Former Ohio State football coach Earle Bruce told a gathering of about 500 people at the Richland County Alumni Club’s 33rd annual Beat Michigan Buckeye Bash on Monday night at the Mid-Ohio Conference Center in Mansfield that he is a little nervous.
The reason why: even though Ohio State is a more than a two touchdown favorite in their annual show down with the “team up north” on Saturday at the “Big House,” he knows from personnel experience that anything can happen in this game.
The odds would seem to be in the Buckeye’s favor. Ohio State has won 23 straight games under coach Urban Meyer and Michigan’s run game has been non-existent and their defense often porous, but Earle Bruce has been through this before.
Bruce was an assistant coach in 1969 under Woody Hayes when Michigan broke the previous Ohio Sate record for wins in a row and he also remembers 1987 when the Ohio State administration decided to fire Bruce on Monday, but his inspired players rose up and beat the Wolverines 23-20 that Saturday.
“That’s what always scares me about this game,” Bruce to those assembled in scarlet and gray, “Both teams can play over their heads. When they play over their heads bad things happen sometimes and sometimes good things happen, but that’s football.”
Former Buckeye fullback Pete Johnson, who was part of three Ohio State teams that beat Michigan talked about how former coach John Cooper didn’t understand the rivalry with Michigan. “If he did, he might still be there,” said Johnson. However, Cooper only beat Michigan twice and on two occasions had unbeaten teams upset by them. Johnson told the crowd that he once tore the held off a Bo Schembechler to prove he was excited to beat Michigan.
“I want my players to not be fast, but just fast enough, but I want them to be tougher than hell and tough in the fourth quarter because that is when all great football games are won. You hit them, hit them, and hit them and hit them and don’t let them up,” said Bruce.
Bruce says the Buckeyes have the advantage on talent, but they have to remember one thing.
“Any coach that has ever coached in this game knows it will boil down to one thing… turnovers. Do you hear me? No turnovers wins this football game,” he said.
Bruce says beating Michigan is the most important thing that any player at Ohio State will ever do. “You don’t win just because you want to win. You have to pay a price to win. I told every one of the football players I coached at Ohio State for nine years. I told every one of them you might be a good football player at Ohio State for every game during the season, but if you don’t play good in this football game against the rival you are a mediocre football player as far as I am concerned,” said Bruce.
Proceeds from the “Beat Michigan Buckeye Bash,” including those raised through both a live auction and a silent suction, go for scholarships provided by the alumni club to students that attend Ohio State.
Always a highlight at the annual event is the appearance of part of the “Best Damn Band in the Land,” The Ohio State University Marching Band and that was the case again Monday night.
Uh, and “O-H”
“You don’t win just because you want to win. You have to pay a price to win. I told every one of the football players I coached at Ohio State for nine years. I told every one of them you might be a good football player at Ohio State for every game during the season, but if you don’t play good in this football game against the rival you are a mediocre football player as far as I am concerned,” said Bruce.
