Michigan football: 'Goldfish mentality' vs. Michigan State game, a year after tunnel fight

Perhaps it's because Michigan football still has so much yet to play for.

Perhaps it's to avoid adding a scrap of bulletin board material to its rival's locker room.

Or, perhaps, he actually has moved on.

Whatever the reason, when speaking Monday inside the Towsley Museum at Schembechler Hall to preview Saturday's upcoming rivalry game against Michigan State (7:30 p.m., NBC), coach Jim Harbaugh said what occurred in the aftermath of last season's 29-7 victory — when eight Michigan State players were suspended following a postgame fight with two Michigan players — is in the past.

"Feels like a long time ago," Harbaugh said. "I like what J.J. (McCarthy) said maybe last week: It’s a goldfish mentality. So it's onward."

Two Michigan seniors, running back Blake Corum and edge Jaylen Harrell, mostly, said as much when it was their turn to speak shortly after. Harrell was asked if any discussion remains around last year's postgame incident, which cast a shadow over the Wolverines' first win in the rivalry game since 2019, among this year's group.

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"Not really," he said. "Not anymore."

Harrell's smirk said otherwise. And though Corum too has moved on, he did make a proclamation.

"We're not really focused on what happened last year," Corum said. "We're not going to hold a grudge on what happened last year. Always keep in the back of the mind, but we're not going in there like 'oh we're going to rough them up' or we're going to fight or anything like that, like that's part of the past.

"So we're going to go in there, handle business, and come out victorious."

That's more like the rivalry talk people have come to know when Michigan (7-0, 4-0 Big Ten) and Michigan State (2-4, 0-3) have competed in recent years, though this season's game has seemed to lose a bit of its luster with the two teams on opposite trajectories.

Harbaugh's group has been ranked No. 2 nationally since the start of the season and has spent the past seven weeks breaking one program record after another.

Meanwhile in East Lansing, September was marked by the firing of former coach Mel Tucker for his involvement in a campus sexual harassment case. The football team has four consecutive losses.

The Spartans, in two straight games, have held double-digit leads on the road against likely bowl teams: up 16-6 at Iowa and ahead 24-6 at Rutgers last Saturday. But consecutive fourth-quarter collapses cost interim coach Harlon Barnett's team victory each time.

Still, Harbaugh claimed to be impressed with the film thus far.

"Super tough, as evidenced this past week," he said. "I think it's a tough team, I think Coach Barnett’s got them playing really well and got them on the move. It's for the state championship game. We expect one heck of a football game, gotta get prepared for it."

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That includes redshirt freshman quarterback Katin Houser, who made his first college start against Rutgers. He completed 18 of 29 passes for 133 yards and two touchdowns, ran eight times for 27 yards and a score and didn't turn the ball over.

"He did some really good things," Harbaugh said. "I was impressed, very. Young guy making his first start, it was a most impressive performance."

Still, there has been more bad than good from the Spartans this season, particularly in areas it appears U-M can exploit. MSU's 15 turnovers are third most in the nation, and the Spartans rank No. 115 in penalties committed per game (7.5). No team has committed fewer than Michigan (16) on the season.

While the winner of the rushing battle will likely always remain the top stat — the team to win that aspect of the game has come out victorious in 47 of the past 53 meetings — discipline is critical, in rivalry games in particular.

"We take pride in that, our coachers take pride in that," Corum said. "We try to be one of the smartest teams, we take pride in learning from our mistakes and not making mistakes. Our coaches preach that."

Michigan is installed as 23.5-point favorites but does not need extra motivation: Its last trip to East Lansing is the last time it lost in Big Ten play and the regular season.

Since that late October day nearly two years ago, the Wolverines have ripped off 19 straight games in the conference and 22 in a row in the regular season.

"When all the leaves are brown and the skies are grey, that's when the championships get decided," Harbaugh said.

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Corum said he does not remember what the 2021 ride to East Lansing was like. What he does remember is the ride back, after the gut-wrenching 37-33 loss.

His first stop when he got back in Ann Arbor? The weight room.

"Got me a good pump in," he said. "Lot of emotions."

It's why Corum is already anxious for Saturday for what he considers, possibly, the biggest game of the year.

"Ohio State-Michigan, Michigan State and us, it's kind of like, which one's more of a rivalry?" Corum said. "You know, sometimes I think it's the in-state one, because it's the bragging rights you know in the state that you live in, state that you go to school in you know, for the rest of year.

"Does Michigan State or Ohio State mean more? I really don't know. ... But, blood, sweat and tears, we're going to leave it all out there in East Lansing on Saturday. I'm really excited, we're going to keep Paul."

Contact Tony Garcia at apgarcia@freepress.com. Follow him @realtonygarcia.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan football takes goldfish mentality vs. MSU a year after fight