waving to opposing defenders who know not whether to help on shooters, double down or posts or, in a fit of frustration, find themselves lost on the vast, floor-spaced plains, covering no one, doing nothing.

Michigan shot "just" 35 percent from three today and was out-attempted from beyond the arc by the Cardinals (17 attempts to Louisville's 20). But, outside of that, Michigan's victory this afternoon in Indianapolis came from a familiar storybook.

The Wolverines out-executed the larger, more physically imposing Cardinals, who trotted out a 7-foot Cairene from its bench when a member of its starting forest of frontcourters was felled by fouls. Also, see if this sounds familiar: Michigan turned it over just six times against an aggressive Louisville defense (see also: VCU, 2013).

Michigan also did something Beilein has done numerous times now in his Ann Arbor tenure (both in games and long term): adjusted.

Long known as a perimeter-oriented roster, Michigan has seen its focus shift subtly in the other direction this season. Yes, Derrick Walton is still the heart and soul of this team, and was every bit of that Friday afternoon against Oklahoma State. But just like Beilein's offenses shifted away from being relatively ball screen-averse, the offense has evolved far beyond what Michigan was doing, even as of January. With two skilled bigs, capable of hitting the outside shot and flummoxing bigs with above-average handles, Michigan can play position-less basketball.

Want to leave them open? They'll bury a three in your eye. Want to play tight man-to-man? They'll cut and find ways to finish at the rim. Want to guard them in the post one-one-one? Well, Moritz Wagner showed what he does to that defense today.

The versatility of Michigan's frontcourt options paid off again, just like it did twice against Purdue. Wagner tallied a career-high 26 points (11-for-14 from the field), many of them coming on easy spins against Deng Adel et al in the post or blow-bys from the perimeter.

Wagner's shot chart is ... good. 

With the win, Michigan moves on to its third Sweet 16 in five seasons. Either Oregon or Rhode Island awaits.

But there were moments when the game appeared ready to escape Michigan in predictable fashion, snowed under by a barrage of Louisville offensive rebounds and a disjointed offense at the other end.

Michigan tied things up late in the first half, but an 8-0 Louisville run in the final minute sent it into the half not feeling great about itself. It was a first-half finish reminiscent of the 2013 title game, in which Luke Hancock erased Spike Albrecht's transcendent performance with several big shots of his own.

Louisville's Mangok Mathiang put his team up nine with 16:10 to play. Not long after, Quentin Snider lined up a triple for a chance to give Louisville a 12-point lead -- it wouldn't have been insurmountable, but there are points in games where things either keep going in one direction, or, they reverse course.

Luckily for Michigan, Snider was off all afternoon, finishing 0-for-9 from the field (0-for-7 from beyond the arc).

The Wolverines slowly chipped away, tying the game at 51-51 after a pair of Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman free throws with just over nine minutes remaining. Abdur-Rahkman put Michigan ahead with a layup not long after, and Michigan never trailed again the rest of the way.

D.J. Wilson added a jumper, Wagner buried a triple and Walton, who struggled with his shot all game, buried his second triple of the contest to put Michigan up 61-57 with 5:55 left.

Although Walton struggled from the field, he contributed when it counted, first with the aforementioned three and again with 30 seconds remaining on a layup to put the Wolverines up 69-65. As has typically been the case with the senior point guard, even when his shot isn't falling, he's found ways to leave his mark on a game -- in addition to 11 points, he tallied seven rebounds, six assists and zero turnovers.

Louisville grabbed 15 offensive rebounds, good for a 45 percent offensive rebounding percentage. Despite that, and the fact that the Cardinals out-attempted the Wolverines from three, Michigan punched back with the Wilson-Wagner one-two, for which Pitino had no answer. Seemingly content to afford the skilled Michigan bigs one-on-one opportunities and trade two-point baskets, that strategy burned the Cardinals.

After scoring 28 points in the first half, Michigan dropped 45 in the second. The Wolverines adjusted and proceeded to exploit the mismatches they were provided.

The result? A career day for Wagner, a 17-point day for Wilson and another Beilein team advancing past the opening weekend of the tournament.

At this point, forget about the seeds: Michigan is a good team that picked it up at the right time. Whether you want to credit Maverick Morgan, a pair of sophomores progressing rapidly or a senior igniting a team, the Wolverines have hit their stride over the last two months.

Whichever team Michigan has to face next will have its hands full. It doesn't seem like this Michigan team has any intention of seeing its season end anytime soon.

Michigan 71, Wisconsin 56: From January to champions

No matter what happened today, few would have envisioned this Wolverines run just five weeks ago.

The plane incident and the wearing of the practice jerseys are inseparable parts of this team's lore, and rightly so. Today's Big Ten Tournament championship game, however, was not necessarily about resilience or moxie, but a Michigan team culminating a spree of splendid basketball -- one that began several weeks ago -- with one more top-notch showing.

This team isn't a plucky underdog getting by on grit, some luck and hot shooting. This team is just good.

In case any doubt remained as to the growth and quality of this team, Michigan did well to quash it with a convincing 71-56 win against the Badgers Sunday afternoon in Washington D.C., good for Michigan's fourth win in four days and its first Big Ten Tournament title since 1998, the tournament's inaugural year (a title that was later vacated).

Led by another shining performance from senior Derrick Walton (22 points, six rebounds, seven assists, two steals and just one turnover), Michigan led for 39 minutes, 42 seconds (the Badgers led briefly, 6-5, early in the game).

This won't go down as the best or most talented Michigan basketball team, but they did something even those stacked teams of a few years ago -- rosters with Tim Hardaway Jr., Nik Stauskas, Mitch McGary, Trey Burke, Caris LeVert, Glenn Robinson III, Jordan Morgan, and so on -- failed to do.

This one won the Big Ten Tournament. Four wins in four days -- a new banner will soon rise.

The shaky Michigan of January, one for which a tournament berth seemed a dubious proposition, was ushered out the door long ago. In that January apparition's stead, a reforged Walton, increasingly confident Moritz Wagner and D.J. Wilson, and Zak Irvin, once lost but then refound, led the way on the road to March.

Since Michigan's listless Feb. 4 home loss against Ohio State, they've been one of the best teams in the country, winning nine of 11 coming into today (with losses coming in overtime at Minnesota and on a last-second shot for the ages at Northwestern).

After defeating Illinois, top-seeded Purdue and Minnesota, only No. 2 seed Wisconsin -- against whom they split the regular-season series -- stood between the Wolverines and a conference tournament title.

For all of Irvin's well-documented struggles in late January and into February, the senior notched solid regular-season performances against the Badgers, scoring a combined 38 points on 15-for-28 shooting. He tallied a quick six points early today en route to nine first-half points, but fellow senior was the star of the first 20 minutes, putting up his first 12 points by making four of his first five three-point attempts.

Michigan extended its lead to 10 at 30-20 with five minutes left in the half. However, a 12-3 Wisconsin run, capped by a Bronson Koenig triple just before the buzzer, cut it to one at the break. Koenig, who did not play in the matchup at Crisler Center, tallied 13 first-half points on 5-for-7 shooting.

Michigan came out of the second half with a 6-0 run, with Wisconsin tallying its first points 5 minutes, 19 seconds into the half on a pair of Nigel Hayes free throws (the Badgers didn't convert their first field goal until more than eight minutes had elapsed in the half).

Almost two minutes later, Irvin extended Michigan's lead back to 10 with a strong and-1 take at the rim, putting him in double figures for each of Michigan's four tournament games.

With Wisconsin's offense scuffling, struggling with turnovers and, quite frankly, failing to convert some good looks, Michigan looked to keep its foot on the gas and avoid a fate similar to its regular-season collapse against Virginia Tech.

With just over eight minutes to play, a Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman triple hit the rim, bounced up approximately five feet, contemplated the meaning of life before swishing in and giving Michigan an 11-point lead -- it was just that kind of day. The Badgers quickly cut the deficit to six, however, with six minutes to play.

On the ensuing possession, Irvin again answered the call, this time curling around a screen for a catch-and-shoot at the arc over Jordan Hill to beat the shot clock and push the lead back to nine. Not long after, Duncan Robinson buried a triple from essentially the same spot on the same curl. After a stretch featuring several dribble-heavy possessions, Michigan was, as they say, "running its stuff" with precision.

 And just to cement the fact that this was Michigan's day, a frantic loose ball situation after Wisconsin pressured on an inbound pass led to a Wilson outlet pass to Abdur-Rahkman for a breakaway dunk. Then it was Wilson's turn for a breakaway dunk, then Walton's for a breakaway layup.

Up 13 with 1:08 left, chants of "Let's Go Blue" rang out, presaging the celebration of Michigan's tournament title.

It's hard to believe that, after all of this, there's still basketball to be played. Michigan will learn its NCAA Tournament seeding later today (but indications are it might be a 6-seed).

Whatever happens, the last four days gave Michigan fans a ride they won't soon forget.

And with few teams playing better basketball than the Wolverines right now, another ride could be on its way.

Michigan 82, Purdue 70: Senior send-off

On Senior Day, it was a sophomore star who shined the brightest overall for the Wolverines, but a senior who made the biggest play.

Sophomore Moritz Wagner kickstarted Michigan's effort against No. 14 Purdue, scoring 12 of Michigan's first 23 points. Purdue's Caleb Swanigan was completely out of his element against the mobile Wagner, who tallied 22 first-half points, doing it both inside and outside (4-for-6 from beyond the arc in the first half). Michigan went into the half up 45-30 and led by as many as 22 in the second.

