UConnReport.com: University of Michigan football team to open vs. UConn in 2010

Nothin' like opening your new quarter billion dollar playground against...UConn!

It could have been worse.

In a word--pathetic.

UConn
UMass
Bowling Green

What a crappy 2010 non-conference home schedule that is. Thanks for nothing, Mr. Martin.

Let's concentrate on 2009, please. Talk about putting the cart before the horses.

Heres a what if : What if UConn beats you?

so Michigan is going to play Basketball to open the football schedule?
or does Ucon have a football team too?

What if UConn beats us? First off, I'm not worried about it. Second off, that's not the point. They spent how many millions to renovate the stadium. They hype up wanting to get a big opponent for the opening contest, going so far earlier this week to say it would be a "BCS" opponent and they were talking a home-and-home series. Obviously expectations were very high for a marquee showdown. Instead, they blow a home-and-home on UConn? UCONN?!? As I said, no offense to them, but if we're going to do a home-and-home, I'd much rather it have been an SEC or Big 12 team, not UConn.

Sparky give Martin a break. If Rich Rod ends up turning the football program around like i think he will. He will have hired Maloney, Belein and RR. You can't do much better than that. On top of all that his financial management has been incredible.
Thank you for real Mr. Martin.

What they failed to tell us publicly is that the BCS conference opponent would be an inferior one that stood little chance to make a game of it.

This is pretty cool. Nothing like three easy victories at home. They have four great games on the schedule every year in PSU, OSU, ND, and MSU; also, Wisky, Iowa, and Minny can be good games. Seven competitive games out of twelve is more than enough.

I'm glad to see UM use the same strategy that OSU has used to get to three title games this millenium. Until the system changes, UM should take advantage of the easiest road to the title game, just like their neighbors down south. With RR at the helm, UM will soon have the horses to get to the NC game and actually win one or two of them down the road.

H Man: Huh? Give Martin a break? I have no problem with RichRod and I have fully supported him from the start and will continue to do so. I'm happy with the coaches Martin has hired, but again, that's not the point at all. We're talking scheduling here and our consistently weak out of conference opponents.

For a school that likes to tout our football program as one of the best, we sure do schedule like a bunch of wimps. Tater, seven of 12 is nice, but when six of the seven are conference opponents we see almost every year (and the seventh team...ND...essentially is a conference opponent as we do see them every year), that's the same ole same ole. The only chance you get to mix it up is with your out of conference schedule and we continue to schedule mostly the Michigan directional schools, MAC, Delaware State, UConn... wow, feel the excitement. I'm SO jacked up we're going to play... UConn... Please, there's no way you can convince me you're thrilled with our non-conference schedule.

I agree that part of the reason is simply because they want to work the BCS system, which sucks for us. But it's hard to proclaim your team to be the best when you're looking for the "easiest road to the title game."

Tater,

You sound foolish. I want to be entertained. Sports are for entertainment. UConn is the type of game that people give their tickets away to family,friends, or business contacts. I want big time games. The type of game scalpers are selling tickets for outrageous prices. That certain electricity in the air. Uconn= no electricity. Also, UConn is 7 years removed from D1AA, this is a lose/lose situation. We used to take on big dogs. Boring. What a snoozer.

Who does the rest of the B10 play 2010? I thought we typically
play another conference as a non-conference schedule. It was B12
a couple of years ago, PAC10 as well, when we were annihilated by
Oregon, and when we lost to UCLA after a 21-10 halftime lead a few
years back, in the Carr years. Everyone living in the past forgets
those losses.
Why don't you geet off of the staff and let our
young team play a season with a slightly less heavy schedule. If
they are of high caliber talent, it'll show anyway.

I see Tater's point. But, I still expected to see a higher caliber opponent for the grand opening. On the other hand I do understand the difficulties in scheduling high caliber opponents with only 13 months until the 2010 opener.

I tend to agree with those who say they should have made the official opening of the renovated Big House a bigger noise. They might have scheduled the Detroit Lions, for example. So there you have the Wolverines taking on the NFL and a guaranteed win at the same time. ;-)

Sorry, couldn't resist that one.

I'm not too upset about playing UConn in the opener. Yes, I was hoping for a big name BCS school too after the hype, but UConn isn't that bad...9-3 in 2007 and 7-5 last year. Beat Buffalo last year in their bowl game...plus we still have ND...if you look around the B10, it's pretty comparable if not better than everyone else's out of conference schedule...tough to have all top games that we would all like to see...scheduling isn't as easy as we would like it to be...all that said, I am only interested in one game right now...Western Michigan Sept. 5...GO BLUE!!!!!!!

I love the Wolverines and Coach Rodriguez. They could schedule Concordia 12 times and I'd show up each time to cheer on my glorious Maize and Blue!!!

You know what: if we continue to complain about our opponents dis-respectfully like this, we deserve to be called arrogant.

Remember App State? How about Utah? Who I am sure everyone was saying Utah?????? when Martin scheduled them, and then they turn out to be the number 2 team at the end of the season ...

While the Big Ten has been on their way down, the Big East has been on their way up. I agree that UConn isn't exactly the matchup I was hoping for, but UConn is at least as good as Virginia ...

Uhhhh... UCONN went 8-5 last season... what was the UM record again????

I'm a big Wolverine fan, but to be fair, after losing to Appalachian State and Oregon (first two games of 2007) and then to Utah (first game of 2008), I really don't think we have grounds from which to complain about a lack of competitive games at the top of our schedule. Beating Western Michigan and Eastern Michigan this year would help.

12/12/2009: time for a retrospective.
UConn Huskies won 8 of 12 last season - after the announcement they'd play Michigan for the Big House "Grand Reopening." So it looks like they'll be a worthy opponent for as-yet-unproven RichRod, especially since UConn lost by just 2 points to Cincinnati which was coached by Brian Kelly, who just replaced Charlie Wies at Notre Dame.

Michigan came out with a 5-7 record in 2009. Much talk now among the always-sour trolls about replacing RichRod with.... (they don't have a clue). It WILL BE a huge blow to Rodriguez IF he loses to UConn at the "Big Luxury House" opening gala. Embarrassment for the UofM on that scale would, possibly write his ticket out of Ann Arbor. No pressure though. ;-)

If no one wants their tickets for this game, I would be happy to buy them from you!!!! Need 2 tickets.

I think UConn will be a good test for the Wolverines but we will more than likely win the game because UConn lost their star player last year and have a lot of young guys, (we do to) but I feel that with Tate's and the whole offense's expereince we will pull this game out