After 27 long years, the University of Michigan football team has climbed their way to becoming national champions.
Head Coach Jim Harbaugh led the Michigan Wolverines through a successful 15-0 season, ending in a rewarding championship game where UMich played the University of Washington Huskies and ended their season with an exciting 34-13 win. Some, however, have claimed that Michigan’s climb to the top was not so virtuous.
During the season, the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) investigated the claim that the team illegally recorded important play calls — named “signs” — made by opponent coaches from the sidelines. The NCAA ruled that Michigan staff, led by Connor Stallions, filmed rival teams and fed these signs to their players during games. This practice of stealing signs, along with recruiting violations, led to the resigning and firing of UMich staff members and a three game suspension for Harbaugh.
While it is not uncommon for teams to gain intelligence on opponents, former Michigan staffer Connor Stallions may have taken it too far. Stallions reportedly purchased tickets to over 35 opponents’ games. He paid people to record the signs used by the coaches to communicate with their players. NCAA officials state that sign-stealing, when recorded, is illegal.
Despite the advantage from stealing signs, UMich is known for top-tier football and has remarkable players, one of which is their quarterback, Jonathan James McCarthy.
McCarthy’s quarterback rating is third in the league and this season he threw for 2,991 yards. Both him and Harbaugh are taking their talents to the National Football League (NFL) where Harbaugh took on the role of Los Angeles Chargers head coach and McCarthy is likely to be selected in the first round of the draft.
August Groh (II), captain of the Boston Latin School varsity football team, points out that the UMich team should continue to be recognized for their incredible wins and their championship run of beating Oklahoma State University, University of Alabama and University of Washington, all of which was done without stealing signs.
There are, however, mixed opinions as to how much the sign-stealing benefited Michigan and their journey to the national championship.
Deion Sanders, a former NFL and professional baseball player as well as current head coach of the Colorado University football team, reacted to the sign-stealing scandal by saying, “Everyone’s trying to get whatever it is they can. You could have someone’s whole game plan, they can mail it to you, you still got to stop it.”
It is common knowledge that each team is working to gain any upper hand that they can on an opponent. The extreme measures taken in this situation, however, may warrant further review of NCAA rules and regulations.
BLS girls’ basketball team Head Coach Keri Orellana says, “You can scout teams and review all kinds of video on them. You can have detailed information on your opponents, their abilities and tendencies, but it ultimately comes down to execution on the part of the athletes.”
On the other hand, the Washington team could have triumphed in the National Championship if UMich had not cheated throughout their season. UMich might have been able to make it to the championships without sign-stealing, but the Washington team was just as qualified. Both teams had 14-0 seasons and players eligible for the NFL draft. Winning this Championship means a lot, not only to the players and coaches but to fans as well.
Washington has been ranked the No. 2 team in college football for decades, and they entered the championship game with that outstanding rank, contending for an even better one. Fans were upset when the team lost the championship game, and these feelings only heightened after they discovered that this loss may have been due to cheating.
Charlie George (I), captain of the BLS varsity football team and a “devout Washington fan,” expresses the injustice of this situation: “The main problem is that we do not know how much effect [the sign-stealing] had on the game or how widespread the issue was. […] I was honestly not surprised that someone would be cheating like Michigan was. It is very advantageous to know the playbook of another team.”
And so there emerges two sides to this complex story. Did Michigan benefit substantially from using covert methods to steal signs? Did they deserve to be in the national championship game or were they punished unfairly by the NCAA? Was their cheating really just a more extreme version of what all teams do? Each viewpoint has merit, but at the end of the day, the UMich Wolverines are the national champions with or without an asterisk next to it.
