No Mas

Ladies and Gentlemen, it is over. The worst season in recent memory for University of Michigan Athletics is over. After starting off the football season 4-0, the Michigan Wolverines managed to lose 7 of their last 8 games and missed a bowl game for the second season in a row. The basketball team, coming off their first trip to the NCAA tournament under Coach John Beilein and a preseason ranking in the Top 25, failed to make any postseason tournament and finished the season with a game winning three-pointer coming off the fingertips of Ohio State's own Evan Turner. The hockey team had one of the worst regular seasons in Red Berenson's tenure. If it wasn't for an improbably run in the CCHA Playoffs they would have failed to make the NCAA Tournament for the first time in over 20 years. Their season ended last night in heartbreaking fashion to Miami of Ohio in two overtimes. Best yet, they scored the winning goal in the first overtime, but unfortunately the worst refs ever blew the whistle early. The icing on the cake that really made me feel better about everything was hearing about junior guard Manny Harris' decision to leave early and declare himself eligible for the NBA Draft this summer. Great...just great.

I guess I wouldn't be sitting here whining and crying about it all if Michigan did not have such a rich history of phenomenal athletics. I remember some of the first years that I really paid attention to sports Michigan won two ice hockey championships, one football national championship, won the Big Ten Basketball Tournament, had a Heisman Trophy Winner and a Hobey Baker Winner all within a span of three academic years. Now that I'm wrapping up my third year here at Michigan, what have I witnessed? I've watched Appalachian State march into the Big House and shock the world. I've seen Dennis Dixon dick all over Michigan in one of the worst losses I've ever witessed in Michigan Stadium. I've seen Ohio State beat us not once, but twice in the Big House. Heck, I've even seen Michigan State beat us in the Big House. Better yet, I've seen the Big House not be the "biggest house." I've seen our basketball team be awful, then good, then awful again. I've seen our hockey team have amazing seasons, then just fail and falter during the playoffs. I will say though, I did have the pleasure in seeing another Hobey Baker Winner here in Ann Arbor.

I guess the combination of me growing up in Ann Arbor along with the perfect timing of my maturation as far as appreciation for sports goes spoiled me. Although this is all true, I'm not asking for national championships left and right. I would just like to see one of my teams do well. Watching Michigan State ease their way into another Final Four only furthers this general disappointment. Between Tom Izzo's stupid smirk he always has, and Terrelle Pryor dominating the Rose Bowl this past January, and all these devastating losses. I really am not sure if I can handle another season like this. I'm what I'd call an extremely loyal fan, but this is ridiculous. People joke about being cursed and all that, but seriously? How many other ways can we lose? We get blown out on the road. We get blown out at home. We have amazing regular seasons, and lose early in the playoffs. We have awful regular seasons and make promising runs, to get our little hearts broken. We get hit with buzzer beaters and last minute drives. We lose on national television, and we lose on regional broadcasts. This is all without even bringing up the embarassment that has been the ongoing investigation on whether or not we practice too much. I'm done. NO MORE.

I'll admit, I don't necessarily have a whole fix-it plan. Heck, I wouldn't know what to do if you put me in charge of one of those teams for one day. I do know this though: this is all completely unacceptable. If they have any sense of the athletic history of UofM (which we all know at least Red does) they will not accept this. They will sit their returning players down this offseason and demand greatness. I'm sick of "waiting for players to develop." I'm waiting for coaches styles to "develop." I'm over it all. We are the University of Michigan. We demand greatness. Time to step up.