Michigan vs. Ohio State 2006: An oral history
The Michigan and Ohio State football teams had played 102 times in college football’s greatest rivalry, and there were many classic games.
But as the second half of the 2006 season progressed, the teams appeared headed for a showdown unlike any previous. Ohio State had been ranked No. 1 all season. Michigan had been No. 2 in the polls for five weeks heading into the Nov. 18 matchup in Columbus.
As the hype built, many expected the game to linger through history.
It has -- but not for the reasons anyone imagined.
Building up
The 2006 Michigan football team opened the season ranked No. 14 in the Associated Press poll. Coming off of an injury-riddled 7-5 season, which ended with Ohio State stealing the season finale in Ann Arbor and then a penalty-filled Alamo Bowl disappointment, U-M was at a 20-year low point. It hadn’t won fewer than eight games since 1984, and many speculated that coach Lloyd Carr had lost the magic that led to the 1997 national title and five Big Ten titles in his first 11 seasons as coach.
Just like nine years earlier, an NFL-laden roster was determined to prove it was better than critics believed.
Adam Kraus, U-M All-Big Ten offensive lineman: “We came in that year pretty maligned. We were coming off that 7-5 year where we lost in the Alamo Bowl to Nebraska, and I don’t think anybody believed in that team except the people in that room. I remember entering the year and had this Cinderella Man kind of theme going. The underdog, that nobody believed in us. When we went into Notre Dame that third week of the year, we were 2-0 and had beat Vanderbilt and Central Michigan, two easy wins, and I remember going into Notre Dame, and they were ranked No. 2 in the country, and hearing the Notre Dame fans say, ‘This isn’t Vanderbilt, this isn’t Central Michigan.’ And nobody in the world thinking we were going to do anything. And we beat 'em up pretty well.”
Jamar Adams, U-M All-Big Ten safety: “All the weeks leading up, we were doing a great job taking it one game at a time. That was pretty easy, seeing, the year before, we lost a number of games. When the coaches said something to us that particular year, it really stuck to us, guys committed to winning. ... The off-season thing was a bit more intense, a bit more passionate. So we knew something was different. We just knew the talent level we had was really high. We knew we could be really good if we were disciplined, that was a part of our training. We had to show our ability over and over and over.”
An early Prescott Burgess pick-six, a Chad Henne bomb to Mario Manningham and a 47-21 win over the Irish vaulted Michigan to No. 6. A week earlier, Ohio State had solidified its No. 1 ranking with a win over defending champion Texas, so the Buckeyes were everyone’s target. Both teams kept rolling, with Michigan making another statement at Penn State on Oct. 14. That began a monthlong countdown to The Game on Nov. 18.
Game week
Michigan entered the game coming off of a 34-3 win over Indiana. The real scare had come from Ball State a week earlier, when former U-M assistant Brady Hoke, who had recruited much of the fearsome U-M defensive line, almost spoiled the perfect season. Indiana weekend was an unremarkable Saturday for most people, except in one Ann Arbor house.
Shemy Schembechler, son of legendary U-M coach Bo and a Washington Redskins scout: “The week before, Michigan State was playing a home game, and it was the early game. It was an hour drive from East Lansing to Ann Arbor. I left at halftime so I could make the kickoff back in Ann Arbor with Bo. So I left and I vividly remember calling him and saying, 'What do you want for dinner?' … So we ordered Domino’s Pizza. We’re pretty simple guys. So we had pizza, we watched the Indiana game. There were a couple tense moments: Morgan Trent intercepted the pass and almost ran it out, and Bo ripped his ass through the television. … He and I were really entrenched in the game, so we didn’t talk very much. But it was so good to spend time with him because it was the last Michigan football game he ever saw. The fact that it was just he and I made it very special.”
The Wolverines went into the Ohio State week expecting to win. The survivor would be a lock for one of the two spots in the Bowl Championship Series title game that season. The loser… well, no one wanted to consider what would happen to the loser.
Adams: “We said if we go out and do what we’re supposed to do, we’ll win the ballgame. We didn’t think, ‘Oh, we’ve got a shot here.’ It was we’ve got to go beat these guys pretty good. Not overconfidence, but we had a legitimate amount of confidence in our defense and how our offense was going to perform, as well as our special teams. We said, ‘Yes, we’re going to win this game, and we’ll move on to the BCS national championship game.’”
