The Wolverines Ride Emotion, and Henne's Arm, to Victory
Before Michigan played Florida in the Capital One Bowl in the final game of Coach Lloyd Carr’s career Tuesday, he addressed his team with tears in his eyes and emotion in his voice, his players said.
After the game ended with a 41-35 Michigan victory before 69,748 fans in Citrus Bowl Stadium, the Wolverines started to carry Carr off the field on their shoulders. But the 62-year-old Carr ordered them to put him down.
He said he wanted to speak with Urban Meyer, the coach of the Gators. “Lloyd said, ‘Some day, you’re going to retire,’” Meyer said of their conversation, “‘and your players are going to play as hard as my guys did.’”
Both teams played hard and Michigan came from behind in the fourth quarter after squandering a two-touchdown lead. The game was filled with dramatic moments, trick plays, fluke twists, violent collisions and lots of trash-talking. The finish was frantic, and both teams wound up with 9-4 records.
The Gators were the national champions last year and the Wolverines have been a powerhouse for a century. Michigan might have scored even more, but it turned over the ball four times, twice on fumbles by running back Mike Hart near the Florida goal line.
“We knew we could move the ball,” quarterback Chad Henne said. “We stopped ourselves. They didn’t really stop us.”
Jake Long, an offensive tackle, said Henne told the linemen to give the receivers time to get open “and he’ll pick them apart.”
Henne, who threw two interceptions, completed 25 of 39 passes for 373 yards and 3 touchdowns. Hart gained 129 yards on 32 carries and scored 2 touchdowns. Adrian Arrington caught nine passes for 153 yards and 2 touchdowns.
The Wolverines won with a version of the spread offense that they installed after the regular season to exploit the inexperience of Florida’s defense and the talent of Arrington and Mario Manningham, who caught five passes for 78 yards and a touchdown.
On the other side of the ball, the Wolverines contained Florida quarterback Tim Tebow, who won this year’s Heisman Trophy as a sophomore. Although Tebow threw three touchdown passes and accumulated 209 yards through runs and passes, he was hampered by the blitzing of the Wolverines, who often knocked him to the ground after he threw the ball.
It was only the second meeting between the Wolverines, of the Big Ten, and the Gators, of the Southeastern Conference. Michigan won the first in the Outback Bowl in 2003.
In between, Michigan lost four consecutive bowl games. “They were a hungry team,” Tebow said. “They came out ready to fight. They heard a lot about the SEC and wanted a piece.”
Among the impressive Gators was Percy Harvin, who caught nine passes for 77 yards and a touchdown and ran 13 times for 165 yards and another touchdown.
The Gators ran four plays from scrimmage on fourth down, converting two, one on a fake punt. Meyer did this in part because, he said, “I didn’t think we could stop them” if the Wolverines got the ball back.
Florida took its second lead of the game, 35-31, with 5 minutes 49 seconds left on a 10-yard run by Harvin. Michigan got the lead back 1:37 later on Arrington’s 18-yard reception to complete a sizzling drive of 67 yards on four plays.
Florida got the ball back twice after that, but could not gain a first down. Tebow’s last six passes fell incomplete, the final one while he fell backward under intense pressure deep in Gator territory. “We got in his face,” said Shawn Crable, the Michigan linebacker who had suggested before the game that Tebow was overrated.
“We hit him up high,” Crable said. “We got to him more than he thought he was going to get hit.”
Crable, a senior, spoke as he sat on a folding chair beneath the grandstand. He wore a pinstriped dress suit, and his grass-stained jersey was draped over his shoulder. Like many Wolverines, Crable discussed Carr, who will be replaced next year by Rich Rodriguez, who was hired from West Virginia.
“He made me into a man,” Crable said of Carr. “I came in at age 18 and I thought I knew everything. Now, I’m a little smarter. He was more than a coach.”
In his postgame news conference, Carr’s eyes were moist and his voice cracked a little. He was frequently asked to sum up a career that began as a Michigan assistant to Bo Schembechler in 1980 after starting as a high school assistant in 1968.
“I told them I loved them,” he said of his players. “Every guy in that locker room from here on out will be my friend. That is one of the joys of coaching.”
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