With a title shot at stake against Ohio State, Michigan is “ready for moment.”

With a title shot at stake against Ohio State, Michigan is “ready for moment.”

ANN ARBOR, Michigan: The Michigan players, who are gearing up for a winner-take-all match against their bitter rival Ohio State on Saturday, have adopted a “championship-or-bust” mentality that many first discussed when camp was ready to start in July.

As of right now, the Wolverines are 3rd in the College Football Playoff rankings after going 11-0, and Ohio State is 2nd after going 11-0 as well, coming into Saturday’s 119th series meeting in “The Game,” which will take place at Michigan Stadium.

Ohio State entered the 2021 game having won eight straight and fifteen of sixteen. Michigan, the two-time defending Big Ten champion and CFP participant, has won two straight against Ohio State.

While both Michigan and Ohio State advanced to the CFP Final Four the previous year, their chances of doing so this year are considerably reduced.

All belong to the winner. Success or failure?

This week, left guard Trevor Keegan stated, “We think about that every day.” It’s a game we get ready for. The season is meaningless if we lose this game.

Our objectives are all very visible to us. We need to defeat the team from the South in order to achieve our goals of winning the Big Ten and qualifying for the national tournament.

The typical seasonal stress was already present, starting with goal-setting and daily preparation to achieve them.

For the Michigan players, entering this year was about still feeling the sting from losing in the national semifinal against TCU and falling short of playing for a national title for the second year in a row.

The Wolverines used that, at least early on, to fuel their winter conditioning that took them into spring practice.

But now they’ve had other motivation, and their “Michigan vs. Everybody” apparel has taken on new meaning in the last five weeks, since it was confirmed the NCAA is investigating the program for an alleged signal-stealing scheme.

And since then, the Big Ten suspended head coach Jim Harbaugh for the final three regular-season games for violating the league’s Sportsmanship Policy. The suspension includes Ohio State.

And last Friday, hours before the team departed for Maryland, linebackers coach Chris Partridge was fired for reasons relating to the investigation

Keegan, who said recently he deleted social media so he wouldn’t have to see everything being written about the team, and the Wolverines have dealt with the outside noise, they’ve said, by maintaining a one-track mindset.

“The thing we say, we don’t care what anybody thinks about us,” Keegan said. “We only care about the people in this building.

Our opinions and what we think of this program is all that matters. We’re really blocking out the noise. Obviously, there’s been a lot the past month or so, and we get that, but we’re doing everything in our power to complete our goals and do everything we wanted to do.

It’s right there in front of us. We know that and we’re doing everything we can.”

The Wolverines have won 23 straight Big Ten games, including wins against the Buckeyes the last two seasons. Michigan was reeling coming off the COVID-19-shortened season that yielded a 2-4 record.

The Wolverines did not play at Ohio State that season because of pandemic-related illness within the team.

Before the 2021 season, Michigan altered its approach and began making the Ohio State game front and center, as evidenced by Harbaugh speaking of the increased focus on the Wolverines’ rival during Big Ten media days that July.

Ohio State has long made it clear that the Buckeyes think about Michigan all the time during the season.

Michigan added a “Beat Ohio” drill and there was more signage added to the football facility, placing the focus on the Wolverines’ archrivals.

Defensive tackle Kris Jenkins was asked this week about Keegan’s comment that the season will mean nothing if Michigan loses to Ohio State.

“All I’m gonna say, we live by the motto, ‘What are you gonna do today to beat Ohio State?’ ” Jenkins said. “That’s a motto we’ve lived by for two years coming up now.

That’s everything we started to work on; everything we started to build is for moments like this.”

When did the switch flip and that motto became the daily challenge?

“Not a specific moment. Not an exact moment,” Jenkins said. “You could definitely feel that switch flipped in intensity, especially with the players and the leaders we got.”

Zak Zinter, Michigan’s starting right guard, recalled the Wolverines decided to take a different approach in this rivalry not long after the 2-4 season.

When it was the 2020 season, everybody was against us, and we wanted to prove something to everyone in 2021,” Zinter said. “We were both one-loss teams that year, and it was really gonna come down to whoever won that game was going to move on and keep going.

We took that personal, and we wanted to prove to everyone outside this building we have what it took.”

Among the Michigan goals set before each year since 2021 has been what they’ve called, beating “the states” — Michigan State, Penn State and Ohio State. The Wolverines won at MSU and at Penn State this fall, and now it’s all about the Buckeyes.

After putting in years of training, spring ball, summer workouts, fall camp, and other preparation for major rivalry games, you know you’re ready for this moment when it finally arrives, according to Jenkins.

“You know you’re prepared for that moment, you’re prepared to play, and you’re ready to give it everything.”

thus the outcome is championship or bust.

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