Michigan football ready to hit the road, 'take over' away venues
Michigan Wolverines football has had the same routine over the last four weeks. The No. 2 Maize and Blue opened the 2023 campaign with four straight home games at The Big House, all of which they won by a comfortable margin. They went back to their dorms, apartments and houses, celebrated the win and got back to work Sunday.
Michigan’s schedule will be different this week, with the first of two consecutive road games looming. The Wolverines will clash with Nebraska Saturday and Minnesota the following week.
A knock on the Michigan program during head coach Jim Harbaugh‘s first several seasons at the helm was its record in road games. In Harbaugh’s first five seasons, the Wolverines were 15-9 on the road, including an 0-7 mark in away contests against ranked teams. The same story played out time and time again. Michigan was a very good team, a Big Ten contender, most seasons. But tough road games got in the way of getting through the regular season with the record to make the Big Ten championship game and College Football Playoff.
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That changed in 2021. Michigan did drop a road tilt at Michigan State but exorcised some demons with hard-fought wins at Wisconsin (U-M’s first win there since 2001), Nebraska and Penn State. The Wolverines made the opponents’ music their own, jumping around with the Badger fans in Madison, rocking out to ACDC’s ‘Thunderstruck’ in Lincoln and vibing with ‘Kernkraft 400’ in State College.
The script was the same the following year, with Michigan winning at Iowa and Ohio State for the first time since 2005 and 2000, respectively. In Iowa City, Michigan embraced the Hawkeyes’ tradition of covering the visitors locker room in pink, bringing pink towels onto the field and waving them around. The Wolverines didn’t back down in Columbus, egging on the crowd, waving to fans as they filed out in the fourth quarter and planting the ‘M’ flag at midfield after the 45-23 beatdown.
“The last couple years, the one thing that this program has done and the personality and the leaders on this team, is they have embraced road atmospheres,” Michigan radio play-by-play commentator Doug Karsch said on the ‘In The Trenches’ podcast. “It’s ACDC that Nebraska plays at the end of the third quarter. The Michigan kids danced and jumped to it two years ago. They love it, they leaned into it. ‘Jump Around’ up in Madison, they love that. They jumped just as much as everybody else did.
“They try to make it their own. They try to own whatever the opposing stadium does. It’s probably a big reason why this team has now won 16 consecutive Big Ten games — a bunch on the road — because they’ve been able to embrace that road environment. They don’t get intimidated, and they have fun with it is what they’re doing.”
It wasn’t until early Big Ten season away games that Michigan had its coming out parties the last two seasons, before marching to two-straight conference championships. The Wolverine players are waiting with bated breath to hit the road.
“I love road games,” Michigan senior running back Blake Corum said. “Going into their stadium and take over. You have the opportunity to take over. We’re going to make sure we take advantage of that. It’s going to be a great week of work, and I can’t wait for next Saturday.”
“At the end of the day, turn that road game into a home game — that’s the defense’s mentality,” junior linebacker Junior Colson added.
“Very eager,” Michigan graduate defensive back Mike Sainristil said. “It’s always fun to go to new atmospheres, and it’s a different mentality because it’s really us against everybody, and we’re prepared for that. We’re going to prep all week, but champing at the bit to get out there.
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“I’m just ready to bully somebody in their house. I just can’t wait to turn around in Nebraska to turn up on every, turn up on every play.”
Sainristil, who made a 48-yard diving catch to set up a field goal in a 32-29 win at Nebraska in 2021, is especially excited to return to Lincoln.
“I love Nebraska’s fans, I’m not gonna lie,” the Michigan standout said. “That night game, like that was probably one of the funnest games I’ve ever played in.
“It was louder than Penn State because it was loud the whole entire game — winning, losing, no matter what, it was loud. And just it just felt like a great football game. They had the lights, they were saying anything. Hostile environments are the best environments.”
Michigan’s head coach knows the Wolverines will have to play at a high level to come out on top.
“Just put the plan together, practice it and then you gotta pack your team,” he said on ‘In The Trenches.’ “You gotta pack a good defense — that’s most critical — and play good.
All these games, you just gotta play good football. I thought we did that [in a 31-7 win over Rutgers]. Had we not, Rutgers is a darn good team. They’re gonna win a lot of games this year, and everybody we face from here on out is that kind of team.
“If you don’t play good, you’re gonna have a good chance of getting beat. If you play good, you have a good chance of winning these games. Just get prepared.”
