Loss is The Game
“All is well, as long as we keep spinning.” [1]
Before he left the San Francisco 49ers to become head coach of the (winningest) college football program (of all time, look it up) that he quarterbacked to the 1986 Big Ten Championship and two victories over archrival Ohio State, Jim Harbaugh said he “hated the way the sun always beat down on you in California.” [2] While I loved John U. Bacon’s “Endzone: The Rise, Fall, and Return of Michigan Football,” I noticed recently that this was the only sentence in all of the book’s 464-pages that I underlined.
Enticed, in part, by promises of beaches, palm trees, and 72-and-sunny-all-the-time, I left Michigan for California 15 years ago. The brochures failed to mention anything about the harsh reality of summer in the parts of California where one can actually sort-of afford to live. Suffice it to say that summer in East San Diego County — located well-east of the beaches — makes me feel like I’ve done something to trigger the Almighty’s deep displeasure. Bend down and hear me now: I repent.
A Michigan November may look dead and sad, but that’s just how it appears. Even with the state’s notoriously inhospitable winter looming ahead, and with only bare trees and smoke-colored sky remaining from the by-then-extinguished fall foliage inferno, late autumn is cherished by many Michiganders I know because of the reunion that takes place at a different kind of season’s end.
You don’t know Jordan McGlashen, but he believed that the mixture of Michigan’s Maize-and-Blue and Ohio State’s Scarlet-and-Gray when the two schools’ football teams met every November had the fingerprints — unseen but unmistakable — of the Divine. For many of us — on both sides of the rivalry, I suspect — who grew up with “The Game,” and live or grieve depending on its outcome, it’s as if the two sets of colors are the correct combination that unlocks a door to the place behind everything else. It’s one of many doors perhaps, but we’re all supposed to find what’s back there.
For those of you whose left eye is now squinted, your nose is crinkled, and you’ve just whispered “what?”:
“You may have noticed that the books you really love are bound together by a secret thread. You know very well what is the common quality that makes you love them, though you cannot put it into words: but most of your friends do not see it at all ... Even in your hobbies, has there not always been some secret attraction which the others are curiously ignorant of — something, not to be identified with, but always on the verge of breaking through, the smell of cut wood in the workshop or the clap-clap of water against the boat’s side? — C.S. Lewis [3]
Is it Dylan lyrics for you? Your garden at dawn? The video of your daughter saying “yellow” for the first time?
My wife didn’t understand the rivalry either. She’s a California girl, born and raised. A fellow Michigander joked that Nicole “didn’t even know how to spell football” before she met me. After becoming familiar with the concept that Michigan and Ohio State played each other in football each year, and that it seemed important to me, Nicole did for me what she thought was a loving act. She assumed that since I like Michigan, I must also somewhat like Ohio State — you know, since they play each other and all. After getting ready to go out one evening a few weeks before our wedding, I walked out of my bathroom to find an Ohio State t-shirt laid flat on my bed. It was a “gift” for me. My immediate shriek of horror, and my father’s long pause and subsequent “she did what?” when I told him what happened, provided her the clarity she needed. Things are much different today. Trailing the heavily favored Ohio State Buckeyes 42-41 in the 2013 Game — the first college football game she ever attended — Michigan was about to attempt a game-winning two-point conversion when Nicole was moved to tears by the awe and wonder that had come over my face and by her own recognition that before her was more than a field, scoreboard, helmets, and a two-point attempt that would ultimately fail.
If given a truth serum, though, I would tell you that I secretly love Ohio State’s game day traditions — like “Script Ohio.” In the weeks (months?) leading up to The Game, I find myself whistling “The Best Damn Band in the Land’s” entire game day repertoire. They’re not my enemy’s battle hymns. They’re vital organs of a body to which I am joined. Unquestionably not vital, though, is Ohio State fans’ repetitive declaration that they “Don’t give a damn for the whole state of Michigan” to the tune of the 19th century’s “The Old Gray Mare.” That original tune appears on a “Childhood Campfire Greatest Hits” CD that is currently stuck in my family’s 2011 Toyota Siena’s CD player because it too has been played over and over and over again. The Campfire CD is irretrievable and unplayable, which is more than I can say for the “Don’t Give a Damn…” song, the very existence of which negates the need for a truth serum: if you write an entire song about how much you don’t care….
It’s OK. I understand.
To me, The Game has all the markings of a dysfunctional family, but it’s a family nonetheless. Endless bickering, constant measuring of ourselves against the other, living eternally rent-free in each other’s head, and still agreeing to meet once a year on a holiday weekend. Sure, they say “Muck Fichigan” and all that, but if we were all forced to choose between a) a season in which our team came up just short against the other guy in a hard-fought classic or b) a season in which some impossibly small-print contractual obligation stealthily penned two decades earlier forced us off each other’s schedules, which would we prefer? I know my answer.
