For the CFP playoff game against Georgia, we take a trip back nearly 22 years to the 2000 Orange Bowl, when Lloyd Carr, Tom Brady, David Terrell, and crew took down the Alabama Crimson tide in overtime.
This segment appears on the WTKA 1050AM Ann Arbor ‘Countdown To Kickoff’ before the 2021 Orange Bowl, College Football Playoff semi-final game on December 31, 2021. Check out all the This Week in Michigan Football History clips here.
script:
GOOD AFTERNOON on this glorious day for Meechigan football. TONIGHT we’ll face the University of Georgia for the third time in history, and we split the previous meetings in 1957 and 1965. Despite both of these games being played at Michigan Stadium, interestingly enough the Bulldogs wore their HOME RED jerseys, no doubt creating a primary color buffet as the field was littered in Red, Blue, and Maize.
While this is Michigan’s inaugural trip to the college football playoff, this of course is not our first time playing in the Orange Bowl. My favorite and yours is CERTAINLY our journey to Miami 22 years ago in a blockbuster match-up of two historical college pigskin POWERHOUSES. To ring in 2000 Lloyd Carr’s #8 Wolverines faced the fifth-ranked Alabama Crimson Tide.
Early on, things looked grim. With the running game plugged up, an unheralded quarterback named Tom Brady took to the air and erased a pair of 14 point deficits. His favorite target was David Terrell, who all told snared 3 TDs from TB10. Michigan had a couple of chances to put the TIDE away late, including a last-second field goal, but in the final seconds, Bama blocked Hayden Epstein’s attempt at a game-winner.
So on the first day of the new millennium, Michigan entered into its first overtime game in program history. Thankfully Tom Brady was a guy who could handle the pressure. On the 1st play of the extra stanza, Michigan’s cool QB tossed an absolute dime to tight end Shawn Thompson for a 25-yard touchdown. Epstein added a critical extra point to give Michigan its first lead of the game at 35-28.
But it wasn’t over and Alabama struck RIGHT back, needing just 2 plays for QB Andrew Zow to find Antonio Carter on a 21-yard TD strike. As Alabama lined up for the extra point it CERTAINLY looked like the game would go to a second overtime. But Yost, Ufer, Crisler were watching up in Meechigan Football’s Valhalla, as Alabama’s kicker Ryan (FLOOG-ner) Pflugner pushed the extra point WIDE RIGHT and Michigan celebrated its first, VERY GLORIOUS, Orange Bowl title.
GO BLUE! Beat The DAWGS! Let’s get back to Indy! AND FOR more, check out MVictors.com and WTKA.com – for the Keybank Countdown to Kickoff this is Greg Dooley.