Purdue, however, stormed back and cut Michigan's lead to six with just over two minutes to play. Memories of earlier defeats (e.g. Virginia Tech) resurfaced.

Derrick Walton (17 points, 11 rebounds, five assists) then made the play Michigan needed most, burying an off-balance 3-pointer to beat the shot clock and push Michigan's lead back to nine late, a crucial shot in the face of Purdue's surge. Michigan held on for an 82-70 victory, moving to 19-10 (9-7) on the season and most likely locking up an NCAA Tournament berth.

Michigan showcased its diametrical brand of basketball when, late in the first half, DJ Wilson and Wagner collaborated on a pick-and-roll, with Wilson finding Wagner on the dive for an easy two. Yes, Purdue had the size and physicality advantage, but in space its frontline players looked like Chris Graham trying to stay with Anthony Gonzalez in the 2006 iteration of The Game.

There is another version of this game in which the Boilermakers' size overwhelms Michigan with a barrage of putbacks, dunks and baby hooks. Today's game did not offer that version. Instead, Michigan used its speed and offensive precision to outmaneuver Purdue's frontline advantage.

After a 66 percent mark in the first half, it was unlikely the Wolverines could continue hitting at that clip. Wagner picked up his third foul, too, with 15:48 to play. And even though Michigan missed its first seven 3-pointers of the second half, Purdue couldn't get closer than 11 (until late). Michigan's defensive shape, paired with a number of missed bunnies by Haas et al, kept the Boilers at bay for most of the second half.

Even when Purdue wasn't missing relatively easy looks in the paint, Michigan's defense forced turnovers via well-executed double teams and traps. Michigan is not an elite defensive team by any stretch, but they've improved significantly since the early part of the Big Ten schedule, when several opponents shelled the U-M D (Illinois, 85 points; Iowa, 86 points; Maryland, 77 points; Nebraska, 85 points).

Michigan created some breathing room for itself when Xavier Simpson swished an open corner three, then Wilson and Duncan Robinson followed suit with triples of their own to make it 66-44 just before the penultimate media timeout. The Wolverines appeared ready to cruise to an easy victory, another statement win at home.

Purdue, however, wouldn't go away so easily. A 13-2 run cut Michigan's lead to 11 with just over five minutes to play. Fittingly, with Michigan needing an answer, Wagner scored his first (and only) points of the second half to push the lead back to 13.

Purdue kept charging, eventually cutting the deficit to six points with 2:13 left. Walton's shot-clock-beating three took the wind out of Purdue's sails, and Michigan was afforded the opportunity of giving its seniors a standing ovation from the Crisler crowd.

Ignoring the clunker of a win at Rutgers and the overtime loss at Minnesota, Michigan has hit its stride at the right time. For even the most paranoid, this victory probably gets Michigan into the tournament field. Now, Michigan can focus on improving its seeding with road victories at Northwestern and Nebraska, then a strong showing in the conference tournament.

As for the seniors, it's almost hard to believe that the careers of Walton and Irvin are near their end. Both have enjoyed great highs and experienced lows. Walton has turned it up of late, while Irvin has, for the most part, struggled mightily this season.

Whatever happens, if Irvin can find himself the rest of the way, no one will remember the rest of it. Hit a big shot, make a big play, keep the season going -- do any of those things, and history smiles fondly.

Michigan 64, Wisconsin 58: Groove back

It was only a matter of time.

Senior Zak Irvin came into tonight having averaged 3.25 ppg in his last four outings, with a macabre 4-for-31 mark from the field during that stretch. Luckily for Michigan, fellow senior Derrick Walton has carried the load, but Irvin was relegated to the shadows in the process, seemingly set to play out his college career beset by a particularly aggressive case of the yips (or some variation of that).

The thing about the yips is that it often makes a dramatic exit once its clawing embrace is shed. Irvin made several big second-half shots -- including what must have been a cathartic breakaway dunk to put Michigan up eight with under three minutes to play -- en route to 18 points and a 64-58 victory against No. 11 Wisconsin Thursday night in Ann Arbor.

Although Wisconsin was without guard Bronson Koenig, this will still go down as a resume-building win for the Wolverines, who looked to avenge the loss in Madison. Michigan played with fire in that first meeting Jan. 17 at the Kohl Center, choosing to avoid double-teaming Badgers big man Ethan Happ. That strategy paid off, as Happ finished with 11 points on 5-for-13 shooting, a mediocre night for him.

Eventually, though, the fire burns you. In tonight's matchup at the Crisler Center, Happ hit the Wolverines for 18 first-half points (8-for-9 from the field). More importantly, however, Happ managed just four second-half points before fouling out in the final minute.

Luckily for the Wolverines, Moritz Wagner brought his A game, too, tallying 12 points on 4-for-7 shooting in the first half to keep Michigan afloat in the face of Happ's prolific first half. While Irvin's line was encouraging, Wagner (21 points) was the undisputed star of the show. Perhaps the most impressive of his buckets was a take from the left wing, when Wagner started right then went left behind his back en route to a nifty finish at the rim.

Not much else went well for the Wolverines in the first half. Michigan struggled most when reserve center Jon Teske drew into the lineup -- Happ went to work on Teske. Compounding the frontcourt issues, DJ Wilson put up zero points in the opening frame (he went scoreless in the matchup at Kohl). On top of all that Derrick Walton went 1-for-6 in the first half for three points, despite coming off of a string of superb play that had pushed him into the All-Big Ten First Team discussion. It was also an uncharacteristically sloppy half for the Wolverines (seven turnovers).

Nonetheless, UW went just 1-for-7 from beyond the arc in the first half, which ended with the visitors up just 31-30.

Michigan's turnover issues continued to start the second half, when a Dmitrik Trice steal turned into two points the other way. Then, Zak Showalter buried a three and Happ backed Wagner down for an easy two (after which Michigan started doubling him) to open a 38-30 lead.

Michigan did not allow the game to get away, embarking on a crucial 8-2 run that included Wilson's first -- and only -- points on a dunk assisted by Irvin.

In a key sequence to follow, Irvin banked in a shot-clock-beating triple and Happ picked up his third foul with about 12:34 to play. Not long after, Irvin buried a long two to get him to 12 points on the night, his first strong showing since he scored 12 in the home blowout of Indiana.

With the score knotted at 47, Walton (five points, five rebounds, eight assists) found a way to make a non-scoring contribution, driving into the lane and dishing to Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman who knocked in a triple while being fouled, putting Michigan up 51-47 after his free throw with just under eight minutes to play. Michigan kept rolling when Mark Donnal blocked a Happ shot that led to an Irvin three at the other end.

Irvin's aforementioned dunk put Michigan up eight with just under three minutes to play, and the Wolverines held on for the win to move to 7-6 in Big Ten play.

Although Walton's streak of prolific scoring came to an end, he found other ways to contribute. Wagner produced a masterful performance to neutralize Happ's big first half and the Wolverines made adjustments at halftime to limit Happ in the final 20 minutes.

Sure, UW was without Koenig, but this will still look like a good win. More importantly, if Irvin's performance is indicative of how the rest of his season will play out, the Wolverines might just finally be rounding into a stabilized, dangerous form as postseason play approaches.

Michigan 75, Indiana 63: Exorcised

Indiana's Assembly Hall, Michigan's "house of horrors": it's become a cliche, but one with teeth. After all, things become clichéd with a reason, not by rhetorical whims.

The reason? Coming into today's matchup, the Wolverines had gone 1-17 in Bloomington in their last 18 meetings, the last win coming in 2008-09.

So, naturally, in continuation of Michigan's season of wild unpredictability, the Wolverines notched their first Big Ten road victory on Sunday, racing out to a 10-point halftime lead and holding on in the second to win 75-63 and move to .500 in conference play (6-6).

Once again, the senior Derrick Walton led the way. Whether it was the Illinois "white collar" comment or the realization that his college career's end draws near, or a combination of the two, Walton has played the best basketball of his four-year career over the last month.

With 2:40 to play, Walton converted a step-back mid-range jumper from the elbow, the kind that confident players make when they're feeling it, getting a friendly shooter's roll on the typically unkind Assembly Hill rim. Luckily for Michigan, Walton has been feeling it in a big way.

After scoring 20-plus points in his previous four outings (IU, MSU, OSU and MSU again) he tallied 25 points on 7-for-13 shooting, plus five rebounds, four assists and three steals. He capped his day with a steal at midcourt, taking it the other way for an uncontested layup and the cherry on top of the Assembly Hall victory sundae.

Michigan got off to a hot start, going 6-for-10 from three in the first half, whereas the Hoosiers went 0-for-6 while also committing 10 turnovers. Walton again led the way for the Wolverines with 10 first-half points.

Even so, Indiana hung around, particularly early in the second half when Michigan failed to turn offensive rebounds (sometimes two in a single possession) into points. Michigan eventually snapped a scoring drought lasting more than eight minutes when Moritz Wagner buried a pick-and-pop triple just over four minutes into the second half.

Indiana cut the lead to six, but none other Walton converted an and-one bucket, and a few minutes later Duncan Robinson buried a DJ Wilson-assisted three. Wilson added a sweeping take to the rim for two shortly thereafter.

