One argument from rival fans has focused on whether Michigan can survive without the Stallions, arguing that the Wolverines’ 2020 season was close to Michigan’s and that a quick recovery is questionable. This quote won’t help the Wolverines defense.
“People ask me how many times I’ve made mistakes,” Stallions said in the documentary. “Well, I rarely make mistakes.”
It’s worth clarifying: The Stallions told WolverinesWire that he sets a standard for himself that he has to be 95% sure of the opposing team’s signals before he says anything to his coaches about a play. And about 20% of the time, he doesn’t even give pre-snap information — unless, of course, the team is in a huddle. There have been games where there were no signals at all because the team was in a huddle the entire game (which is not uncommon in football).
The documentary takes a detailed look at the Michigan team since Stallions’ departure, starting with the game against Michigan State, the first game he wasn’t on the sideline for since being hired as a full-time employee. Former Michigan linebacker Michael Barrett points out that Michigan State still hadn’t scored a point in the 49-0 blowout loss.
“OK, we still hadn’t scored,” Barrett said. “That was the first game where everybody knew Michigan was ‘cheating’ or whatever and you knew what Michigan was going to do now.” Stallions added in the documentary that Michigan State still huddled every game without him.
There was a solemnity to this season that didn’t exist before the MSU game that extended into the rest of the season. Every game was a litmus test for whether the Stallions were the reason Michigan was such a dominant team. Spoiler alert: Michigan won in 2023 and culminated with a national championship, but the closest the Stallions came was when they were in the stands as regular fans.
“The reason this is a great story for Michigan is because the team continued to win after the scandal,” Barstool Sports president Dave Portnoy said, “because they know that if they make a mistake, they’re going to try to negate not just this season, but the accomplishments of the past few years.”
If anything, the media frenzy and accusations of cheating demoralized the Wolverines. Despite the absence of the Stallions (or coach Jim Harbaugh), Michigan beat Penn State, Maryland, and Ohio State, three of the best teams Michigan had faced at the time. They then beat Iowa in the Big Ten Championship Game, Alabama in the Rose Bowl Game, and Washington in the National Championship Game.
“They played the wrong team,” Stallions said in the documentary. “They played the wrong guys. They played the wrong brothers.”
“Despite all this speculation and everybody going crazy, at the end of the season there’s no Connor Stallions, there’s no sign stealing and they’re still winning,” Wetzel said.
That hasn’t been without its mental toll both during and after the season, with Barrett lamenting that the Wolverines didn’t get the recognition they deserved, as their late-season win proved, because of the speculation and stories surrounding the Stallions’ actions.
“It’s still frustrating,” Barrett said, “I feel like we were overlooked for what kind of team we were, what kind of players we were, because I hear people say our national team has an asterisk on it and stuff like that.”
Sign stealing is a part of football, but plays still need to be made and defended. Too often you see teams making the same play over and over again, and the “it has to be stopped” principle applies. Even if the Stallions were geniuses or went beyond the rules to get signs, the play would still be made on the field.