This is going to be extremely abbreviated this week as I am on vacation and don't have time to put every thought to paper just yet.

Care: Winning LOSs

How we feeling here, folks? Both lines were called into question before the season, and a few times this season already. Against this Iowa team it was necessary to win both lines of scrimmage and we did that in spades. It wasn't as flashy as our previous games, but it was never going to be against a disciplined defense. Yesterday our boys up front got it done and that was awesome to see.

Don't Care: Will Howard's mistakes

We know what we have in Howard. He is a high floor, reinforced concrete levels of steady leader who is in complete command of our offense. He's also still learning how to read defenses like a pro and how to throw the ball more than 35 yards in the air. I'll take it because he's extremely accurate (until he makes his quota of two mistakes per game), and his running ability is huge in the red zone. He's the leader we needed, even if we aren't going to have multiple 40 yard completions per game.

Care: Is Jay Higgins the last great "Big Ten" linebacker?

Man is he legit. I said in the off-season in a thread about one player to add to our 2024 squad that he was likely the guy I would choose because LB was our big defensive question mark. My opinion hasn't changed. No offense to Simon and Styles who are going to be solid pieces as the season grows, Higgins reminds me of JL, Shazier, etc. He's everywhere and makes that defense so much better because he's on the field. I want to see us get back to fielding guys like him.

As offenses continue to move away from smash-mouth football, it's great to see a linebacker like him still racking up season of 150+ tackles.

Don't Care: Worrying about Jim Knowles

At some point you need to look at the data and evidence, and just stop being worried. Knowles' defense may not be playing great offenses yet, and looks soft sometimes. But it's clearly by design, and it's clearly working. I remain cautiously optimistic but our second half performances and our overall defensive resume is fantastic. Yards don't have any value once the clock reaches zero. We'll learn a lot next week against Oregon but I am trying to let go of my worries and enjoy the team.

Care: Perfect season for a 12 team playoff

I am beyond excited for this year's postseason. The chaos we're witnessing already with Vandy beating Bama, SEC newcomer Texas being the best team in the conference (lol), the "I can't believe they got better" Indiana/Illinois/Rutgers of the Big Ten, and everything else going on... It's going to be really fun. I've been a fan of this expansion even if there are still blowouts in the postseason. But every team has a shot on any given day, as we've seen, and I expect some surprises come December.

Don't Care: For the whole state of Michigan

But most definitely mostly Michigan football. Them losing gives me the warm and fuzzies, and even with more officiating bullshit (I have never ever seen a TD taken off the board AFTER an extra point was already kicked... Is there precedence for that?) they couldn't close it out because the fucking suck when they can't cheat.

And thank you, Will Johnson for putting the final nail in your own coffin by playing over-aggressively like you always do and getting caught. I hate that team and hopefully everyone has enough tape on them now to start handing them losses with regularity.