Schembechler was Michigan’s legend-in-residence. Building his career as an Ohio State assistant and the head coach at Miami (Ohio), Schembechler coached the Wolverines in 1969-1989, compiling a record of 194-48-5 and winning 13 Big Ten titles. Though he had a history of heart trouble, suffering two heart attacks during his coaching career, he had changed his lifestyle in retirement. He spent football seasons in an office in the U-M football building that bears his name. On mid-October, he had a heart issue that required a pacemaker to be inserted but was back at a U-M game a few weeks later, sitting in one of the old “suites.” On the Monday of Ohio State week, with a massive press corps waiting, he addressed reporters.
Bo Schembechler, that day: "I think this is about as big as it gets. I don't know what else you can do. Two teams that have been dominant all year long. ... This is the greatest college football rivalry there is. I don't see that changing. I mean, I think it's going to continue to be exactly that way. … If they embarrass the Michigan team like they did two years ago, somebody ought to do something about it. They didn't do it to any other team, and they haven't done it to any other team this year. By God, they better not do it to Michigan -- and you can take that back to them."
Former U-M equipment manager Jon Falk, who was brought to Michigan by Schembechler in 1974 and considered him a second father: “I took him home Monday, and he was having a hard time walking. I went around to help him get in the house, he pushed me away and said, ‘I’ll walk in the house.’ Then he stumbled, and I got him in the house. He turned around and said, ‘Falk, I know what you’re doing to me, I know exactly what you’re doing. ... If something happens to me tonight, you’ll tell everyone tomorrow, 'I got him in the house, he was OK when I left.’ So we laughed about it.”
Former U-M athletic director Bill Martin, 2000-10: “I was watching practice, which I rarely did, because I was so engaged doing something else. Around 5:30-6 in the evening … it was Wednesday night, out under the lights, bitter cold and Bo was sitting on one of those portable golf chairs. I was sitting there with Jonny Falk … watching practice, freezing and talking about everything football, Thanksgiving dinner. I talked (later) about our argument when we were watching practice and what type of cranberries were the best, whether it was the canned stuff or the fresh stuff. We must have argued about that for 10 minutes. Bo finally came down on the side of canned cranberry sauce because he said it fit so nicely on the plate between mashed potatoes and the dressing.”
After a season of inspiring messages and themes, Carr offered another one late in the week. He centering on the “Carpe Diem” message from the movie ‘Dead Poet’s Society,’ telling the players to “Seize the Day.” Then on Thursday night, after the final scheduled practice of the week, Carr pulled out his trump card: Schembechler had the floor to address the team. Much of Schembechler’s speech centered around his former quarterback Tom Slade, who had died from cancer the previous week.
Adams: “That’s one of the bigger moments. Thursday after practice was usually a very quick day. You practice and you don’t normally watch film on a Thursday. But we got called upstairs by coach Carr. Then coach Schembechler walked in. Yeah, he was around the program a lot, but every time he spoke to you, it was a very big moment, because he was such a passionate guy about football, such a passionate guy about Michigan. You knew, when he spoke, he spoke about playing hard, he spoke about passion, he spoke about execution. He’d speak about the true, core characteristics. When he came in that Thursday and spoke to us, it was a very, very passionate speech. ... He just generated that feeling -- you knew about 1969, 1974, you knew that the same passion that allowed Michigan, when it wasn’t the most talented team, and Ohio State was clearly the dominant program at the time, it allowed these young guys to compete with those guys.”
Falk: “Thursday night, he was at practice, he gave the speech to the team, and I remember going in to see him after he gave the speech to the team and I said, ‘Hey, Bo, that was a great speech’ … He said, ‘Good, good, that’s the way I wanted it.'”
That night, Schembechler and his wife, Cathy, joined U-M regents Andrea Fischer Newman and Dave Brandon for dinner at the Chop House in Ann Arbor.
