“I love Coach Hoke. He told us when he got here that beating Ohio was the main thing and (Saturday) we finally did it. I’m trying to stay humble, but it’s hard. This feels so good.”
A few yards behind him, senior Michael Shaw, the Wolverines’ backup tailback also from Trotwood, was caught in the crush of the crowd when a girl reached up and smooched his cheek.
When he finally broke free, he too spoke of Brady Hoke, the Wolverines’ first-year head coach and himself a Dayton guy:
“Coach Hoke taught me what it is to be a Michigan man and today — right now, right here — I understand that.”
This was the first time in eight years Michigan had beaten Ohio State.
The two schools like to paint the game as the greatest rivalry in all of college sports, but lately that claim has sounded pretty hollow. It had become embarrassingly one-sided — Michigan had been outscored 100-24 in the previous three meetings.
Saturday was different as the two teams went toe-to-toe in a high scoring affair that featured the highlight reel exploits of the two quarterbacks — Michigan’s Denard Robinson and Braxton Miller, the OSU freshman from Wayne High.
Afterward, one Michigan player after another acknowledged Hoke, who grew up in Kettering where — as a kid playing in his back yard — he’d fantasize he was doing something heroic for the Wolverines, whom he loved.
But those long ago dreams paled next to Saturday’s realty.
Although he remembered one of his players dumping a cooler of water on him when the final gun sounded, Hoke said everything on the field after that was “a blur.”
What he did relish was the scene as soon as he got behind closed doors with his team: “Seeing those kids in the locker room, seeing how happy they were ... it’s one of the good days. It’s been a struggle for them, but (Saturday) they fought for each other and they encouraged each other.”
One of the first things that Hoke would be doing now was moving that clock he’d erected in Schembechler Hall that told the number of days it had been since Michigan has beaten Ohio State. “It was 2,962,” he said. “Now it goes back to zero.”
Not only has the rivalry been reset, but Hoke has instilled a pride back into a program that was derailed by the reign of Rich Rodriguez, a guy who, players insinuate, didn’t understand what it was to be a Michigan man, a shortcoming that showed up many places, including the won-lost record.
“We’ve gone through a lot,” said Dave Molk, Michigan’s fifth-year center. “This is my third head coach, third offensive coordinator, third O-line coach, third strength coach. It’s been a roller coaster and for some reason it seemed like it was never going to get good.”
Then Rodriguez was dumped and Hoke was hired. That his head coaching gigs were at Ball State and then San Diego State left some Wolverine boosters scoffing at first. They wanted a big name guy, but as it’s turned out, he was the perfect guy.
He had been Lloyd Carr’s assistant for eight seasons at Michigan and he understood the job and especially the OSU rivalry.
“He probably put 1,000 times more focus onto it than before,” Molk said. “We said ‘Beat Ohio’ after every single team meeting.”
Hoke — who starred at Fairmont East High in the late 1970s and then at Ball State — refuses to call the Buckeyes Ohio State and instead refers to them only as “Ohio.”
Asked why his coach does that, tight end Kevin Koger just grinned: “It’s one of those unexplained mysteries, I guess.”
It’s reminiscent of the way Woody Hayes tweaked Michigan, calling it “that school up north.” And in some ways Hoke reminds you of Woody — stocky, a bit rumpled, fully engaged.
“He’s the most genuine coach I’ve ever had,” said senior defensive tackle Mike Martin. “He really cares about the program and our guys. He taught us a different mentality. He taught us to compete.”
The Wolverines are now 10-2 this season — they won just 13 games in the past three years combined — and ended up a perfect 8-0 at home.
“(Saturday) we were perfectly at the edge of confident and cocky,” said Michigan defensive end Ryan Van Bergen.
Molk agreed: “There was absolutely nothing that was going to stop us (Saturday).”
He said that attitude has been instilled and nurtured by Hoke: “He is us and we are him. I love him. I love how he coaches. I’d do anything for him. He’s almost a friend. If I ever come back in 20 years, the first guy I’d find, the first guy I’ll call, is Coach Hoke.”
It’s that kind of embrace that made Saturday’s game so much better for Hoke than those football fantasies in his Kettering back yard:
“I love my team, the kids on the team and the way they represent Michigan,” he said. “I’ve got the best job in the world. Come 2:30 every day, I’ve got 115 guys that I have a chance to make a difference in their lives. What could be funner?
“Or, is it more fun?” he said with an unsure shrug.
“It’s funner, right?”
On this day, whatever Brady Hoke said, even when it was wrong, it was right.
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