A Quiet Sort of Sunday

Few things in life live up to their billing, and that’s especially true when it comes to football. But yesterday’s Michigan – Ohio State game was everything it was supposed to be, and perhaps a bit more. Here’s Mitch Albom, from his column in the Detroit Free Press:

But once the game got going, it was all football. And, man, was there a lot of football. You'd need extra projectors to show all the highlights. For a game steeped in the tradition of Bo versus Woody, there was precious little of their style. Defense took a back seat to speedy offense. Running took a backseat to passing. Tackling took a backseat to elusive offensive moves. Ohio State had six offensive touchdowns. Michigan had five and a field goal. There were 900 combined yards of offense. Nine hundred yards?

[…]

It is not the ending anyone in Ann Arbor wanted. And maybe some feel sad for the Michigan players that this game, which they waited all season to play, had to come with the heavy burden of the death of a beloved Michigan family member.

But college is supposed to be about learning. And a real life lesson is that things don't always go the way you want, and the timing of life is often inconvenient, the sad and the wonderful happening within hours of one another. However bad the players feel this morning, there are other things in life that are worse than losing a game. That lesson has been well learned in the last few days.

No storybook ending. But then this was not a storybook. It was sports. And if the heavy-hearted Wolverines fell three points short in the biggest game in this big game's history, well, that is hardly something to be ashamed of, is it?

Nope: Nothing to be ashamed of at all.

There will be a lot of talk over the course of the next three weeks or so about who should play Ohio State for the national championship. ESPN’s talking heads debated the subject of a Michigan – OSU rematch within minutes of the conclusion of yesterday’s game in Columbus. There is absolutely no doubt in my mind that OSU is Number One: they proved that conclusively. And there’s not a shred of doubt in my mind that Michigan is Number Two and should remain Number Two. I haven’t made up my mind about a rematch, but it seems logical. Of all the one-loss teams in Division I-A, there isn’t a single one that could beat Michigan. Shouldn’t the two best teams in the country play for the championship?

(~~La La La~~…) What was that? (~~~La La La~~~…) Why…It’s a FAT Lady! And I do believe she’s singing!

Bernalillo County Clerk Mary Herrera said the county's canvassing board is expected to reconvene Monday to certify the results.

"It could change but it doesn't seem possible at this point," Herrera said.

The overall tally showed 105,916 votes for Wilson and 105,037 for Madrid. That gave Wilson a winning margin of 879 votes -- with roughly 211,000 ballots cast in the race.

Herrera said results from Bernalillo County included all but about 500 provisional votes that were disqualified. Voters who cast those ballots will be notified by certified mail and can protest their disqualification at hearings Nov. 22 and 27.

So Heather Wilson pulls it out, but it certainly was a near-run thing. In true Democrat fashion, Patricia Madrid (Wilson’s opponent) is hanging on and refuses to concede. A spokeswoman for the Madrid campaign said “We can't make a decision about what to do next. Other people can declare victory but we choose to wait and let democracy play its course.” It should be all over tomorrow. Unless, of course, there’s “vote fraud,” or “voter suppression,” or an invasion of vote-snatching zombies from outer space…

An oldie but a goodie, via BlogBuddy Morgan: “Top Ten Worst Company URLs.” And they’re real. What were they thinking? Did they even LOOK at what they did?

Today’s Pic: A rainy, windswept, and very moody sort of day at the south end of Monument Valley, Utah. June, 2005.