A sports blog by and for Midwest Sports Fans
Congratulations to the British Columbia Lions, who defeated the Winnipeg Blue Bombers 34-23 in front of a crowd of 54,000 to win the 99th Grey Cup. I’m not sure that Vancouver deserves nice things, considering how the city responded to losing the Stanley Cup, but I can’t imagine that Winnipeg is too torn up about the loss. After all, the Jets are back!
Anyway, here’s what we learned this weekend:
It’s morning. While you get out your favorite coffee mug, pour a glass of orange juice, and make sure you have enough milk for your bowl of cereal, get yourself back up to date with the happenings in, or at least somewhat near, the sporting universe.
The following are links that we’re certain Rashida Jones would love.
You probably know the overall gist of the situation at this point. In fact, you’ve more than likely heard the numbers packaged up in a variety of fancy ways, a weekly effort to try and explain exactly what the hell is going on here.
67 for 96 (a 68.9 percent completion rate), 1,008 yards, seven touchdowns, one interception.
98 carries, 905 yards (an average of 9.2 yards per rush), and eight touchdowns for a grand total of…
1,913 yards of total offense and 15 touchdowns through five games.
Even in Rich Rodriguez’s wildest dreams of the perfect spread optioning, dual threat scoring behemoth, he could not have imagined his niche quarterback position to be executed at the level Denard Robinson has taken it to so far this season.
[Editor's Note: Throughout the day I participate in email conversations with friends about hot sports topics. One of my friends in particular is very active in these conversations. This is that friend.]
Wendell just wanted to share what he is thankful for on his weekly day of repent.
Wendell is thankful for Rich Rodriguez (aka Dick-Rod).
Specifically, Wendell appreciates Dick-Rod replacing an NFL pipeline with ambiguous position players, such those with the dubious label “athlete”, equating to non-NFL caliber talent, but talent capable of winning the insignificant-East.
Rich Rodriguez kicked off the 2009 campaign with an impressive showing from his true freshmen quarterbacks in the Wolverines’ 31-7 win over Western Michigan.
Tate Forcier is only the third freshman quarterback to start for Michigan in the school’s history, with the others being Rick Leach and Chad Henne. He looked sharp and passed for three touchdowns in his debut.Â
Even better than his three touchdowns, he had no completions to the other team, finishing 13-20 for 179 yards. He also rushed for 37 yards on 11 carries.
Denard “Shoelace” Robinson was 2-4 for 18 yards through the air, but his running game was more impressive. Robinson rushed 11 times for 74 yards, with an impressive touchdown run of 43 yards. The video of Robinson’s incredible debut run is below.
The only letdown in this game was Rodriguez’s thought that putting Nick Sheridan into the game was a good idea. Sheridan continued his stellar quarterbacking abilities that he so finely displayed last year by going 0-2 with a completion to the other team. I had instant flashbacks to every game he played in last year. It seems that some things will never change.
This win was nice, but basking in the glory of a Week 1 victory is something that Michigan cannot afford to do, as they have a real test at home next week against Notre Dame, who rolled Nevada 35-0.
Kurt Fraschetti
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* – Denard Robinson / Tate Forcier photo credit: Said Alsalah/Daily via Michigan Daily
by Sean Kane
This isn’t Bo Schembecler’s Michigan and it’s not Llyod Carr’s, either. It’s a talent loaded soon to be spread offense super force in the Big Ten. The record doesn’t show it, but the film and numbers do.
While the Blue and maize posted a loss to ND on Saturday, they showcased a couple of things worth serious note. The first and foremost being that the RichRod era is just beginning. Despite the turnovers, six in all, four in the second half, handing a ND defense a game they didn’t earn in the first half, Michigan showed some promise. While Notre Dame jumped out to a quick first quarter lead the Wolverines were able to battle back with an offense that has the patented Rich Rodriguez thrill written all over it.