Michigan pushed its lead back up to 13 with five minutes left and Indiana looking incapable of mounting a run, despite Michigan's earlier drought. James Blackmon Jr. appeared as if he wasn't 100 percent in just his second game back from injury, going just 2-for-7 from the field for six points (he didn't attempt a shot in the first half).

This isn't a particularly good Indiana team, but a road win is a good win every time, especially at the place that has handed much better Michigan teams losses in recent memory. Michigan did what it had to do to make the officiating irrelevant, building a lead and keeping it watered and well-maintained throughout.

Now, Michigan turns to the final third if its conference schedule. A tournament berth is certainly not assured yet, but today's win went a long way toward mitigating the disappointment caused by the home loss against the Buckeyes.

Michigan will have an opportunity to score a marquee win when the Badgers visit the Crisler Center on Thursday.

Bullets

• Michigan turned it over just eight times to Indiana's 15. That's one way to keep the refs out of it. 
• Xavier Simpson had another encouraging outing. He's beginning to stack up some solid performances as a reserve spelling Walton, and also while sharing the floor with the senior. Two assists, two rebounds, a steal and, most importantly, zero turnovers for the freshman point guard today. 
• While shooting just 4-for-11 from the field, Wagner tallied a double-double (11 points, 10 rebounds). 
• Since his zero-point effort in Madison, DJ Wilson has averaged 11.3 ppg over the last six games. While he's still putting it all together, there are points in the game when you can see the future NBA player he can be. 

Michigan 86, Michigan State 57: When it all comes together

Michigan has had two chances to avenge earlier conference road losses so far this season. First, they did it against Illinois in the motion picture "Back in Blue," the biting, redemptive sequel to "The White Collar Boys." 

They also did it tonight against Michigan State, handing the Spartans their worst loss against Michigan in 21 years. 

If you needed any indication which iteration of Michigan had showed up, the Wolverines forced four MSU shot-clock violations by the game's second TV timeout. 

Michigan's outside shooting soon followed its defensive energy, reprising the lights-out performance against Indiana. That 30-point win against the Hoosiers was Michigan's most lopsided victory against Indiana since 1998. With a 86-57 victory tonight, Michigan notched its most lopsided win against the Spartans since Feb. 27, 1996 (also a 29-point victory, 75-46) and broke a five-game skid in the rivalry series. 

The Wolverines shot 75 percent from the first half (8-for-11 from three), staking claim to a 55-29 lead, Michigan's most prolific first half of the season. On top of that, they forced 12 first-half turnovers, many directly yielding points.

The in-state rivals last met not long ago, Jan. 29 in East Lansing, a 70-62 loss for the Wolverines in which Derrick Walton seemed to be the only guy ready to play. Making matters worse, a flu-ridden Zak Irvin scored as many points as the Atlanta Falcons made smart offensive playcalls late in the Super Bowl on the doorstep of the New England red zone (that would be zero). 

This time, Irvin made his mark on the scoresheet early with a triple (although he was again quiet in this game overall, not scoring again after that triple). The three was the first of many for Michigan, which raced out to a 32-19 lead on 6-for-8 shooting from beyond the arc. 

The Wolverines rode a balanced attack in the half, getting contributions from just about everyone, including Xavier Simpson, who put in some of his best minutes of the season spelling Walton. In the first half, Walton had 12, Moritz Wagner had 13, Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman had 10, and Simpson and Duncan Robinson chipped in five apiece (including a Robinson buzzer-beating three to close the half).  

Naturally, the game got chippy. DJ Wilson picked up a technical foul after dunking on Kenny Goins. Not long after, Nick Ward picked up a tech of his own by tripping Wagner while the teams headed to their respective benches for a timeout. 

But, when you're up by 26 at the half, an unnecessary technical will probably be allowed to slide. 

As for Michigan State, things were going so poorly that Tom Izzo was forced to call a timeout 1:09 into the second half after a Wilson dunk (assisted by Wagner). 

Speaking of Wagner (19 points, six rebounds, two assists, two steals), he continued to do work in the second half. Unlike the first matchup, in which Wagner was hamstrung by foul trouble, he had no such trouble tonight, using his athleticism to get easy buckets on smart cuts and simply by taking the ball to the rim with strength. 

Aside from Miles Bridges (15 points, five rebounds) and his spectacular dunk, MSU had no answers on either end of the floor, and never cut the deficit to fewer than 22 points. 

Michigan's home loss to the Buckeyes could come back to haunt it later. But if there's a palate cleanser better than a 29-point victory against Michigan State, I don't know what that is. 

Bullets

• You might roll your eyes when players talk about negative chatter and how they'll be motivated to prove the doubters wrong -- Derrick Walton has been saying such things of late. In this case, though, he's followed through on his words. Walton is in the midst of his most inspired stretch of basketball in a while. He finished with 20 points, eight assists and five rebounds. 
• Xavier Simpson had his best game to date. Defense will always be an issue for him, based on his size (or lack thereof) alone, but he flashed some playmaking ability and simply looked more comfortable with the ball in his hands. Simpson tallied seven points on 3-for-4 shooting with two assists to one turnover. 
• Michigan lost to a bad Ohio State team at home and followed that up with a blowout of Michigan State. Attempting to find any reason or use any kind of predictive model to assess this team is futile. 
• Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman put up a season-high with 16 points. He started conference play scoring zero points in eight minutes at Iowa. He's quietly put together very strong games in three of his last four outings. If Michigan can get peak MAAR down the stretch, that would be a huge boost. 

Michigan 62, Michigan State 70: A tale of two seniors

Michigan's offense hummed Thursday night against Indiana, zooming like a brand-new sports car.

On Sunday in East Lansing, the car hit pothole after pothole and broke down, a helpless wreck sending tendrils of smoke snaking to the rafters.

After a stretch during which Michigan defeated Michigan State in six of eight tries, the Wolverines came into today's matchup having lost the last four meetings. That losing streak became five straight on Sunday afternoon, as the Wolverines fell, 70-62, despite a motivated effort from senior Derrick Walton (24 points, nine rebounds, five assists).

Zak Irvin, however, finished 0-for-8 from the field, with zero points and three turnovers, his worst outing of the season and worst since a 1-for-8 performance against Texas on Dec. 6.

Meanwhile, Walton did his usual work on the glass, while also attacking the rim -- he didn't always finish, but went to the line more often than not.

Despite some rough first-half offense from the Wolverines -- seniors Irvin and Walton combined to shoot 2-for-13 for five points, all from Walton -- they found themselves down just 32-28 at the half.

The Wolverines shot 32.4 percent from the field, while the Spartans managed to shoot 50 percent. On top of that, Michigan was well off its torrid points-per-possession pace from the Indiana game, putting up just 0.88 points per possession in the first half today.

A team can survive that for a half, but two? The Wolverines would need to find the offensive rhythm they had Thursday against the Hoosiers in Ann Arbor if they were going to come away with a key conference road win.

Things started auspiciously enough in the second half when Walton buried Irvin-assisted triples on consecutive possessions. The good vibes didn't last long, though, as the Spartans were able to enter the bonus with more than 11 minutes remaining in the half and build a 51-42 lead.

Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman stemmed the tide with a triple for a scuffling Michigan, but MSU's Matt McQuaid buried his third trey in three tries to put the home team's lead back at nine with 10 minutes to play.

Unfortunately for Michigan, that second-half offensive renaissance never came. With around seven minutes to play, Michigan had more second-half turnovers than second-half made field goals.

Michigan was within striking distance late, but in the sort of way that a football game is a two-score game when a team is down 16. Walton didn't have a great day from the field himself (4-for-12), but he was the only one who proved determined enough to make something happen.

While Irvin will get most of the flak, DJ Wilson was also just 4-for-12 from the field (0-for-3 from beyond the arc), Moritz Wagner scored 10 but was limited at times by the usual foul trouble and Michigan's bench was mostly irrelevant.

A win against a Michigan State team that had lost three straight would not have been an upset or a huge surprise, like it might have been in the past. The Wolverines, however, just didn't have the answers for Michigan State's defense, the latest chapter in a season's worth of shapeshifting. Unstoppable one moment, eminently stoppable the next.

Which Michigan will turn up down the stretch? Your guess is as good as mine.

UPDATE: Per Beilein, Irvin has been battling the flu, which would certainly explain today's performance.

John Beilein says Zak Irvin missed practice on Thursday and Friday with the flu.

— Brendan F. Quinn (@BFQuinn) January 29, 2017

Bullets

• Xavier Simpson had a nice dish in the first half, wheeling around the right side before dropping a nifty pass to Mark Donnal in the paint. 
• Moritz Wagner continues to be plagued by foul issues, picking up an early one that saw him yanked for Mark Donnal. This goes without saying, but Michigan's best lineup includes both Wagner and DJ Wilson on the floor. 
• Speaking of Wilson, his first-half block from behind was a thing of beauty. 
• Zak Irvin finished scoreless for the first time all season. While Wagner and Wilson are/should be the heart of this offense, Michigan can't beat anyone when Irvin is playing like that. 
• MSU's Miles Bridges is quite good (15 points, 13 rebounds). Sometimes, there's just not much you can do when a future NBA player is feeling it, as he was in the second half. 
• Cassius Winston flashed creativity and speed toward the basket, scoring a Spartans team-high 16 points, mostly from the line, where he went 10-for-11. 

Michigan 32, Florida State 33: The (third) one that got away

Some games are close, others "close," others somewhere in between.

