Michigan-Michigan State fight should be reminder: Unbridled vitriol not the answer
The Big Ten ruled. And it’s over. And that’s not the worst news for this increasingly unhinged rivalry between Michigan and Michigan State.
Mostly, because it’s exhausting, all of it.
The shoving. The headbutting. The unending "little bro" business. The insults. The mocking. The relentless search for moral high ground.
The frame-by-frame breakdown of players jawing and jostling and moving their legs in a manner that could be construed as ... a kick? A stomp? A step?
Nothing?
Something?
The end of a rivalry?
Too drastic?
Take the temperature out there in places where Green and White meet Maize and Blue and you’ll find the suggestion without much effort.
But then if we can’t play a football game once a year in this mostly glorious state, then what does that say about us?
That we’ve reverted, mostly. That we’re toxic-spewing children no longer capable of processing defeat or victory or understanding that one doesn’t make up a whole.
That part of college football is no different than our politics, where mistakes are grounds for dismissing entire peoples.
Everyone wants justice, and everyone is certain who deserves it, except the Big Ten, which decided it couldn’t make sense of the footage from Saturday night’s dustup at Michigan Stadium.
The conference called it inconclusive. And so, we move on. Ah, who are we kidding? We’ll never move on, not before death, or the next time Michigan and Michigan State meet.
Until then, U-M will remain spoiled and arrogant and above reproach, and MSU will remain ill-tempered, whiny and soft. This is what we tell ourselves, right?
This is the language pinballing through our frontal lobes when a defensive end pushes a tight end, and a tight end headbutts back, and players rush onto the field, and one of them appears to make a stomping motion.
Yet we can’t see if anyone actually got stomped. And even though no one has come forward yet to say they were stomped, or hurt, we reflexively assume the worst, because due process works better as an ideal than as our reality.
And so, we speculate, and extrapolate, and take our biases and combine them with our passions and use them to make sweeping judgements about thousands of people.
Make that tens of thousands of people, actually, because that’s what we’re talking about when we discuss Wolverines and Spartans – or Spartans and Wolverines for those inclined to assume there is a hidden agenda in listing the Wolverines first.
There is not.
Just as there was no hidden agenda in the Big Ten’s decision Tuesday. These are the same leaders that suspended Jim Harbaugh for three games late last season ... after several rival coaches and administrators lobbied for consequences to the sign-stealing incident.
Here is the opening part of the Big Ten’s statement:
“The conference thoroughly reviewed video of the incident that occurred at the conclusion of Saturday's Michigan-Michigan State football game. Amidst the confrontation, student athletes from both teams were on the ground and surrounded by so many individuals that both players were completely obscured from view.”
“The video review was inconclusive as to whether individual discipline was appropriate for anyone in the immediate vicinity of the two players who were on the ground.”
The league saw what everyone else saw. It just looked through a different lens. And added this:
“While the confrontation was a disappointing conclusion to the contest, the Conference appreciates the efforts made by staff from both teams, security personnel, and game officials to rapidly de-escalate the incident, as well as the responses by both head coaches. The Big Ten discussed the situation with both institutions and determined that no further action will be taken.”
First of all, the conference is right that it could’ve been worse. Thankfully it wasn’t.
What also helped, as noted above, was the response from the coaches, both immediately after the game and then again on Monday, when each held their weekly news conferences.
Here is what Jonathan Smith said after the game:
“It's an emotional game and you don't love finishing kind of that way. Especially, I thought for the football game itself, it was physical, I thought guys were playing really hard and I thought it was a pretty clean game, so it's tough to finish that way."
And here is what Sherrone Moore told the Big Ten Network after the game:
"That's disappointing. That's not what Michigan football is all about. That's not how we represent our program and this university. That's uncalled for. That'll be dealt with and handled, but that's just very disappointing that our football team was a part of that.”
Both coaches doubled down on the message Monday. And though MSU athletic director, Alan Haller, attended Smith’s news conference to announce the school had reached out to the Big Ten to investigate, and said he wanted U-M held to the same standard as everyone else in the league, he, too, used a calm and civil tone.
He also didn’t plan on asking Washtenaw County prosecutors to seek criminal charges, if any were applicable:
“I don't plan on doing that. I don't think that situation (in 2022) should have been a criminal incident, and I don't think this should be as well. This is a sportsmanship policy situation ... but I do not believe that incident or this incident is a criminal situation.”
Haller deserves credit for his approach. He well remembers Jim Harbaugh’s bombastic sermonizing after the tunnel incident two years ago, and the effect that had on the rivalry.
No one in a position of power with either program tried to over sensationalize what happened this time. Perhaps that is a small and hopeful sign.
Moore said it would never happen again. And while Smith said he and his staff would never forget Saturday night, he was mostly talking about the intensity of the game on the field.
He is new to it. Now he knows.
In the future, let’s hope that’s where it stays. And if it strays, and emotion gets the better of a few players again, there should be consequences as long as there is clear evidence.
Yet even then, the mistakes of a few shouldn’t give license for unbridled vitriol toward everyone else. We’re of the same place, and share the same space, and at some point, that’s got to count for something again.
Contact Shawn Windsor: swindsor@freepress.com. Follow him @shawnwindsor.
Next up for Spartans: Hoosiers
Matchup: Michigan State (4-4, 2-3) vs. No. 13 Indiana (8-0, 5-0).
Kickoff: 3:30 p.m. Saturday; Spartan Stadium, East Lansing.
TV/radio: Peacock (online-only); WJR-AM (760).
Line: Hoosiers by 7.