On Monday night, the Michigan Wolverines defeated the Washington Huskies 34-13 to win their first college-football national championship since 1997. The game was closer than the score indicated, but not particularly well-played by either team. The most compelling thing about it was simply that Michigan won: Their fanbase had been so desperate for this long-elusive title that their unbridled joy in victory was the real story.
It ended a season that, in many ways, was the final year of college football as we know it. The future of the sport, which is now in the hands of television executives rather than university administrators (or fans!) is uncertain; the change is only beginning.
One thing seems likely, though. After a season in which the Wolverines and their coach Jim Harbaugh were the center of attention from start to finish, the future of college football is going to look a lot like Michigan. In many ways, the story of this team is the pattern college football — or, more accurately, the TV bigwigs who run it — will want to follow in years to come.
Brand Name
A primary concern for devout college-football fans is that the sport is turning away from its dedication to tradition and regional fandom and focusing only on the biggest schools that can deliver the biggest ratings. As Stewart Mandel of The Athletic has noted, the sport’s new ideal television consumer is not someone who has followed their team for years but instead, as I’ve written before, “a bored, distracted, unaffiliated gambling aficionado who doesn’t really care about college football but will look up from his phone when the television is showing a game with a brand-name team he recognizes.” This is why fans fear that as college football rapidly turns itself into Minor League Football, it will consolidate into two NFL-type conferences with only 32 teams, which may doom up turning any school that isn’t a top-shelf brand into irrelevance. (Imagine what’s happening to Washington State and Oregon State happening to Arizona, Illinois, and Syracuse.)
That won’t be a problem for Michigan, one of the premier names in college athletics, with a vast, insanely dedicated fanbase that will never miss a game and thus provide a reliable ratings floor, regardless of opponent. (That Michigan has such a wide footprint in media — they’re still out there dancing across your social-media feed right now — doesn’t hurt either.) We claim to like underdogs, but every ratings metric shows that the money is in powerful brands. There aren’t many more powerful college-football brands than Michigan.
Charismatic, Polarizing Lead
This has to be the first time in college-football history that the championship-winning coach only coached half of his team’s regular-season games. Jim Harbaugh was suspended for the first three games and the last three games of the season, for different offenses. (Technically, the first suspension was self-imposed and not formally approved by the NCAA; it’s possible the organization could punish him further next season.) None of this ever seemed to faze Harbaugh, who was able to turn all this turmoil into “adversity” that he could overcome, self-centering the narrative like a skilled reality-television star. Harbaugh is an extremely talented coach (not to mention a very strange person), and he both loves the spotlight and loves to complain about its glare — another perfect reality-show combination. Harbaugh was an ideal villain this year, someone most of the viewing audience would hiss at but never look away from. The fact that he’s a true Michigan Man — he was a star quarterback for the team in the ’80s — made him the perfect guy for diehards to rally around despite all the scandals and drama. As with any main character, there’s always the risk of cancellation: Harbaugh has made no secret of his desire to return to the NFL. But that just makes him even more watchable, because deep down, no matter how much fans rooted against him, we’ll all miss him when he’s gone. A classic reality-show dynamic.
Unapologetic Nature
Michigan is as respected and august an institution as you will find in college athletics, a school and athletic department that has always prided itself on Doing Things the Right Way. (Unlike hated rival Ohio State.) But if you thought this year of scandal and villainy would lead to self-reflection, you’re mistaken. What might have appalled storied coach Bo Schembechler and his followers in the past instead gave rise to a Michigan vs. the World mentality — they even made a T-shirt out of it — that powered the program and its fans the whole season long. This drove everybody else in college football absolutely nuts and led most people to root for Michigan’s comeuppance, but hey, as the saying goes: Michigan didn’t come here to make friends.
Moments When All Seemed Lost, Resulting in Unearned Aggrievedness
It sure looked like Michigan was toast in the CFP semifinal against Alabama last week, with the team facing a pivotal fourth-down play that would have ended their season had they not converted. Not only did Michigan end up prevailing, they did so when the odds were stacked against them, allowing them to play the “no one believed in us” card despite being favored in every single game they played this year. Every story needs a pivot, the recovery from an all-seems-lost moment, and Michigan had a great one.
Ultimate Glory
Did the bad guys win? Probably, though “bad guys” is always overstated. (It was tough not to cheer for meditating quarterback J.J. McCarthy and charismatic running back Blake Corum, I’ll confess.) In addition to being college football’s main character, Michigan was also a fantastic team and a very worthy champion: No one can say that this title was a fluke.
The only thing Michigan was missing was a riveting championship game: All told, the season finale was a bit of a snoozer. There’s always next season, though, with a new cast, new storylines, and — most importantly — new conflict. The one thing successful television must have is drama. And Michigan never failed to deliver on that front.
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