Michigan's Orange Bowl matchup against Florida State Friday night fell somewhere in that in-between No Man's Land. After all, Michigan lost by one on a last-minute Seminoles field goal. They made some big plays in the second half, namely Mike McCray's pick six and, later, Chris Evans juked a Florida defender out of this dimension to put Michigan ahead with 1:57 to play.

That juke was the future in motion, an example of what can't be taught and what Michigan desperately needs more of: raw, unmitigated explosion. The ability to make people not just miss, but miss so badly that they fall to the ground, questioning what is up and what is down. It's the type of play elite talents make in big moments. Grinding opponents into dust on 10-play drives is fun, but Michigan has usually done that because it had no other option. But when you have the ability to take a shortcut, you take it, and that's what a player like Evans brings to the table.

In Evans, and some other promising players on offense (and, hopefully, some on defense, to be unleashed next season), Michigan has a game-changing talent. Unfortunately for Michigan, it didn't quite have enough of it this season when it counted, especially on offense. A close loss at an offensively challenged Iowa team, a brutal loss at Ohio State featuring five fourth-quarter yards and a bowl game with just 252 yards of offense, 4.3 yards per attempt through the air and this on the ground ...

... and it's safe to say Michigan's fall from possible eliteness to a degree or two below that starts here.

Even so, Michigan had a chance to pull out a 2012 Sugar Bowl-esque victory (I was at that game in New Orleans, and it was the kind of game that almost left you feeling compelled to apologize to the opposing fans for winning). Alas, 65 yards of Keith Gavin kick return yardage later and the Noles were in position to comfortably drive for a score, which they got ... by throwing at Jourdan Lewis in the corner of the end zone.

Go figure. Sometimes there's not much to say. Things happen. When Dalvin Cook runs around and past your defense a few times like they're painfully limited pawns on a chess board, that's one thing. When a team gets your All-American corner for a touchdown in a key situation?

Well, that's football.

---

When a season concludes, especially one like this one, there's always an urge to categorize it, to tag it, to fit it into a neat, little box.

Was it a "successful" season or was it a "disappointment"?

In truth, it's a little bit of both.

Michigan's three losses came by a total of five points. It's disappointing that with this collection of talent, Michigan wasn't able to find the one or two plays it needed to join the playoff field.

But, only four teams go, and only one team wins. If we're categorizing all seasons that don't end in a playoff berth or a national title as failures, just about every fan should be disappointed. That's no way to live.

What is disappointing is the still lingering conference title drought. As a high school sophomore in 2004, I never thought that would be Michigan's last conference crown for a long, long time.

Here we are, though. Next year, Michigan probably won't be a playoff-caliber squad, simply by virtue of what they need to replace on defense -- I do think, however, that competing for the division crown and a trip to Indianapolis are within reach, once the early-season growing pains are sorted out.

While the 2016 season ended with a thud, it can't be said enough: Michigan has won 10-games in consecutive seasons, just two years after going 5-7 and getting a coach fired. Yes, Hoke recruited fine in parts, but a failure to identify offensive talent, namely on the line, hamstrung Michigan this year.

Right now, for all of Michigan's defensive talent, that's the difference between them and the cream of the crop: Michigan's line just couldn't stand up. For further example of what that looks like, watch the tape of the Ohio State-Clemson game.

Until Michigan upgrades its line and fields upper-echelon skill position talent, its defense can never be good enough to carry it to a title, where it is at this point a pretty solid bet they'd have to beat Alabama.

One day. It didn't come together this year, and likely won't in 2017 by virtue of roster turnover.

After that? Anything is possible.

---
Of course, no season finale is complete without fond reminiscences over the players taking their abilities elsewhere, whether into the real world or the NFL.

This year is especially heavy on the heart, as Michigan loses a cast of likeable, not to mention very good, football players. Jourdan Lewis, Jabrill Peppers, Chris Wormley, Ryan Glasgow, Ben Gedeon, Taco Charlton, Channing Stribling, Delano Hill, Dymonte Thomas -- and that's just defense.

The odds are good Michigan will never have another Taco -- both in name and in his particular combination of size, speed and agility. While Michigan lacked game-changing ability on offense, there was no shortage of it on defense, thanks to players like Charlton. He was a bringer of doom, a destroyer of poor, unprepared tackles.

Lewis? Despite his size, he blanketed receivers, with such grace and ease -- even when a receiver seemed open, that was never the case.



As far as interceptions go, that play falls in the same category as Charles Woodson's in the 1997 Michigan State game. That's something. No one will remember the particulars of this year's defensive slugfest against Wisconsin, but they'll remember that play -- it's hard to forget something like that.

As for the defensive linemen, it will be some time before a Michigan defensive line is so unflinchingly dominant again. Wormley is a guy who has seemingly been around for eight years -- like Mike Martin, he's an example of a human being who is impossibly agile for his size. Watching him play, it's still hard to believe that Wormley weighs more than 300 pounds. Losing an agile, versatile planetoid on the defensive line will be a major loss, to say the least.

As for Glasgow, his journey -- and his brother's before him -- is all you need to know when considering why some think Jordan Glasgow could be something far more than a special teamer. Whatever it is, that family has it. Michigan missed Ryan Glasgow's presence late last season when he was knocked out with an injury -- they'll certainly miss it next year when he's beginning what should be a long and productive NFL career.

Peppers hasn't officially announced his departure, but it's safe to assume he's probably gone (rather, it would be a surprise if he returned, simply based on his draft projections). All in all, it feels like only yesterday when he committed to Brady Hoke's Michigan: a different time, a different world. Fans were robbed of a full 2014 season when he went down with an injury, but he entered the fray in 2015 and truly began to shine brightly this season. Few Michigan players, if any at all, have ever brought his overall speed, instincts and playmaking ability on defense and special teams. I only wonder if Michigan couldn't have done more with him; but that's over and done now.

For our purposes now, I'll say this: it might cause some whiplash when opposing teams run successful screens next season, or Michigan's punt returner, whoever it is, doesn't make the first few would-be tackles miss like they're not even there.

All of the above is not to discredit the offense, of course. Amara Darboh and Jehu Chesson, for example, had some big moments in their career. While Darboh had some unfortunate drops and lacked big-play speed, he was a mostly reliable option and a guy who could usually churn out some tough yards after contact. With Chesson, we'll always have the Florida game.

Then, of course, there's Jake Butt, whose Michigan career unfortunately ended on a sour note. (An aside, but for what it's worth, my personal opinion is that if the player wants to sit out a non-playoff bowl game to get ready for the draft, I have no problem with it. Would it be disappointing, from a selfish fan's point of view? Sure. But, the truth hurts: any bowl game not involving Alabama, Washington, Ohio State and Clemson this bowl season meant nothing in the grand scheme of things.) Like Wormley, Butt offered a unique combination of size, speed and technical ability. When Butt dropped an easy pass in a game this season, I was shocked, because it happened so infrequently.  When Jake Rudock to Wilton Speight needed a play, they could throw it up to him and count on him coming down with the ball more often than not. Michigan has some promising tight ends waiting to step up, but none will be Butt right away, if ever -- after all, most would probably agree he's the best tight end in program history.

The worst part is that none of these guys will play for Michigan again. They were all fun to watch, in good times and bad. It's a shame their times as Wolverines has to come to an end, but all things do.

And while 2016 ended on a down note, the season brought far more good than bad. And, eventually, Michigan will find itself on the winning side of the sort of games it lost this season, when a play or two flipped things.

It'll all come together, in due time. For now, fans will just have to be patient, and remember how things were not too long ago.

Until then, enjoy the ride.

Michigan 70, Virginia Tech 73: Highs and lows

For the second time in less than a week, a Michigan team let one get away.

After a macabre showing at South Carolina and a game against Mount St. Mary's we know took place because there is a box score as evidence, Michigan looked to regain the confident step it found in New York City not long ago.

The Wolverines found that step early, a confident strut, against visiting Virginia Tech, staking claim to a 15-point lead at one point. That strut gave way to a nagging limp, however, as the Hokies would claw back to within two early in the second half, then again erased a 10-point deficit in the final 8 minutes to score a 73-70 win in Ann Arbor.

Zak Irvin led the way for Michigan with 23 points, 15 of them in the first half. But, unfortunately, he saved the worst for last, airballing a three late and then, given a chance to put Michigan in the lead with the shot clock off, dribbled and dribbled and dribbled before missing an ill-advised, stepback two just inside the arc.

Michigan, paced by an 8-for-12 start from the field (4-for-6 from three), raced out to a 23-8 lead. Unsurprisingly, Michigan found the rims much kinder at home than it did in Columbia, where they scored 46 points in what was easily one of the poorest, if not the poorest, offensive efforts in the John Beilein era.

With that said, defense has easily been the most notable facet of this Michigan team thus far. It has by no means been perfect, but the errors of the past don't seem to be taking place as frequently thus far this season. A fairly experienced roster certainly helps, but there's no doubt the coaching of Billy Donlon has helped sharpen the defense at every level, from perimeter defense to rotations; an uptick in rim protection has also helped. Michigan forced nine first-half turnovers and allowed just one offensive rebound in the first half.

But just like everything else about this game, Michigan's defense was good to start, then it was bad, then it was good, then it was bad again.

Michigan found itself up 39-30 at the half, a somewhat unsatisfying lead considering its domination of the better part of the opening 20 minutes. Part of that strong effort came from a bounceback performance from Irvin, who tallied 15 first-half points after scoring just 5 points on 2-for-13 shooting against the Gamecocks.

