College GameDay debates whether Jim Harbaugh will coach against Penn State

As the Michigan sign-stealing story continues to unfold, the focus seems to have shifted to potential punishment coming for coach Jim Harbaugh, most likely in the form of a suspension by the Big Ten. ESPN’s College GameDay crew debated the merits of such a suspension.

They also debated whether Michigan should try to get ahead of any enforcement by the league office by suspending Harbaugh on its own, much like it did to start this season, in anticipation of NCAA action following COVID-19 recruiting violations.

“It’s a great question and I think it would be wise to find a game now and say, ‘All right, we did our thing,'” ESPN’s Ryan McGee said. “Their whole thing is not cooperating, so bench him now, be proactive and make sure you have him for the other games. It’s a game you think you should win that you probably should win, but it will look like you sacrificed something.”

ESPN’s college football insider and GameDay contributor Pete Thamel explained that if the Big Ten does hand down a suspension, things could start to get heated quickly.

He also laid out a timeline for some potential action.

“From a factual standpoint what we know sitting here on Monday afternoon as we tape our weekend recap pod is that we likely won’t know anything until the middle of this week at the earliest,” Thamel said. “And from what I have heard from Michigan and Harbaugh’s side is if the Big Ten does come with a ruling on something, which is likely to be suspension of Harbaugh, which most people around the Big Ten expect to happen, that Michigan will push back.

“So the interesting part of this story is we could really just be starting. Could you imagine if there’s an injunction to let Harbaugh coach on Saturday? I mean we’re talking now about things that really, really are big. And again, that’s a hypothetical, but if you are going to push back legally that’s where this goes and I think it’s really interesting.”

Thamel pointed to what he called ‘strong and powerful evidence’ that the NCAA and Big Ten are working with as his rationale for thinking a Harbaugh suspension might be warranted.

He also opined on the possible length of a suspension of the College GameDay podcast.

“I would think it ends up being more than one game, just considering the stakes, considering the schematic advantage that the coaches and athletic directors have relayed to (Tony) Petitti and how they think of it. Again, what has guided this and really been one of the fundamental backbones of this story is that when this information was presented to the NCAA, the week the investigation started, my sources indicated to me right away that it was strong and powerful evidence. …

“Everything that’s guided this so far has indicated the initial things that they’ve been told and what they’ve been operating off of have some serious clout to them, some serious, empirical, irrefutable evidence. And it has operated since then like that’s the case. So it will be very interesting. I think I’m going to be learning a lot more Latin here in the next few weeks, because I don’t think this goes quietly.”

The ESPN GameDay crew wrapped up their segment discussing Michigan and a possible suspension by noting it’s a polarizing issue either way.

“The only certainty, and Rece (Davis) has alluded to this, is that nobody’s going to be happy,” Thamel said. “You can suspend him for however long, the 13 schools are going to think it should be longer. If they make him miss a series of the Penn State game Michigan fans are going to be outraged because they don’t think they did anything. This is a white-hot, divisive thing that Tony Petitti is going to have a really hard time navigating because you are never going to find some middle-ground consensus on this. That is the only certainty moving forward in this.”