This could explain why the cancellation of the 2020 edition of The Game — made official by an August 11 vote of Big Ten Conference Presidents as the COVID-19 pandemic rages on — feels like the death of someone close to me.
After all, The Game and I have been through a lot together.
From the day I was born in 1983 until I left for college, Michigan dominated Ohio State, winning 13 of 18 matchups and tying the Buckeyes once. The “Shoebox” was our nickname for the home in which my father, John McGlashen, lived in the late 80s and early 90s. It was his third home since the divorce. The multiple-shades-of-brown shag-carpeted living room was also the dining room and a bedroom. John slept on its couch one night a week and every other weekend while his three boys, B.J., Jordan, and I slept in the main bedroom. His beloved daughter, Kaitlin, had the second bedroom.
That living room was also the birthplace of our Michigan fanaticism. It was the theater in which we watched Desmond Howard return an Ohio State punt 93 yards for a touchdown en route to a 31-3 victory in 1991. Our widened eyes then saw one of college football’s iconic moments as Howard celebrated the score by striking the pose of the Heisman Trophy he would win three weeks later.
“The Shoebox” was John McGlashen’s home where he and his sons, B.J., Jordan, and I (pictured) watched Desmond Howard strike the Heisman pose during Michigan’s 1991 victory over Ohio State. Photo taken February 11, 2020, hours after John’s funeral.
The mid 90s saw my father remarry and the Wolverines ruin two undefeated Ohio State seasons.
The late 90s saw my father re-divorce and lose his job at the same time. It was the worst period of his life. He moved into a different home with an even smaller living room where we watched the epic performance of another eventual Heisman Trophy winner, Charles Woodson, in a 20-14 victory over Ohio State in 1997. From that living room my brothers, friends, and I ran screaming out into the street after Michigan captured a share of the 1997 National Championship in the Rose Bowl. And into that living room I burst, because John didn’t have a phone on which to call him, to show him my acceptance letter to the University of Michigan. He yelled, leapt up out of his seat, and gave me a celebratory hug for the ages.
Unfortunately, my arrival on campus in the fall of 2001 coincided with Jim Tressel’s arrival in Columbus to take over as head coach at Ohio State. Since then, the rivalry has been an utter horror show. The Wolverines have lost 17 of 19 matchups, and each year seems to introduce a new torturous plot twist.
One of Michigan’s two victories since 2001 came in 2003. On my walk to the stadium that day, I acquired a hat from a Michigan marching band member’s uniform. How? I’m hazy on the details. While the day’s victory was glorious, sending Michigan to the Rose Bowl for the first time since 1997, I’m haunted by the thought that my “acquisition” may bear some responsibility for how the rivalry has turned out since (Do you think it’s the hat that He’s upset about? If it’s your hat, I want (need) you to have it back. Soon. It’s on my two-year-old son’s wall. He won’t miss it.).
In 2005, I was kicked out of Michigan Stadium in the first quarter after I knocked a hat off the head of an Ohio State fan who had the audacity to use the same bathroom as me. I had to settle for screaming at my living room TV as Michigan blew a 9-point fourth-quarter lead. This portended a drinking problem that would also get me thrown out of a San Diego bar after watching the 2007 Game (a 14-3 Michigan loss). Keep in mind that the Game traditionally kicks off at Noon ET, so I was in “throw him out of our bar” condition when the game ended in a time zone three-hours behind. The drinking problem would have to be dealt with not too many years later.
In the summer of 2006, B.J. and I bought tickets on a whim to that November’s Game not having any idea that it would be called “The Game of the Century” with Ohio State and Michigan ranked #1 and #2, respectively, at kickoff. The worst grief we took from Ohio State fans outside the stadium was “Hey, you have poop on your shirt!” We walked into Ohio Stadium discussing our surprise at how good-natured and kind the Ohio State fans had been all day.
However, we walked out of the stadium discussing how lucky we were to still be alive (surely it had nothing to do with the aforementioned drinking problem, Michigan’s Mike Hart running in the game’s first touchdown, me subsequently running my mouth to the OSU fans surrounding us, and Ohio State running up the next four touchdowns unanswered). Michigan kept it close but came up short again, 42-39.