Virginia Tech's surge coincided with a quiet stretch from Irvin early in the second half. Irvin scored just over 6 minutes into the second half to extend Michigan's lead to three, though, a key moment in the game. Then, Duncan Robinson took a charge on the defensive end and buried a three on Michigan's next offensive possession, upping the lead to 50-44 with 13:04 to play.

In the frontcourt, instead of DJ Wilson or Mark Donnal, Mortiz Wagner led the way with 11 points on 5-for-6 shooting. Meanwhile, freshman center Jon Teske made an impact, too, entering the game and immediately altering a VT shot attempt, plus grabbing a pair of rebounds (one of the offensive variety).

By the 8-minute TV timeout in the second half, Michigan led by 10, aided by a banked-in triple from Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman. The worst seemed to be behind them.

However, foul trouble reared its ugly head.

Wilson drew his fourth on a Derrick Walton free throw attempt with 7:44 to play, putting VT in the bonus. He later picked up his fifth foul with 3:03 left. Despite playing at home, the Wolverines trailed in free throw attempts, with VT going 15-for-17 and Michigan just 4-for-7 at the final TV timeout.

The Hokies took their first lead at 68-67 with 1:44 to play, and a triple extended it to 71-67. Robinson canned a three after an airballed Irvin attempt to cut it back to one with 42 seconds left.

Michigan received a bit of luck on the ensuing possession, when VT's Seth Allen was called for an offensive foul, giving Michigan a chance to win it with the shot clock off.

Unfortunately, Irvin put up another clunker, missing a long, stepback 2-point jumper after having the ball stick to his hands for most of the possession. VT then buried two free throws to push the lead back to three. Michigan lucked into a half-court inbound opportunity after the full-court pass was deflected out of bounds, but Robinson's three-point attempt at the buzzer fell off the mark, capping the collapse for the Wolverines.

The wind in Michigan's sails after the blowout wins against Marquette and SMU has faded, drifting elsewhere across the vast ocean of the college basketball seascape. The Wolverines looked listless against South Carolina and collapsed against Virginia Tech -- while the squad is sure to continue to improve, there's no doubt a home nonconference loss of this variety will sting, and could even come back to haunt Michigan come tournament time, if things get that bad.

Michigan hits the court Saturday for a tilt against Kennesaw State before facing major-conference competition again, with Texas and a trip to UCLA next up on the schedule. Especially given the fact that Northwestern recently beat the Longhorns convincingly, the Wolverines cannot afford another nonconference home loss.

Michigan is 5-2, a collapse away from 6-1. But, as Michigan fans have been twice reminded in the past several days, the final score is the only fact that matters. Everything else is just exposition: intriguing, but irrelevant.

Michigan 20, Indiana 10: The storm before the storm and tackling the ghost

So much for the proverbial calm before the storm.

Michigan headed into its penultimate regular-season game simply looking to survive, without Wilton Speight, against a capable Indiana team before heading to Columbus for a shot at a division title. With reports of bad weather on the horizon and backup quarterback John O'Korn getting the starting nod, it wasn't hard to guess how the game would have to be won: defense and the running game.

Michigan used those very things, holding the Hoosiers to 10 points and a season-low 255 yards, a significant improvement from last year's effort in Bloomington. On top of that, the often brilliant yet often criticized senior De'Veon Smith had a career day, notching 158 yards and two touchdowns on 23 carries.

But late in the third quarter, the outcome floated in the air, blowing left and right like the wind and the snowflakes that would slowly envelop Michigan Stadium in a blustery maelstrom.

Down 10-6 late in the third quarter, the stagnating Michigan offense faced a third-and-8 from its own 36. To that point, the Wolverines had converted just one of nine third-down attempts.

O'Korn dropped back, giving the token play-action fake. Two unblocked Hoosiers screaming toward him, the transfer from Houston deftly split them and headed to daylight down the left side. Thirty yards later, O'Korn was brought down. He bounced back up, pumping his fist and breathing smoke into the cold Ann Arbor air.

Years from now, when Indiana fans remember this game, that's the play that will come to mind. And rightfully so, because the game quickly shifted in Michigan's favor from there. On the next play, Smith rumbled 34 yards for a score, which proved to be the winning tally.

Later in the third, after pinning Indiana deep in its own territory, the Wolverines got the ball back starting at the IU 39. Again, Smith made quick work of things. After an O'Korn incomplete pass, Smith went 39 yards for his second score of the day, giving Michigan a 20-10 lead that was essentially insurmountable given the weather conditions.

With the win, Michigan recorded its first consecutive 10-win seasons since 2002-2003. Let that sink in for a minute.

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Needless to say, this wasn't the prettiest performance. O'Korn looked harried and uncomfortable, and rightfully so, as Michigan's pass protection was far from good. Even so, the pocket awareness that Speight seemed to have perfected in his season to date just wasn't there.

But, given the blanketing snows, expecting huge numbers would have been foolish. After all, it's not as if Ohio State did much better in poor conditions against Michigan State (and those were nothing compared to the conditions in Ann Arbor).

Michigan did what it had to do to win, a week after it didn't quite find the juice to flip an eventual one-point loss into a close win. On top of that, this isn't the Kevin Wilson Indiana teams of old -- these guys actually play defense. Not just "good for Indiana" defense, but good, period.

Sure, 7-for-16 for 59 yards and no touchdowns is not good, however you spin it. In the end, though, a win is a win.

The question is: can Michigan get by with a similar performance in Columbus this Saturday? Instinct responds with a resounding "no," although it's not as if Ohio State isn't without offensive issues of its own.

Both the Buckeyes and Wolverines have spent their seasons subconsciously fighting proxy wars against common opponents. The numbers are all there, ripe for dissection and analysis.

But for all of the advanced stats that have flowered into being in recent years, the biggest storylines are reductive. Michigan has beaten Ohio State three times this century (2000, 2003, 2011). For someone like me, who grew up in the '90s when the situation was different but I wasn't quite old enough to appreciate it, I haven't known much else. Even in 2011, Michigan barely eked by a bad, Luke Fickell-coached Buckeyes squad.

In this game, there are no tricks or fancy ideas. There are no easy ways. You could even say that, for the most part, there are no lucky bounces or fluke plays (certainly not of the Auburn-Alabama "kick six" variety).

The winning team, more often than not, is the better team; in the '90s, Michigan wasn't always the better team heading into the game, but they were the better team on that one day in November.

Without a doubt, Michigan's defense cannot afford to be thoroughly outplayed like it was last year in Ann Arbor, to the tune of 42 points. Unlike the 2006 matchup, when the Buckeyes scored 42 and Michigan fell just short with 39, this team isn't built to meet that challenge.

That will be especially true if O'Korn starts. Speight may be able to play, but maybe the doubt being cast about his status could just be a classic case of gamesmanship. At this point, who knows.

Certain things will have to happen for Michigan to win. Facing talented athletes like JT Barrett and Curtis Samuel, the tackling simply has to be better. And, when pass rushers get to Barrett, they have to bring him down. Of course, that's easier said than done -- after all, memories of Braxton Miller, Terrelle Pryor and Troy Smith are recent evidence of that. Those ghosts linger, have lingered, for many a year. A step too slow, a step misplaced, and the ghost has escaped, over and over again, living to haunt another year.

Michigan will have to bring those apparitions down, this time. This time, Michigan fans hope that Don Brown has the answers DJ Durkin, Greg Robinson and Ron English couldn't find.

On the bright side for Michigan, the Buckeyes have not seen a defense like Michigan's to date. Further still, the Ohio State offense has struggled against lesser teams, including against Northwestern and a Malik McDowell-less Michigan State.

But, as we all know, those sorts of things tend not to matter when it's time for The Game. Both teams, in theory, will be bringing their best, including previously unseen wrinkles and miscellaneous fancy machinations.

Like any rivalry, the big-time players will leave their mark, either as landmark moments in lore or as markers of what could have been. Last year, Barrett and Co. rolled over Michigan with ease. This time, Michigan will need, among others, its best player, Jabrill Peppers, to have his moment. His Woodson, his Howard, his Biakabutuka. Peppers can very easily shut down the whispers of "overrated" by playing his best game on Saturday. On defense, on offense, on special teams, Michigan will need Peppers to leave his mark.

Michigan has spent its season showing flashes, revealing little tricks here and there with their superstar from New Jersey. Through it all, fans have wondered if there are additional wrinkles in the bag of tricks, beyond what we've already seen, tricks that would ostensibly be deployed down the road on a Saturday afternoon in November.

Well, the wait is over. There is nothing left to save, nothing left to hide. On Saturday, everything will be tinged with finality.

It won't be No. 1 versus No. 2, but it'll be close enough. In reality, in the new playoff world, it will mean just as much as that November day in 2006, when everything hung in the balance.

All roads lead to this. As the opening kickoff rises into the sky, Michigan will have a chance to decide: Will it tackle the ghost?

Or, will the ghost slip through them yet again, incorporeal and unattainable?

For now, we wonder. On Saturday, that ghost will reappear, to haunt or ... to be defeated.

Michigan 79, Marquette 61: The bigs show

After two easy but not necessarily impressive wins against lesser foes, perhaps Michigan needed the bright lights of the World's Most Famous Arena to get going.

That turned out to be the case Thursday night against Marquette, as the Wolverines were lights out in a 79-61 victory to move to 3-0.

