“I thought we were going to win the football game up until the fourth-down pass was incomplete.” “I thought we had a chance,” Cooper said. Then, on fourth and nine at the 17, Germaine’s pass fell incomplete, Michigan players falling to the ground in ecstasy. Glen Steele sacked Germaine for a seven-yard loss on first down. “Before the game, we watched the Rose Bowl drive versus Arizona State and said, ‘It’s going to come down to this,’ ” Michigan safety Marcus Ray said. In last year’s Rose Bowl, Ohio State trailed Arizona State, 17-14, with 1:40 remaining when the Buckeyes drove 65 yards in 12 plays for the winning score, a five-yard pass from Germaine to Boston.
Ohio State got the ball back at its own 16 with one time out and 1:35 left. “I kept saying, ‘Lets just punt the ball so we can play defense,’ ” he said. The play would have been talked about for years, Katzenmoyer screaming toward the end zone with the dramatic interception return for the winning touchdown.Įxcept, with nothing but grass and history ahead of him, Katzenmoyer dropped the pass. Michigan was protecting a six-point lead with 1:40 left, desperate for one more first down to run out the clock, when Brian Griese’s dump-off pass intended for Anthony Thomas hit linebacker Andy Katzenmoyer in the arms. The ultimate horror would come in the waning moments. After I caught it, all I was thinking about was end zone.” “I was shocked,” Weathers said of the pass. On first and 10 from his own 44, with Michigan linebacker Sam Sword draped around his legs, Jackson side-armed a pass into the waiting arms of corner Andre Weathers, who accepted the gift and raced 43 yards with the interception for a score to put the Wolverines up, 20-0. On Ohio State’s next possession, Jackson made an even worse decision. “Stanley Jackson threw me a great pass,” Woodson would sarcastically comment later. The Buckeyes were down, 13-0, in the third quarter, on the verge of making it 13-7, when Woodson helped himself to a Jackson slant pass intended for Dee Miller in the end zone. Naturally, Jackson, Ohio State’s starting quarterback, chose Saturday to throw his first two interceptions of the season. The Buckeyes can add these artifacts to their growing wax museum of Michigan horrors: Woodson also delivered another psychological blow to 10-2 Ohio State, which is 1-8-1 against Michigan in the Coach John Cooper era. He also may have won the Heisman with his effort-evoking memories of former Wolverine Desmond Howard’s trophy-clinching, 93-yard punt return against the Buckeyes in 1991. “I think Charles Woodson played one of his greatest games in the very biggest game we have at Michigan, in a game that meant everything to us,” Michigan Coach Lloyd Carr said. He set up his team’s only offensive score with a 37-yard reception in the second quarter, scored Michigan’s second touchdown with a 78-yard punt return three minutes later, prevented an Ohio State touchdown when he intercepted a Stanley Jackson pass in the Wolverine end zone and gave up an Ohio State score when quarterback Joe Germaine and receiver David Boston beat Woodson on a 56-yard touchdown pass in the third quarter. There is delirium in greater Detroit because Woodson showed up at the biggest Ohio State-Michigan game in 22 years, then took it over.
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