Michigan coach Lloyd Carr broke down the film of his team's shocking loss to Appalachian State and noticed, among other things, too many penalties, before and after the snap, which hindered the Wolverines offensively all game.
Then of course, he finally saw a blown blocking assignment on Michigan's last-second field goal attempt that, if converted, would have prevented Saturday's historic upset.
"Ultimately, with a chance to win the game, we didn't execute a fundamental play, a play that we have worked extremely hard at all fall," Carr said during this weekly press conference. "So that's the way it is."
For the Wolverines, the way it is, is also now out of both nationally recognized top-25 polls. Michigan fell from No. 5 to unranked in the Associated Press and USA Today coaches' poll after becoming the first ranked team from Division I-A, now known as the Football Bowl Subdivision, to lose to a team from I-AA, now known as Football Championship Subdivision.
The drop in the AP poll was unprecedented, marking the largest downward move since 1989, when the poll expanded to 25 teams.
"I don't think there's any question that you have to face the reality of your performance, and of the things that you need to do to get better," Carr said on yesterday's Big Ten coaches' teleconference.
Carr pointed to the seven penalties for 56 yards, which forced the Wolverines out of manageable down-and-distance situations and quarterback Chad Henne into making decisions "he wouldn't normally make," Carr said, particularly an interception with Michigan trailing early in the fourth quarter.
"Like everybody else on our football team, he would have liked to play better this week," Carr said of Henne.
Little school love
Ohio State coach Jim Tressel, who spent 15 seasons at I-AA Youngstown State, said his teams there didn't think much about someday upsetting a big-time I-A program. But now that it's happened, Tressel feels a sense of accomplishment.
"We felt all those years at Youngstown State that we could have competed with anyone,"
Tressel said. "We never were concerned with what other people thought of our division. People that aren't in your world don't really know what your world is about. ... People are going to make up their own mind how they look at you."
'Surprised, like most people'
First-year Michigan State coach Mark D'Antonio was speaking with reporters after the Spartans' season-opening win against UAB when he found out Michigan lost its game.
"I was surprised, like most people, but I knew that the score was tight as the game progressed," Dantonio said. "When you're an underdog and able to play with a team through the first and second quarters, you start believing in yourself a little bit more and emotions start to take over, and that's probably what happened."
The Juice is loose
Illinois quarterback Juice Williams was injured in the second quarter of the Illini's 43-34 loss to Missouri but he will start Saturday at home against Western Illinois, coach Ron Zook said.
Zook said Williams suffered an eye injury and had what looked like a "boxer's eye," but returned to practice Monday.