And in a bit of a plot twist for a John Beilein team, the Wolverines' frontcourt players led the way.

Mark Donnal, Moritz Wagner and D.J. Wilson all hit triples early for Michigan, which built up a 25-15 lead about halfway through the first half.

With Michigan up 32-20 and shooting 61 percent from the field at the 8-minute TV timeout, the same old question came up: Can they keep this up? That's always been the question for John Beilein's teams -- albeit a reductive one. When will the downturn come, the cold streak, the decline? When the offense is working and guys are hitting their outside shots, Beilein's offense is hard to stop. Once those shots stop falling, Michigan looks quite the opposite, particularly in years without players who can attack the rim.

Well, that storyline didn't come into play tonight. In fact, it might not even be the story anymore at all -- there are still many pages to turn, but we might be reading from a new book entirely.

For the first time in Beilein's Michigan tenure, the Wolverines' frontcourt size might a very real advantage. Of course, who knows how good Marquette is, but the Wolverines' frontcourters dominated, hitting their outside shots, grabbing offensive boards and blocking shots all night.

Wilson has been the story of the season to date. Preseason hype is one thing -- in fact, there was Wilson hype last year, after he spent his offseason adding muscle to his frame. But, last season came and went and the hype train never left the station.

This time, however, Wilson's development appears to be real. Tonight, he scored 10 points, grabbed 12 rebounds and blocked two shots (not to mention affecting others). The long, athletic guy who seemed lost last season has looked like a completely different player through three games.

Michigan did all this with Derrick Walton picking up two early fouls, which, while not a positive for Michigan, allowed freshman Xavier Simpson to get some meaningful run. Simpson executed a Spike Albrecht special, dribbling circles in the lane before finding Wilson up top for a three.

Walton's absence didn't matter too much, as Michigan not only shot 6-for-11 from three en route to a 50-28 halftime lead, they did it in the paint, too. Michigan's offensive attack was humming to the tune of 1.27 points per possession, despite Walton not scoring in the half. Donnal was the star of the first half for Michigan, scoring 13 points on 5-for-7 shooting and adding three offensive rebounds.

Meanwhile, Marquette shot just 42.3 percent from the field in the first half with only five attempts from the free-throw line.

Michigan kept its foot on the gas early in the second half, later highlighted by a poster-worthy dunk from Wagner over Marquette center Luke Fischer.

Eventually, though, Marquette did start to wake up, cutting into Michigan's lead with a 10-0 run to make it 65-49 with 8:15 to play. Marquette later cut the lead to 14, but a fortunate bounce on a Zak Irvin jumper followed by an alley-oop slam by Wilson on the next possession prevented the Golden Eagles from mounting a real comeback.

Donnal and Muhammad-Ali Abdur-Rahkman led Michigan with 15 points apiece. Fischer led Marquette with 19 points on 8-for-13 shooting.

Michigan will face SMU (3-0) tomorrow night in the 2K Classic title game. The Mustangs defeated Pitt, 76-67, led by 24 points from F Semi Ojeleye.

Michigan 13, Iowa 14: That November feeling, pt. 2

File Photo

On a November Iowa night, perfection crashed into the gaping maw of unpredictability, like a deer running right across I-80 and into your path: sudden terror, swift and paralyzing.

But that's November football. September and October are utterly different things, separate and apart from that month, November. Had T.S. Eliot been a college football fan, perhaps he would have reconsidered his stance on April, the ostensibly cruelest month. T.S. Eliot never watched a No. 3 team in the country -- one that had scored 40-plus points in seven of its first nine games -- travel to Iowa City and cough up 201 yards of total offense and 13 points against a previously 5-4 team, one that lost by 27 points the previous week.

What branches grow out of this stony rubbish? For Iowa, it's a game in which you could say the Hawkeyes outplayed Michigan despite only putting up 230 yards of offense, going 4-for-16 on third down, and 3.5 yards per attempt by C.J. Beathard.

None of that mattered. Michigan ran into a seemingly refocused, re-energized Hawkeyes squad, and didn't have an answer when they weren't able to connect on the early knockout punch. Every game has its primary inflection point (some games have many). The Wolverines laid claim to a 10-0 lead -- it seemed as if one more first-half score from Michigan would have done the Hawkeyes in.

Instead, a Ron Coluzzi punt downed Michigan at its own 2, Michigan's pass protection failed and suddenly Iowa had two on the board. A Michigan three-and-out later and the Hawkeyes were starting on their own 48. Seven plays later, it's 10-8.

In games like these, each mistake is magnified. Khalid Hill coughs the ball up on the kickoff return to open the second half, and it eventually leads to three more for Iowa. Michigan was down just 11-10, but the winds had shifted, unabated on the vast Iowa flatland.

Michigan bumbled through the rest of the quarter before a fortuitous roughing-the-center call on a Michigan punt gave the Wolverines life. Even then, the Wolverines stumbled mightily when faced with a third-and-1 from the Iowa 27, when the swarming Iowa defense engulfed Karan Higdon shortly after he received an outside pitch from Wilton Speight.

The two teams traded interceptions, with Michigan's particularly backbreaking given that they'd reached the Iowa 38 -- even a field goal would have changed everything.

Then, with a chance to truly put the game away, Michigan ran De'Veon Smith for one yard, Jabrill Peppers for one yard, then a shot downfield to Amara Darboh fell incomplete (with Speight taking a vicious shot to the shoulder).

Few situations in sports fandom are more tense than this: The other team has the ball with just enough time to get into field goal range and, in the process, leave your team with little or no time to respond. There's a helplessness that builds with each successful play, with each moving of the chains.

Even worse, starting from the Michigan 36 after a face mask penalty, the Hawkeyes didn't have to go far. They did what they had to and booted the 33-yarder as time expired, ending Michigan's run of perfection.

---
So, what now?

Even after Iowa's brutal performance at Penn State, I knew this matchup presented the proverbial "trap" game (I would be lying if I thought it would be that close, let alone yield a Michigan loss). A Big Ten road game, at Kinnick, at night, is always going to be tough. Ohio State learned a similar lesson earlier this year against what at that point seemed to be a fairly pedestrian Penn State squad.

Such is college football. If Michigan fans can take any solace, it's in the fact that they weren't the only ones to fall. Clemson, Washington, Auburn and Texas A&M all dropped games, with Clemson and Washington falling out of the undefeated ranks.

Still, there's no antidote for the frustration that follows a November failure. With that said, Michigan still, in theory, can win out and join the playoff field.

It's just that that proposition seems far shakier than it did, especially with the news of Speight's injury.

Enter John O'Korn.

It wasn't long ago that another Big Ten team rode a backup quarterback to a national title. Ohio State, of course, struck gold with Cardale Jones, who powered the Buckeyes with his blend of running ability and arm strength to wins in the Big Ten title game against Wisconsin, then playoff wins against Alabama and Oregon.

Michigan fans will have to hope Jim Harbaugh can find similar success with O'Korn, the Houston transfer billed as the higher-ceiling option earlier in the calendar year before Speight proved himself more capable of consistently and prudently moving the ball.

None of that matters now. O'Korn will be the starter, and Michigan's hopes will ride on his ability to get the offense back on track after a faith-shaking night in Iowa City (perhaps Unreal City, as Eliot wrote, is more appropriate).

Bullets

• Tackling ... it is a concern. Whether it's Mike McCray or Channing Stribling or even Peppers, Michigan's back seven players have had some whiffs in recent weeks. Sure, Iowa's Akrum Wadley can make you look silly, but these sort of mistakes don't bode well for Michigan's defense against J.T. Barrett et al. 

• Even so ... talk of the defense's failures should be tempered by talk of its successes. For all of the teeth-gnashing following Saturday's loss, the defense still completely shut down Iowa's passing game. Plus, 12 non-safety points is still pretty good, any way you slice it. 

• But cracks are showing, and it's not hard to have visions of last year. Remember when Michigan's defense started to wilt late last season against Indiana and Ohio State? This isn't that, exactly, but teams were previously unable to do much of anything running the ball between the tackles. That wasn't the case for Iowa. Is it the beginning of a trend or did Iowa simply strike gold via Wadley's shakin' and bakin'? We probably won't find out for sure against an Indiana team that isn't the offensive force it has been -- we certainly will against Ohio State. 

• Pressure. Michigan's 'D' still tallied six tackles for loss, including a sack apiece from Taco Charlton, Chase Winovich and Chris Wormley. So, that's good. 

• Downfield shots. It's an almost pointless thing to say, but if Speight hits one or two of those open receivers down the field, this is probably a different column. But, for whatever reason, he didn't, and here we are. I wouldn't expect the downfield quarterback-receiver synergy to be better with a new quarterback taking the reins, unfortunately. 

• Perfection isn't easy. Four of the last five national champions had a loss. College football is too prone to random bouts of concentrated insanity for perfection to be easy or common. Even Alabama, that paragon of infallibility under Nick Saban, has only won one national championship while going undefeated (2009), while the other three seasons featured a loss (2011, 2012, 2015). I don't know if this Michigan team will join that club of slightly imperfect champions -- let alone make the playoff field -- but it remains true that Saturday wasn't the end of the world. It was only the end of a perfect one. Luckily for Michigan, college football championships are not necessarily won with perfection, but excellence at the right time. 

Michigan 59, Maryland 3: That November feeling

Here we are: another week, another blowout.

