Milbank native could halt Michigan's bid for a perfect season, national football title

If Michigan's football team doesn't win the outright NCAA national football championship, there's no way I'm going to be as mad come Monday night with the opposing coach as I was 26 years ago.

Got you confused and wondering what I'm jabbering out?

The winningest program in the history of college football is the University of Michigan and only once in my lifetime (1997) did the Wolverines navigate through the Big Ten Conference schedule (with some other non-conference landmines along the way) and finish with a perfect season.

Yet, all that perfect season got Lloyd Carr's Wolverines was a shared national title with a 13-0 University of Nebraska team coached by Tom Osborne. In my mind, it was a joke. Michigan beat seven ranked teams that season and was No. 1 in both the AP and Coaches polls heading into the Rose Bowl. They beat No. 8 Washington State to finish off the perfect slate, but ...

Nebraska had been No. 1 ranked for three weeks before beating 7-5 Missouri 45-38 in overtime, scoring a game-tying touchdown on a questionable call in the final seconds. Even Missouri fans thought the game was over and stormed the field.

The next week, the Cornhuskers barely beat unranked Colorado 27-24 but were still No. 2 heading into the bowls. Legendary coach Tom Osborne had announced his retirement late in the season and after the Cornhuskers beat No. 3 Tennessee (now you know why I never liked Peyton Manning) in the Sugar Bowl, the coaches gave Nebraska the No. 1 vote in their poll. That meant Michigan and Nebraska, which beat only four ranked teams that season, were co-national champs.

I'm still pissed. Can you tell? First of all, it was the third time in four years Nebraska had been unbeaten, in part because they had one or zero losses in the (questionable) Big Eight Conference and later the Big 12 Conference for 18 of Osborne's final 20 seasons at the helm. Every year, they'd have to win one (Oklahoma, usually) or two "legitimate" games to be in the national championship picture.

That wasn't the case for Michigan, which hadn't had an unbeaten season in 49 years (1948), in part because of the Big Ten and non-conference schedule it played. The Wolverines' regular season almost always ended against a highly-ranked Ohio State team. For further backing on my claim, take a long look at Nebraska's success (hardly any) since it joined the Big Ten.

Enough, I don't need to argue about who was better that season. Maybe Nebraska was, but in most cases, the No. 1-ranked team remains No. 1 (unless they lose or apparently, the No. 2-ranked team's legendary coach announces his retirement). To this day, I believe that if it wasn't Osborne's final season, Michigan wouldn't have had to share the championship.

But let's fast forward to the present where another No. 1-ranked Michigan football team (14-0) coached by Jim Harbaugh plays for a national championship against a No. 2 Washington team (also 14-0) coached by Milbank native Kalen DeBoer. You know Milbank, some 45 miles northeast of Watertown.

Thanks to the College Football Playoff, which wasn't around in 1997, there will be no shared title this year unless there's some sort of unforeseen calamity that forces the game to be canceled and never played, Barring that, the winner of the Michigan-Washington game will the lone champion.

It won't matter that Harbaugh has served two three-game suspensions this season and possibly will avoid further punishment by leaving for the National Football League after Monday. There are still AP and Coaches polls, but that won't help either team get some sort of sympathy vote, not that Harbaugh's peers would (or should) give one to Michigan anyway.

So now, I'm torn. Do I root for a Michigan team I've followed since the late 1960s when the Merriams sat down to watch the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry game and my older brother chose Ohio State and I took Michigan? Brothers can't agree, right?

I'm torn, not only because the shady dealings behind Michigan's football season have left me wondering if the NCAA is going to wipe out a national title for the Wolverines the same way it wiped out the accomplishments of Michigan's Fab 5 basketball teams in the early 1990s due to shady dealings. A lot of shady dealings here.

I'm also torn because across the field will be DeBoer, one of the best high school athletes I've covered in my nearly 40 years at the Public Opinion, who later became an All-American wide receiver and then a head coach at the University of Sioux Falls (my alma mater). He coached the 'Coo (Cougars) to three NAIA national titles in 2006, 2008 and 2009 and has continued a meteoric rise to become one of the best college football coaches in the nation (regardless of classification).

Not only did I cover Kalen in high school, but I've had a few interviews through the years and have certainly followed all of his endeavors. I also remember in the mid-1990s playing some amateur baseball against a Milbank Firechiefs team that featured DeBoer and his University of Sioux Falls quarterback Kurtis Riggs. Riggs coached the Sioux Falls Storm for 20 years and rumor is, he's heading to UW next fall to join the coaching staff of his good friend.

Baseball, by the way, was likely DeBoer's best sport. He hit over .500 one season at Sioux Falls and played one season of independent baseball. Sure, Major League Baseball salaries are rather significant but it should be noted that DeBoer's financial situation is likely in pretty good shape with the route he has taken.

A great athlete. A great guy. A great coach. DeBoer is making me proud. He's making Milbank proud. He's making South Dakota proud.

There's a chance. Maybe a really good chance that DeBoer's Huskies end Michigan's bid for another perfect season and unlike 1997, a national championship trophy it doesn't have to share.

Now I'm torn. Painful as that might be, there's just no way I'm going to be as mad at Kalen DeBoer for spoiling my favorite college team's dream season as I was in January of 1997.

There's probably a good part of me (maybe more hidden on the inside than all my Michigan garb I'll be wearing on the outside) that will be cheering for just that to happen.

Follow Watertown Public Opinion sports reporter Roger Merriam on X (formerly known as Twitter) @PO_Sports or email: rmerriam@thepublicopinion.com

This article originally appeared on Watertown Public Opinion: Column talking about Michigan-Washington college football championship