Jim Tressel was hired at Ohio State for one reason and one reason alone - to beat Michigan...he has achieved that with a 7-1 mark against the Wolverines...but Tressel has done even more than just defeat Michigan...he set the wheels in motion that helped destroy the once proud Michigan football program...
His beating of the Wolverines year-in and year-out led to the ouster of Lloyd Carr, a head coach who had a winning record over the Buckeyes until Tressel slithered into Columbus...Michigan's inability to beat Tressel led to Carr's demise and forced retirement...the football program went in a different direction by hiring Rich Rodriguez to implement the spread offense in Ann Arbor...the same spread offense that the Florida Gators ran when they pulverized Ohio State in the BCS title game a few years back...
Well, it hasn't happened in Michigan...not only has the offense been inconsistent, the defense has become putrid...Michigan is looking at two straight losing seasons for the first time since the early 1960s...
Tressel has also whooped Michigan on the recruiting front...the Wolverines have been unable to successfully recruit any of the top players from Ohio ever since Tressel became coach...every year Tressel locks up the top 3-5 football players from the state of Ohio...he also built a solid pipeline of talent from Cleveland Glenville...
Ohio State has been to three BCS title games...the Wolverines have yet to appear in one...Tressel has now taken Ohio State to six straight BCS games while Michigan is looking to extend its streak of non-bowl seasons with another losing season...
Ohio State gets the national spotlight with high profile regular season games against the likes of Texas, USC, and in the future Miami (Fla), Oklahoma, Virginia Tech, and Tennessee...the Wolverines only big non-conference game is against a lame Notre Dame football program which is also living off its once proud past...
When Tressel took over at Ohio State, Michigan was considered the best team in the Big Ten...and in less than 10 years, Tressel consistently smashed the once proud empire of the Maize and Blue and turned it into a pile of rubble...
Ohio State University got more than they expected from Tressel...under his reign they have a BCS championship, six Big Ten titles, and the crowning achievement of totally obliterating the Michigan football program...in Columbus, Tressel may never be considered as famous as Woody Hayes but he can claim to be the only one who destroyed Michigan football - something Woody could not achieve...
The only way Michigan can slow down this bleeding is by stepping up and making a statement on Saturday with a win...that would be their first positive step in a long time over Tressel...
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