The difference, this time, is the time of year. With Michigan's 59-3 win against Maryland on the fifth of November, the Wolverines are undefeated in the final month of the Big Ten regular season for the first time since 2006.

It's easy to chalk some of this up to level of competition (although some seem to be forgetting Michigan has three wins against top-15 teams on its resume), but that still doesn't change the absolute certainty with which Michigan is winning. Ohio State, Clemson and Washington have all looked mortal against lesser conference foes. Michigan had its early tense period against Colorado and a close-but-not-close win in East Lansing, but otherwise this season has been a lovingly unfurled red carpet rolling toward Columbus, Ohio.

In 2006, Michigan opened its November with a shaky 34-26 victory against Ball State, which at the time didn't mean much but in retrospect presaged defensive failings later. Of course, those failings came to pass in a 42-39 loss against No. 1 Ohio State and yet another Rose Bowl thumping at the hands of USC.

This time, it was a conference foe in Maryland, not Ball State, and Michigan left no doubt. Wilton Speight continues to improve, playing his best game since the UCF game way back in September. Like the 2006 defense, which showed its cracks in the secondary late in the season, this otherwise dominant Michigan defense has showed some vulnerability against the run the last two weeks, particularly on the edge.

How many rushing yards do you think Maryland acquired on Saturday? Without looking, your guess probably greatly exceeds the reality. The Terps carried the ball 38 times for 78 yards, a figure that includes a long of 21 yards from the speedy Lorenzo Harrison.

That cognitive dissonance tells the tale to date. When Maryland finally got on the board with a field goal, the crowd seemed slightly perplexed. How could this be happening? When Rutgers acquired its first first down against the Michigan defense, some were mildly upset (sarcastically so, but still).

The level has been raised. It's why a two-score victory on the road against a rival, even a rival with a 2-5 record heading into the game, yielded mixed reviews rather than primal ululations on a mountaintop.

With said blowouts comes the cacophony of crowing on "class," that shape-shifting thing that means nothing except what the invoker wants it to mean. In this case, it's "don't score too many points because that is not nice."

Instead, Michigan should have taken delay of game penalties, punted the ball backwards, played Michael Onwenu at quarterback (okay, actually, please do this) and forgotten how to perambulate. In a Big Ten conference game, Michigan should be careful not to do too much, for it is unseemly.

I understand the desire not to feel embarrassed -- at the same time, it is not one opponent's duty to make up for its foe's inferiority with a forced display of "class," especially when there are still things to be accomplished (e.g. getting backups real, live reps).

It's no coincidence that other teams are doing the same. Ohio State dropped 62 on Nebraska. Clemson hit Syracuse with 54, only seven fewer points than the Michigan basketball team scored against Jim Boeheim's squad in a Final Four game in 2013. Washington scored 66 at Cal in an effort to make the playoff committee look bad after giving Texas A&M the No. 4 ranking. Louisville scored 52 at Boston College.

Style points supposedly don't matter anymore, they say. I'm not so sure.

In any case, Michigan has its sights set on a playoff berth, its destiny in its own hands. The Wolverines get Iowa on the road, a tricky Indiana team at home then a trip to Columbus against an Ohio State team that is still in play for a postseason spot. Then, should Michigan get through that stretch unscathed, they'll likely get a rematch with a tenacious Wisconsin squad.

Style points and strength of schedule and discussions of class will soon be blown away like a patch of fall leaves. Winning is all that matters.

And for the first time since 2006, winning is all Michigan has done heading into November, the month in which champions declare themselves.

---
As for the game itself, I'll direct you to MGoBlue's notes section for a full list of notable achievements. Among them:

• Michigan set a new season-best for total yards (yes, besting the Rutgers output). 
• Speight set a record for first-half passing yards with 292. 
• Somehow, Michigan became the first FBS team this season to score a touchdown on all of its first-half drives. 
• Jake Butt passed Jim Mandich in tight end receiving yards, becoming the program's all-time leader. 
• Michigan matched a season-high in tackles for loss with 13 (!), marking the sixth time this season Michigan has recorded 10 or more in a game. 

And so on and so forth. 

With the earlier caveat regarding Maryland's actual rushing output in mind, Michigan did show some vulnerability on edge runs, with linebacker Mike McCray looking wobbly in space at times. There's no doubt Urban Meyer was watching. McCray and all other would-be tacklers will need to be at their best on that November day in Columbus. Lorenzo Harrison is a solid player, but Curtis Samuel is something else. 

Otherwise, Michigan was just about perfect. Speight continues to display that uncanny, Roethlisberger-esque ability to shake off would-be tacklers and make a play. Although he was tackled for a loss once while attempting a hilarious spin move on third down (resulting in a Michigan field goal), he otherwise flashed a useful ability to get out of danger and even make big plays, including his first rushing touchdown of the season. 

In other noteworthy happenings, Jehu Chesson came alive, notching his first 100-plus yard receiving game of the year. Perhaps he's still working his way back from the knee injury sustained earlier this year against Florida. Whatever the case may be, now would be the perfect time to start seeing Citrus Bowl Chesson again. His speed and field-stretching ability would add yet another component to what has been an enjoyably diverse and productive offensive attack. 

---

Next week, Michigan visits an ailing Iowa squad that just took a 41-14 loss at Penn State. Iowa's running game was non-existent (26 carries, 30 yards). Its run defense failed to exist, too, giving up 359 yards on 52 carries (6.9 yards per carry). PSU QB Trace McSorley went 11-for-18 with 240 yards and two touchdowns. 

Michigan, of course, gets Iowa in Iowa City, a place they haven't won since 2005. That sort of trivia doesn't exactly matter, for a number of reasons, but it does mean Michigan cannot expect to play poorly and win easily. 

Most importantly, Speight will have another opportunity to get a road game in a hostile environment under his belt (I'm not sure the Michigan fan representation will be quite as strong for this one as it was in East Lansing). Every little bit of experience counts as the Wolverines prepare to gear up for the trip to Columbus later this month. 

Even a cursory scan of Iowa twitter reveals a deep sense of resigned frustration, one that Michigan fans know well -- except not really, because Michigan has never had a contract albatross like Kirk Ferentz's. 

This, for example, hearkens to Michigan teams of old, before the M Train and Peppers wildcat packages and fullback dives. 

Watch Penn State know Iowa's predictable play call pic.twitter.com/4pYTSGuNYZ

— Heavens! (@HeavensHawkeye) November 6, 2016

Michigan should leave Iowa City with a comfortable victory. But November can be a funny place in time, where "should" and reality part, leaving a swirling madness in the cleft. 

Michigan 32, Michigan State 23: Home on the road

What tells the story of college football better than colors and sound?

The maize contingent in the crowd at Spartan Stadium stuck out more than usual on Saturday. Twice, a very clear and audible doooommmm rang out when Michigan's Eddie McDoom carried the ball, first for 20 yards and later for 33.

You can often discern the state of a program by how many fans it is able to attract to a road venue. Even the hardiest fan base is not likely to travel when defeat is a foregone conclusion.

In the days of Rodriguez and Hoke, scarlet-clad fans flooded the Big House, providing the audio-visual signpost declaring Michigan's obvious inferiority to the Ohio State Buckeyes. Similarly, the Michigan State Spartans have filled the Big House in recent years, ringing the autumn air with chants of "Go Green, Go White."

On Saturday, things were different, both on the field and in the stands. I'm not sure exactly how many Michigan fans were there, but it had to have been the largest contingent in East Lansing in quite some time. The showing was in stark contrast to, for example, the 2008 Ohio State game (one I attended, for some reason). The Michigan contingent for that game was infinitesimal, a sign of the season and the times.

This time, Michigan waltzed into a road game against a rival with a No. 2 ranking and last season's catastrophic finish on its mind -- once the bullied, now the bully.

Even after the Spartans shocked the Wolverines with a 12-play, 75-yard odyssey of a touchdown drive to start the game, Michigan responded like a team fully in possession of its bearings. The Wolverines cut through the Spartans defense like a speedy defenseman carrying the puck end to end, maneuvering around opponents in the neutral zone as if they weren't even there, like green-and-white pylons.

DeVeon Smith for 20. Devin Asiasi for 15. McDoom for 20. Amara Darboh for 8. Smith for 7. Then, the coda, Jabrill Peppers cruising to the pylon to tie it.

The Spartans never led again, as Michigan began to slowly exert itself over the less talented opponent. When the Spartans dared to air it out -- according to Mark Dantonio, the call was actually a screen pass -- Tyler O'Connor tossed a ball into the waiting hands of Jourdan Lewis. Michigan promptly seized on the error, adding three points to go up 27-10 at the half.

The box score belies the nature of this contest. Outside of the brief collar-tugging stretch following Michigan State's impressive opening drive, it never felt as if the Wolverines were in real danger. And, unlike last year when the Wolverines led by two scores late, Michigan State didn't have Connor Cook to bring them back. This time, Michigan scored five second-half points, and it was fine.

Take, for example, the start of the second half. Michigan drove to MSU's side of the field, but a Wilton Speight interception gave the Spartans a brief sense of hope. MSU marched down to the Michigan 8, after which they bashed their heads into a wall seven times.

Earlier in the game, MSU failed to convert a fourth-and-1 from the Michigan 38. Times they are a-changin'.

