reusse on osu-michigan

ol' patrick reusse is a great baseball writer and storyteller, but he's pretty fair on football as well (e.g., you have to be old enough to remember when the Gophers were good to remember when Michigan was bad). a few lines from his notes column today:

The announcement of Bo Schembechler's death came before noon Friday and this was my first reaction: That old Michigan coach will do anything to beat Ohio State... There's probably not a fan on either side of this magnificent rivalry that considers it to be a coincidence that Bo would time his death for the eve of Michigan's greatest-ever showdown with Ohio State.

Can't you imagine the scene? The 77-year-old coach speaks to the Wolverines on Thursday night, tapes a TV show the next morning, starts feeling those familiar chest pains, says to himself, "This should fire up our boys to beat those son of a guns with the nuts on their helmets," and then decides to go to the big stadium in the sky to watch and rant with Woody Hayes, his mentor and then biggest rival.

i mostly watch high school games these days, but you learn a little about big 10 football over four decades in minnesota and wisconsin. for most of these years, i've rooted against the conference's "big 2" and for its "little 8." i may have to watch a bit of today's game, though, since the lad is starting to have conversations like this with his buds.