Fischer Newman: “We were sitting in the front window, where the bar is now at the Chop House, that used to be a table. … We sat down at dinner. He was Bo. He was funny, he was in your face, but at the same time, we did a lot of walks down memory lane. Big smiles. You would have had no clue that life was coming to an end so quickly.”
Friday morning
Schembechler’s usual Friday morning routine was to come to the WXYZ-TV (Channel 7) studios in Southfield to tape the “Big Ten Ticket” with sports anchor Don Shane. The show aired before the games began Saturday. It's where Schembechler felt ill a month earlier, leading to the hospital trip and the pacemaker. On this morning, some who saw him said he looked better than he had in weeks, bright and energetic, joking with everyone.
Former WXYZ sports reporter Tom Leyden: “I was not there every Friday. They would tape that show in the morning -- in our gut, we wanted to be there in the morning because we knew it was a special day. We got in earlier, to get there early to see Bo. You knew you were part of a cool week. He had an incident six weeks earlier where the ambulances had come. We felt he was fragile, to a certain extent. I had just had a reunion and was showing him pictures and talking for a good 15 minutes or so. I was showing pictures, and he saw a picture of my daughter and he said, ‘You stay out of the fray out there in Columbus, that girl needs a father,’ and everyone laughed.”
Before the taping, Schembechler went to the bathroom and collapsed. Chaos ensued. Someone came racing out of the bathroom, yelling for 9-1-1. As others tried to get help, Schembechler was left alone. Leyden and his cameraman Dave Meinhard went in to try to help. Leyden removed Schembechler’s glasses and loosened his tie, holding his left hand and placing his right hand under Schembechler’s head. Meinhard administered CPR until the paramedics arrived.
Leyden: “You’re personally traumatized, whether it’s the next door neighbor or Bo. Then we had to leave. We had that news responsibility, and they said, 'You’ve got to get to Columbus.' ... We got alerted that the news desk was about to go on the air that he had died. We pulled the van over into the rest stop and we just cried. I never had a moment like that with a coworker. ... Then we’re 2 1/2, 3 hours away from home, and I’m looking for a pen. I said, ‘Holy (expletive), I have his glasses.’ So I still had his glasses. My left hand smelled like his cologne, right hand smelled like his shampoo. I could sense the essence of the man on me.”
Mitch Albom: A decade without Bo doesn’t seem possible
Reaction spread quickly from Southfield’s Providence Hospital to Ann Arbor to Columbus and around the world.
Shemy: “He was driving to his show (when we spoke). There were two things abundantly clear in that conversation: one, that he couldn’t breathe and then, the other side of it -- this is so him, because he went to every practice that week -- is, he said, ‘We’re going to win. We’re going to beat Ohio State on Saturday.’ Within two hours of when I talked to him, I got word he passed away. The fact that I spoke to him two hours before he passed away was truly special.”
Former Michigan associate athletic director for media relations Bruce Madej, who had taken off from Ann Arbor to the hospital: “I literally stopped on (M-)14 when I heard Bo died. I didn’t know whether to go back to the office, go to Columbus or go to the hospital. I made my decision on how to handle it and was sitting on the shoulder, making phone calls. ... My dad had passed away the week before, and we buried my dad on Monday. I wasn’t at the (team's) press conference. For me, it was like bing-bang, two important people in my life who I loved, respected and listened to. In some way, my dad’s death prepared me for what I had to do. I went on ESPN at 1 p.m. to say that Bo had passed. I had to divorce myself from my emotions so I could do my job. Now, instead of worrying about the game, I had to do a 180.”
Falk: “I left Thursday night to go to Columbus and I got the call that he had passed away. I walked around the stadium, thinking about some of the great games we had had when Bo was coaching here at Michigan: the ‘76 game we won, 22-0, the ‘78 game, 14-3, and of course when Jimmy (Harbaugh) was the quarterback (in 1986), we won, 26-24, a come-from-behind win. Those emotions were all there. The only regret that I have from that last week was I never got a chance to tell Bo that I loved him. I missed that.