Michigan didn't play its A game, but it didn't even need to. Down 30-10 early in the fourth quarter, the Spartans had a first and goal from the Michigan 8-yard line. Instead of methodically pounding the Wolverines into submission like the Spartans have done so many times before, the Spartans lost 9 yards, then Damion Terry tossed two incomplete passes before Dantonio opted for a 34-yard field goal, which Michael Geiger missed.

Sure, fourth and goal from the 17 is not exactly a promising venture, but a field goal gets you from three scores down to ... three scores down. The field goal attempt was thus pushed off line by a subtle mathematical breeze.

Even late, when the Spartans scored to cut the lead to 30-23, they opted to go for two, which promptly offered up the most pleasing conclusion for Michigan fans: Peppers scooping up the ball and jetting the length of the field to add two final points to Michigan's total.

Michigan fans were hoping for a more lopsided result, and they were certainly justified in expecting one. The Wolverines boasted all the gaudy statistical advantages, while the Spartans entered with a 2-5 record, a listless passing game and a defense bearing no resemblance to the stalwart groups of previous Dantonio teams.

Despite all that, the Spartans racked up 401 yards of offense, 23 first downs, 23 points and 5.2 yards per carry. They brought what they could -- unfortunately for Michigan State, it was not nearly enough.

As for Michigan, the win marked their first against Michigan State since 2012, and just the third in 10 tries against Dantonio. MSU fans will still say Michigan is 3-7 in their last 10 meetings against the Spartans -- and that's fine. It is a fact, after all.

But the past can be a sad place to live, as Michigan fans know. The past is fixed, and what has happened has happened. Nothing changes recent results -- in the past decade, Michigan has faltered, over and over and over again.

What does change, though, is the here and now, and in turn, the future. One team is ascending while the other descends. Will Michigan State continue to fall? That remains to be seen. It's hard to believe a Dantonio-led program will continue to be this bad, especially a year removed from a playoff appearance. It's also fair to say that the Spartans benefited from Michigan's post-Carr decline.

Well, it appears the era of benefits has come to end. That account has closed. The windows are boarded shut and the tellers have gone home.

On Saturday, Michigan won a game reminiscent of some box-score close Ohio State victories over undermanned Michigan teams (2009 and 2013 come to mind). While a total blowout may have been more satisfying for Michigan fans -- not unlike the 2002 Michigan-Michigan State game -- there's something to be said for a "close" game, one in which Michigan didn't play nearly its best and still emerged without suffering a heart-pounding final moment, a position of true danger, trouble with the snap.

This time, Michigan State fans chanted "f--- Jim Harbaugh" as the Spartans went out to attempt a meaningless two-point conversion.

Whether you believe in some sort of cosmic justice or not -- and, if you do, whether you believe such a thing can be applied to the ultimately meaningless world of sports -- the idea reveals itself from time to time, like a rare bird casually strutting into your field of vision before equally casually disappearing from view.

"[O'Connor] pitches it backwards and it's scooped up and there goes Jabrill Peppers ..." 

Peppers picked up O'Connor's wayward option pitch around the MSU 13-yard line -- O'Connor and his fellow teammates did not even bother to give chase, and justifiably so. The cause was lost.

Michigan's No. 5 sprinted unabated for two, crossing the goal line like a sprinter going through the finish line tape.

"Dantonio hates it," Brock Huard said. "That's the worst thing that could possibly happen."

I suppose, in the end, we will see about that.

Michigan 41, Illinois 8: Riding the M Train

Fouad Egbaria

Sometimes, with the passage of time, you look up at a long-standing symbol and see something in a different light, new and reborn.

I returned to the Big House on Saturday for the first time since 2012, when Michigan scored a hard-fought -- and what then seemed meaningful -- 12-10 victory against Michigan State, the first win against the Spartans since 2007.

What I saw on the field Saturday was something entirely different, unrecognizable in every way from what existed four years ago. Just like the City of Ann Arbor itself, which has seen businesses come and go in just the past few years, Michigan has gone forth with an entirely new business model.

From the very beginning, Michigan flashed its new-age business acumen. The Wolverines took another ride on the M Train, capping a long touchdown drive, the first of four touchdown drives to start the game. The Wolverines set up in a row, like camel riders in the desert, one behind the other, sowing some degree of momentary confusion in the sand.

Then, action. Winged helmets move like electrons around a nucleus of stolid protons and neutrons, zipping to and fro, changing the makeup of the structure, stabilizing and destabilizing, but most importantly, changing. It's difficult to say how much the M Train -- maybe the People Mover is a more physically and locally apropos nickname -- actually flummoxes a defense, but its early returns are indicative of efficacy.

The Michigan offense emerged from the M Train car, headed downtown or uptown or out of town, and lost in the ruckus of travelers was Jake Butt, who crossed the middle of the field for an easy 3-yard touchdown grab (which I saw unfold beautifully from my end zone seats in section 34).

And just like everything Michigan is doing these days, it looked too easy.

You can say Michigan's level of competition hasn't been great, but, then again, great compared to what? The Wolverines have dispatched a very good Wisconsin team, easily handled a Penn State team that just beat Ohio State, eventually handled a Colorado team that is one of the biggest surprises of 2016, and easily handled non-power conference teams (Hawaii and UCF) that, at the very least, appear to be not totally horrendous (UCF is third in the American Athletic Conference's East division, while Hawaii is second in the Mountain West's West division).

The only moments of tension in the stadium occurred when Chris Evans went down on the turf, and later when Illinois scored a touchdown.

Fouad Egbaria

Michigan games this year have been an exercise in cognitive dissonance, not unlike watching certain once-in-a-generation players run, like Vince Young or Jabrill Peppers. The frequently uttered sentiment about Young was "he doesn't seem to be moving fast" -- then you look and he's outpaced the chasing defensive ends and the linebackers, and pulls away from the defensive backs like a sports car racing past a fleet of rickety minivans. 

The Wolverines, similarly, have cruised through some of these blowouts with remarkable ease. Sure, facing Illinois' third-string quarterback had something to do with it, but the Wolverines managed to put the game away before anyone in the stadium even had the chance to ask their neighbors about their post-game plans. Main Street? Sure, but let's sing The Victors for the 38th time first. 

Not long after that, Tyrone Wheatley Jr. caught a ball in the middle of the field and cruised 21 yards to the end zone, looking like Devin Funchess if Funchess gained 40 pounds and didn't lose any speed. 

Illinois did get a first down on its next drive, but Michigan responded to this grave injustice with its customary Gradgrindian efficiency: 10 plays, 81 yards, capped by none other than DJ Khalid. Touchdown runs of greater than 1 yard are unseemly, and Mr. Hill does not bother with them. 

And with all of Michigan's shiny new offensive weapons, namely Evans and Eddie McDoom, it's been surprisingly easy to forget that De'Veon Smith is the senior back who's been through it. Against the Illini, however, he carried it a season-high 18 times, and ran in Michigan's fourth touchdown of the first half. Like the linebacker position, the running back spot has evolved from a preseason sea of disparate pieces to a working committee of diverse, talented players. Smith does Smith, Evans does Evans, Ty Isaac does Ty Isaac. Anthony Thomas, Chris Howard, Clarence Williams -- there's a pretty nice precedent. 

And that's all without even mentioning Karan Higdon, who on pure running ability might be Michigan's most complete ball carrier -- this is a guy who carried the ball 11 times for 19 yards in 2015. He carried it eight times for 106 yards on Saturday. 

On what was a sunny, beautiful day, I couldn't have asked for a better homecoming. "The Victors" sounds much better during a blowout win than in the waning seconds of yet another defeat. 

Michigan is now 7-0 for the first time since 2006 and just the fourth time in 40 years (the others being 1986 and 1997). In the final days of October, the air of perfection builds, breathing palpably -- the form of expectation wisps like frosty breath. 

Later, running toward my end zone, Higdon weaved his way through the Illini defense, 45 yards for another Michigan score. Having not been to a game in several years, the feeling of being in on something that's about to happen came back to me. He hit the hole to the right side, unperturbed by any defensive presence, but eventually cut back to the middle and then carried a couple of Illini defenders for the final two or three yards. 

It looked easy. 

That's probably because it was just that. And while homecoming crowds at Michigan Stadium tend to be somewhat subdued to begin with, this crowd gave off the air of one watching a game without a sliver of tension. 

No tension makes for boring games, but that's sort of the whole reason for the path Michigan has taken: so many games that should have been boring were not boring. Hence, fired coaches, then Harbaugh. 

With that said, no matter how dominant Michigan has been, Ohio State's loss at Penn State on Saturday is proof that guards must stay up. Michigan closes its season with three out of five games on the road, including a much-anticipated trip to East Lansing this Saturday. On Nov. 12, Michigan heads to Iowa City for a night game -- while the Hawkeyes don't appear to be nearly at the same level as last year, night games are night games. A mistake here, a mistake there, and what should be a boring game becomes a nail-biter becomes a loss. 

But, Michigan can only cross that bridge when it gets to it. For now, the road has been far easier than expected. After all, there's no place like home. 

I look back on my senior year at Michigan, 2010, and feel as if I'm watching a different program entirely. That year, Michigan took crushing home losses, all by double digits, against Iowa, Michigan State and Wisconsin, the latter of which encapsulated Michigan's inability to stop much of anything. Michigan was one-dimensional, unorganized, dependent on vague, sporadic bursts of magic. That year, Michigan beat Illinois, at home, in triple overtime, 67-65. 

Six years later? It's a different story, in a different book, in another language. 

Fouad Egbaria