• Night Moves: Michigan’s First Night Game (1944)

    While Notre Dame will be Michigan’s guest for the first night game at the Big House, did you know it was Bo Schembechler’s 1982 Wolverines who played in the inaugural battle under the lights in South Bend? The Irish upset the 10th-ranked Wolverines 23-17 on that historic evening in front of 59,000 fans at Notre Dame Stadium. But that ’82 game wasn’t the first time the Wolverines played at night, as that tradition started nearly 70 years ago.  On September 23, 1944, Fritz Crisler’s Wolverines traveled to Wisconsin to play The Hilltoppers of Marquette in a game that kicked off at 7 p.m. As part of the war effort, Michigan had several players on the roster as part of the Navy’s “V-12” training program. To enhance the supply of college-educated officers, the Navy rolled out V-12 in 131 U.S. schools. Those enrolled were considered active-duty personnel, required to adhere to strict military rules and discipline. One of those rules prevented any member to be away from the “base” (the campus, in this case) for more than 48 hours. To accommodate the 48-hour rule and to play a game on the road as far as Milwaukee, Fritz Crisler’s crew left Ann Arbor at around 1:30pm Friday afternoon and arrived at Marquette that evening. Crisler held a brief practice under the lights…