“I was already (in Columbus) and there was nothing I could do. I called (former Bo assistant) Gary Moeller right away, as soon as I heard. Gary was on his way to the hospital to see about Bo then. I called (broadcaster) Frank Beckmann and talked to him. It was just a tough time. Many people from Ohio, as I was walking over, they’d say, 'Hey, we’re sorry for your loss.' There was a lot of concerned people. That goes to show you the tremendous amount of respect Ohio State and Michigan have toward each other.”
Martin: “I was called right away to go to the hospital and make a statement for the press right there at a hospital. I drove to the hospital with a couple other folks. I didn’t have much time to talk to the staff that morning … I’m pretty certain I wrote an email to the staff. I know that Kim Eagle, who was Bo’s cardiologist, he met us there. He said, ‘I know what caused Bo to pass on. We’ve been able to keep him going for a few extra years.’ … I kept thinking how, in the most succinct manner, how could I express the thoughts of the entire Michigan family. I needed to think of the team, the fans, the staff and do it in a minute, two minutes. I was focused on that, Cathy, and everything that was going on."
Fischer Newman: “Dave and I had dinner Thursday night, and we were in the Regents’ meeting Friday morning. Somebody slipped a note to Dave at the Regents’ table. He sat across from me. It was a white piece of paper. He opened it up and he read it and he got all red, and his eyes started to tear. Then he passed the note across the table, and my reaction is pure shock. Then the note went around the table. I honestly don’t remember what happened after that. I don’t know if the meeting continued, I don’t know if we took a break, I don’t know what happened. All I remember is that’s the only thing anybody was thinking about.”
Jim Harbaugh reflects on Bo Schembechler 10 years after death
Friday afternoon
The Wolverines were told about Schembechler’s death, then got on buses to go to Columbus.
Carr: “With the benefit of hindsight, I’d love to have the chance to do some different things as we met and traveled to Columbus. Because I think I could have done a better job of dealing with the idea of what they were in store for. The travel down there -- it’s hard to explain, if you’re in that bus and every single car you meet, coming and going, there were people. It was all about Bo. And that’s all the players and probably the coaches, as well, you were reminded almost every mile of that trip down there. Then we got there and we went to the stadium, and it was different from any other Friday in my life of coaching.”
DPSS chief operations officer and director of University Security Services Joe Piersante, who was the U-M police chief at the time: “We sent more officers with the team that year because that game was everything, we were going into that last game, we were both undefeated, that was, back then, for the Big Ten championship. We took about six police officers in marked cars and we also had an escort with Michigan State police. It was kind of funny, when we got into Ohio, on all the overpasses, all the Buckeyes had big banners. A lot of them were in praise of Bo, which kind of surprised me. Some of them were derogatory, but there were people who respected Bo in the longstanding rivalry.”
Friday night
Adams: “The night before the game, we would get together and wrestle and joke, and people would throw water on (each other). It was this jovial, phenomenal attitude we had. That never happened that night. That night was somber. We had a tradition of coaches who would come to your room, shake your hand and wish you good luck the night before the game. Coach Carr, the defensive coordinator and your position coach would. I remember each one of those guys who came in, it was somber, and most of those guys had tears in their eyes. You think about this, you’re 12 hours away from the biggest game in your college career, and the leaders, the men in your life that help you with direction, they’re in tears. No sobbing, but you know when a man is in tears. … When he speaks, it’s a slower tempo. The whole team had that feeling. I’m not saying it came from the coaches; everyone was just mourning the death. It totally changed what had been, prior to that game, the atmosphere, the confidence. That environment that had existed for the first 11 games that we succeeded did not exist 12 hours before competing in the game against Ohio State.”
Saturday
With some incredible foresight, the Big Ten and ABC in June had decided to make the game a 3:30 p.m. kickoff for the first time in the modern era. The call came from Loren Matthews, who retired as ABC Sports' senior vice president for programming in 2006, as the Buckeyes looked like a clear No. 1 entering the season. The decision was validated, as the game drew the largest audience (21.8 million viewers, on average) for a regular-season game since Notre Dame vs. Florida State in 1993.
Big Ten assistant commissioner Mark Rudner: “I do remember ABC came to us with the request for the later start time. ... We thought we might be able to do something special, and they said, ‘Would you consider playing it at 3:30?’ From my standpoint, it was OK. We went to (Ohio State athletic director) Gene Smith, and they agreed to play it at 3:30. It may be the only Ohio State-Michigan game that ended in darkness. Sure, there was hesitation. Hesitation, on our part, 'is this the right thing to do?' What ABC said was we wouldn’t make the request unless it was that special.”
