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There Are 100 Days to Michigan Football

Waiting for the opening Saturday of college football is agonizing. All we want is 13 weeks of Brent Musberger "pardner" one-liners, the buzz of Michigan Stadium in late November, and jokes about the Bowl Championship Series. Fear not, bleary-eyed traveler. This is a continuing series intended to get through the long, hot summer and back to the glory of football season.

By Kevin Bunkley
Jonathan Daniel

The start of the season is no longer far in the distance, it's a mere 100 days to the opener. The preseason chatter, rankings, and pontificating is still to come, but the 100 day mark gives the college football off season a more finite and discernible end. We start to feel the fall coming now, and sooner rather than later, the maize and blue take the field to embark on the 2013 campaign for a Big Ten championship.

I feel like I'm coming dangerously close to monopolizing WolverineHistorian's YouTube content, but his latest work seemed appropriate for the 100-day mark.

Team 100 was Rick Leach's senior year, and while Michigan may have tied for the conference title and lost in the Rose Bowl, Leach completed one of the best athletic careers Michigan will ever see. Keith Jackson was around to call some of Leach's exploits, and it's difficult for me to understand how good Leach was, due to not yet being alive.

Jackson, on the other hand, felt like Michigan's home announcer for many seasons because he was calling so many of their games. It's one thing to just commentate on a game, but every time Jackson called a Michigan game, his voice seemed to perk up with some extra fire, especially if it was Michigan-Ohio State. I remember a monologue he gave once about feeling the tradition of college football. In sum he said that if you had the chance, go down to your beloved school's stadium the week of a game if the stadium was open to visitors, go inside, and just stand there. Feel the moments that have happened inside the walls, Listen to the air and the hum of the lights. Recognize that you're standing in a pantheon of sacred ground, destined to see more.