But two games top the pile with respect to the emotional suffering they’ve inflicted. 2016 — a 30-27 double-overtime Michigan loss which an OSU fan tried to convince me saw bad officiating “on both sides” — and 2018 — a 62-39 blowout loss in Columbus which Michigan was favored to win, and for which Brian Cook of MGoBlog provided the only plausible “Explanation”:
“This is Hell. I am being punished for some sin so colossal that it justifies me reliving my life over and over again, except the end of every football season has been replaced with every flavor of pain football can hand out.” [4]
I remember reading this and feeling strangely comforted by it. At least someone knew how I felt.
Known to few is that another wide receiver on the 1991 Michigan Wolverines, Yale Van Dyne — the greatest name and wide-receiver number (34) ever printed on a Michigan jersey — had two catches against Ohio State, just one short of Desmond Howard’s total for the game. Pictured are Collin and Yale McGlashen moments before kickoff of Michigan vs. Ohio State on November 24, 2018. Ohio State 62, Michigan 39.
The Game has been an excruciating experience for half of my life now. But would I rather not play at all? A re-watch of the 2016 Game, even with full knowledge of its devastating ending, brings tears within moments of hearing the “Buckeye Battle Cry,” the unique way “The Victors” sounds in an away stadium, and the Ohio Stadium crowd sounding like they give a serious damn about Michigan. Sure, if we played this year, it could mean more pain. But if we met, we’d still say to ourselves beforehand things like “crazy things happen,” and “throw out all the records because you never know what can happen in this Game.”
The very fact that The Game exists means hope exists. We’d have a chance to turn it all around — to make things right.
I didn’t think I had anything that needed to be made right with Dad. But now that he’s gone, I have occasionally struggled with regrets. Years ago, on my trips home from California, I’d split my vacation between family and the drinking problem. On one occasion, I missed our tee time as a result. He was disappointed, but he got past it. He always did. He was always excited for the next time I could come home. Then came the last trip home in January. He wasn’t expecting us. We walked in the door, and as soon as he caught sight of me, his eyes opened wide. Unable to talk or lift himself up the way he wanted, he used all his strength to reach his arms out and embrace me.
Hours later, dressed in a Detroit Lions sweatshirt covered by a camouflage hunting vest, John, who for hours had been helped up and down from his bed by me and Nicole, silently indicated his desire to lay himself down to accept the last rites. He was gone the next day.
On May 5, reflecting on the loss of my father and the season of loss that 2020 had been, I wrote a note to myself: “what do I have but the nothingness this year has become?”
My buzzing cell phone woke me up at 5 AM on May 7, Jordan McGlashen’s 39th birthday.
Caller ID: “B.J. McGlashen”
C: “Beej?”
B: “Collin.”
C: “What’s going on?”
B: “Jordan’s gone, dude. Kaitlin got a call from Ypsilanti PD. He fu___ng OD’d. He’s gone.”
Imagining Jordan’s last moments is what constricts my breathing these days. Did he know what was happening to him? Did he cry? Was it like when Michigan lost the 1993 National Championship game? Jordan wept from his 11-year old knees atop a Michigan Wolverines blanket.
And then what? Did he hear singing? Jordan, Dad, and I traveled to Champaign to watch Michigan’s 2007 comeback victory over Illinois. Afterward, we joined the choir of exiting Michigan fans in singing “The Victors” walking down the built-for-echoes concrete ramps in one unified, thundering, and triumphant voice. Did it sound like that?
Are you both OK now?
If all of this is gone, what do I have left?
Will I be OK?
“When I arrive, will you come and find me?” [5]
And then I remember. As much as the sun beats down on me, and as much as it can feel like Hell here, I love how the setting sun can sometimes hit East San Diego’s El Cajon Mountain. It reminds me of how sunset at the Rose Bowl appeared on the living room TV.
“Come and see.” [6]
It looks like it’s on fire.
[1] Yorke, Thomas Edward. Lyrics to “Suspirium.” Genius, 2018, genius.com/Thom-yorke-suspirium-lyrics
[2] Bacon, John U. Endzone: The Rise, Fall, and Return of Michigan Football. St. Martin’s Press, 2015. p. 310.
[3] Lewis, C.S. “The Secret Thread.” A Year with C.S. Lewis: Daily Readings from His Classic Works. HarperOne, 2003. p. 123.
[4] Cook, Brian. “The Explanation.” MGoBlog, 26 Nov. 2018, mgoblog.com/content/explanation.
[5] Yorke, Thomas Edward. Lyrics to “Suspirium.” Genius, 2018, genius.com/Thom-yorke-suspirium-lyrics
[6] John 1:46
Jordan and B.J. McGlashen outside Michigan Stadium before the 2019 edition of “The Game” which the brothers attended. Ohio State 56, Michigan 27.
An abridged version of this essay, which was also updated to reflect the resurrection of the 2020 Big Ten football season, appeared in Michigan Today on November 21, 2020 and can be found here.