Piersante: “There was so much notoriety for the game, we wanted to make sure we had enough officers to safeguard the team when they were in the hotel the night before, with the escorts, all the Ohio law enforcement were very outgoing and very helpful for us. The Ohio Highway Patrol, the Columbus Police Department and the OSU police. All of them went out of their way to really help us and make sure the team got in safely, as well as the band and the fans.”
Before the game, there was a tribute to Schembechler, including a number of photos of him as Woody Hayes’ assistant. The stadium was silent as it played on the scoreboard. When the game began, Michigan looked ready. Getting the ball first, the Wolverines scored on their first possession. Then Ohio State got its first chance and showed it was prepared, too.
Adams: “Ohio State, every year, had done a phenomenal job of throwing in something that was different. They were a very talented team and had a lot of success with their running game, and the scheme was successful all year. And then we come out, and they’re in an empty set (with no tailback). It was a very big adjustment for us because it wasn’t something we had practiced a lot in practice. We had practiced as if it was a slight addition to what they were going to do, not the majority of their offense. That was definitely impactful.”
The teams traded the lead, and the Buckeyes got moving with a 21-point second quarter to take a 28-14 halftime lead. OSU had big plays on a Beanie Wells 52-yard touchdown run and Ted Ginn Jr. 39-yard touchdown catch. U-M got a 37-yard catch by Adrian Arrington. Michigan was able to rally in the second half, closing within 28-24 before a 56-yard Antonio Pittman touchdown run separated OSU again.
Carr: “We just gave up too many big plays on defense. We had seen the spread offense, and they added a wrinkle with no backs in the backfield, but that’s part of every game. You’re going to have some adjustments to make. Because, in a game like that, you’re going to try to do some things that they haven’t seen. But the bottom line is Ohio State was a great football team. So I don’t spend time thinking about a lot of those other things.”
Adams: “And the turf that we played on was horrible, people slipping and sliding all over the place. I thought it was interesting that the field was in such bad shape. You look around our team, and the strength of that team offensively was field position. We had Mario Manningham, Adrian Arrington, Carson Butler, Antonio Bass. At the skill positions, we had Steve Breaston. The strength of our defense was the front four and front seven and, in my opinion, defenses and skill positions always want great footing. When you have a defensive line and they don’t have great footing, they slip and slide a little bit. I think it was a factor. Nothing I’m saying is the reason we lost, but they all were pieces of the puzzle as to why we lost that ballgame.”
Michigan’s best chance to take the lead came with just under seven minutes left, trailing, 35-31, and Ohio State facing a third-and-15 from U-M’s 38-yard line. If Michigan got off the field, Ohio State likely would have punted instead of trying a 55-yard field goal. Ohio State quarterback Troy Smith rolled right and released the ball just before stepping out of bounds. It fell incomplete, and Michigan looked like it would get a chance. But U-M defensive lineman Shawn Crable came in too high and had a helmet-to-helmet hit on Smith, drawing a flag.
Adams: “It seems like, when I’m walking through the airport, that game seems to be on every time of year, and every time I look, it is just prior to or just after the Crable play. … When the play happened I said, 'OK, this is what we’re supposed to do.' Then I saw the flag come out and I was looking for a holding. When they showed it on the big screen, I was thinking, 'Are you kidding me?' A 5-10 guy getting tackled by a 6-5 guy, how do they expect him to tackle, how do they expect him to hit him? Maybe a little late, but you get a couple steps. It was a shock. We had been training, we had to put it all aside and keep going. … I don’t think anybody felt like they were cheating us or they were taking anything away, but it definitely was a big-time shock. We didn’t feel it was legitimate. We did our job, we did the thing we had done all year: We stopped somebody.”
Former U-M All-America receiver Braylon Edwards, then with the Cleveland Browns: “I was actually at the game, I went on the sideline. I caught a helicopter from Cleveland, because it was Cleveland to Columbus, and I caught a helicopter back. I left right before Crable got the penalty. Thank God I wasn’t there for that. I probably would have killed someone.”
