Hell to the Victors
Michigan's defenders are in midseason form
Be nice to your Michigan friends, they’ve had themselves a week.
College football’s latest cheating scandal broke last Thursday, and this time the NCAA has turned its attention to Ann Arbor.
This isn’t just a routine, paper-shuffling NCAA inquiry involving recruiting calendars or cheeseburgers or other traditional NCAA fare. Michigan knows how to handle that kind of NCAA dustup; coach Jim Harbaugh served a three-game suspension just last month for some relatively minor infractions that seem quaint in retrospect.
No, this thing is different. It’s alleged that Connor Stalions, a Michigan staffer, engineered an elaborate scouting operation in which future opponents’ sidelines were secretly video recorded, and that Michigan coaches used that information to steal signs during games and anticipate their opponents’ next moves in real time.
In other words: Michigan is accused of cheating on the field of play.
The University of Michigan is a prideful place. Big wins and bragging rights are important everywhere in college football, but they carry a special premium in Ann Arbor. A Michigan coach’s record against the Wolverines’ hated rival, Ohio State, often determines whether he receives a statue or a severance package at the end of his tenure.
That’s why this new scandal, which has cast doubt in some circles on Michigan’s recent victories — including two convincing wins in a row over OSU — is impossible for its fans to accept.
So they don’t.
Instead, Michigan fans have embarked on a journey down the Seven Stages of Sports Scandal Coping. If you’ve spent time with a Michigan fan over the past week the following sequence may look familiar:
STAGE 1: This Didn’t Happen.
Michigan Fan: Ha! How predictable. In the middle of our best season in years, suddenly there are random, outlandish accusations trying to distract us. Where’s the evidence? You’re really going to believe anonymous sources?
Narrator: There are photos, videos, text messages, even Venmo records cited in dozens of credible reports.
STAGE 2: This Wasn’t Against the Rules.
Michigan Fan: OK, something may have happened, but nothing that’s against the rules. Stealing signs is a time-honored tradition in college football. And come on, it cannot be true that in-person scouting of future opponents is prohibited!
Narrator: “In-person scouting of future opponents is prohibited” under NCAA Bylaw 11.6.1. And it’s really bad if video recordings are involved.
STAGE 3: It’s a Stupid Rule.
Michigan Fan: Fine. But it’s a stupid rule. These games are all on TV! Who cares if a staffer goes to a game or two, what’s the difference?
Narrator: TV broadcasts and official game recordings don’t show sideline signals for a reason. A staffer would have to watch the games in person to match a team’s signals to its plays, which is why the rule exists.
STAGE 4: Everybody Does It.
Michigan Fan: Look, if you think Michigan is the only team that does this I have a bridge in Kalamazoo to sell you. The only difference is we got caught.1
Narrator: The “everybody does it” defense makes sense when you’re arguing a speeding ticket, not an arson charge. Allegations of cheating during games gets you in a higher tier of trouble.
STAGE 5: This Didn’t Help Us Win Games Anyway.
Michigan Fan: There’s no way that “stolen” signals can really be communicated to the players on the field in the 10-15 seconds before the ball is snapped in any useful way.
Narrator: Then why do it? Breaking a rule just for fun should get you a special punishment.
STAGE 6: This Really Isn’t a Big Deal.
Michigan Fan: With everything going on in college sports — NIL, conference realignment, the transfer portal — this is what the NCAA is going to pick on? Doesn’t the NCAA have bigger fish to fry than chasing down a low-level staffer and his mignons for attending a few football games?
Narrator: The NCAA has a nice beefy investigations unit that’s capable of running several investigations at once. And they seem particularly interested in this one.
STAGE 7: This Will Take Years to Resolve.
Michigan Fan: It’s going to take months, even years, for this thing to work its way through the NCAA process, so it’s not really relevant to the 2023 season.
Narrator: I have to admit, the supernatural effort to whisk us into the future to look back on the present day as “old news” is creative. But the “we might be guilty but let’s table this discussion while we try for a national championship” defense is not a great look.
The Seven Stages offer a soothing cocktail of excuses, denial and misdirection that is helpful during times of crisis like this one. Some Michigan fans will sip on it forever, refusing to acknowledge any bad news and viewing any admission of wrongdoing as disloyalty.
But if the evidence eventually proves overwhelming and the music must be faced, the grown ups at Michigan will turn their gaze inward. And someone will be made to pay.
When things go bad, Michigan doesn’t get sad. Michigan gets mad.
And that’s when we will reach the final, dramatic, destructive stage of the coping process:
STAGE 8: The Reckoning.
You will know that Stage 8 has arrived when there’s an eerie quiet in Ann Arbor. When you defend something you love and it lets you down, that’s what happens. The opposite of defending isn’t conceding. It’s silence. A mother will never admit her son deserved to go to prison, she’ll just change the subject.
And then the decision makers at Michigan will break out a scalpel and very publicly remove the tumor that’s deemed to have caused this mess, so that when all is said and done the Wolverine body is preserved. It will then be decreed that that this episode was an aberration that has been rectified, that it wasn’t the real Michigan that did that bad thing.
Connor Stalions may very well be on the wrong end of that scalpel; he has already been suspended (although he’s still getting paid). His suspension may be the first stop on his forced shame journey that will assist Michigan in rebuilding its credibility.
Despite his recent success, Jim Harbaugh may ultimately be discarded as well.2 If it is determined that Harbaugh was involved in this scheme he will become instantly disposable, deemed not a Michigan Man after all, tossed to the garbage (or the NFL) as further evidence that the ship has been righted.
We don’t know if any of this will be resolved in 2023. It seems unlikely.
What we do know is that Michigan will use this saga as a reason to invoke college football’s favorite refrain: “Us against the world.” Never mind that this was a self-inflicted wound; it’s like slashing your own tires and singing a fight song while you walk to the bus stop. Whatever keeps you focused I guess.
But the show must go on. Michigan will play next weekend, and the next and the next. And then in late November there will be a fleeting mention of the investigation during the Michigan-OSU game, and Michigan fans will bark one of the Seven Stages at their televisions.
If there’s one thing Michigan people love, it’s Michigan, and they will defend to the death anything maize and blue. We shouldn’t expect any more from them, or any less.
Not getting caught is arguably the most important part of any school’s compliance program.
Just two years ago, before Michigan’s recent convincing wins over OSU, Harbaugh was squarely on the hot seat.
There are plenty of facts that need to be unraveled, but I am confident that if this were Purdue, it wouldn't even be a concern.
Thank you, Faux. To mitigate my Schadenfreude, I've applied these steps to scandals/controversies at my favored institutions, and it holds up nicely. You may be the Elisabeth Kubler-Ross of college athletics.