Kraus: “Every time I see (the game) on a 'Big Ten Classic,' you’ll see plenty of blocks that I missed, plenty that Jake Long missed, you’ll see cuts that Mike Hart didn’t make, you’ll see throws that Chad Henne didn’t hit. There was plenty of opportunities for us to capitalize on the game. So never for one minute have I ever blamed Shawn Crable or the defense or one specific individual for that game.”
Michigan scored its final touchdown with 2:16 to play, closing within 42-39 but the Buckeyes recovered U-M’s onside kick.
Edwards: “It was a tough week, being a Michigan guy, then Glenn passes away, coach Schembechler. Knowing that his roots started at Ohio State, then Miami Ohio, then Michigan, it was very emotional for both teams. One thing I was very appreciative of, Ohio State showed a lot of love and compassion for Bo. That’s one thing I will respect about Ohio State, how they handled that situation. No. 1 vs. No. 2, we’re trying to bring Michigan football back after that 2005 season, and to lose the way we did, it’s tough. We don’t get that penalty on Crable, we win that game and we go to the national championship.”
Kraus: “I remember it being a competitive dogfight of a game. That game rarely gets (cheap shots), at least when I played in it. I don’t think it ever got really dirty. There are teams that things will get dirty with, and that wasn’t one of them. At the end of the day, both programs respect the hell out of each other. The rivalry is different than all other rivalries.”
Piersante: “I was around (Carr). We were part of the team-protection detail, we’d take the team and coaches out of the locker room and into the locker room. I’m sure he had a lot of emotions, but from the outside looking on, he was all business.”
The aftermath
Schembechler’s private funeral was Monday, and the university held a public memorial Tuesday at Michigan Stadium with a 10-person speaker list including Carr, Shemy, former Southern Cal coach John Robinson, former lineman/broadcaster Dan Dierdorf and former Alumni Association director Bob Forman. The emotions lingered through the week but, eventually, thoughts turned to football.
Because the Big Ten still wasn’t playing on Thanksgiving week and didn’t have a conference title game, there was a lot of waiting to see whether there would be a Michigan vs. OSU rematch in the BCS championship game. USC looked like the main competition after crushing Notre Dame on Nov. 25, but it lost its shot by losing to UCLA on Dec. 2. Florida squeezed by Florida State and then, sensing a new opportunity, got past Arkansas for the SEC title. The second BCS team would be determined by a combination of the coaches poll, computer rankings and the Harris poll, a mix of journalists and former players. After losing to OSU and dropping to third, behind USC, the Wolverines remained there after getting passed by Florida.
Falk: “When the votes came out and who voted for us and who voted against us, we knew who they were. I talked to Bobby Knight, and Bobby Knight said, ‘Jon, you got beat. They’re not going to have Ohio State play Michigan again.’ I understand that. But at the same time, I’d have loved to play Ohio State one more time. Ohio State’s such a great game anyway.”
That final weekend, Florida coach Urban Meyer publicly lobbied for his team to get the No. 2 spot. Carr chose to remain out of the public eye and simply let the voters decide.
Carr: “If it were today’s (College Football Playoff) setup, that team would have been playing for the national championship. I think everybody knew that every single one of us felt like we should have had an opportunity to play them again on a neutral site. The deal was we lost one game, and it was down there. You can’t look back, as far as changing the dynamics. We were in the BCS, where the media votes, and I think there were people who campaigned hard (for themselves), and there were some people who campaigned against us, which is another story.”
Michigan ended up in the Rose Bowl, where it fell to that USC team, 32-18, taking the shine off that near-perfect season. Ohio State had a massive layoff and was crushed by Florida, 41-14, in the title game.
Carr: “A lot of it had to do with the fact that, mentally, I think it’s fair to say, we were all distracted. Ohio State, that game, it’s hard enough to win, especially when you’re away from home. It’s hard enough to win when you’re focused and mentally preparing yourself those last 18 hours to play and play at your best. We lost to a great team. And we were a great team.”
Michigan and Ohio State meet again as top-five teams this Saturday.
