Michigan Football: Sherrone Moore achieves feat which eluded Harbaugh, Schembechler

The Wolverines head man accomplished a feat no Michigan coach has achieved since the late 1940s on Saturday against the Spartans...

Matt Lounsberry | 3 Hours Ago

Michigan State head coach Jonathan Smith, left, shakes hands with Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore after Wolverines beat Spartans, 24-17, at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024. / Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

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Michigan Wolverines

It's been a rocky first season for Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore, but the new, 38-year-old CEO of Wolverine football just accomplished a feat which eluded his both predecessor and mentor Jim Harbaugh, as well as the lengendary Bo Schembechler.

With Michigan's 24-17 win over rival Michigan State on Saturday night, Moore became the first Wolverines head coach to win his debut against the Spartans since Bennie Oosterbaan in 1948. Each of the previous six U-M head coaches lost in their first meeting with MSU, including Harbaugh's 27-23 defeat in 2015 and Schembechler's 23-12 loss in 1969.

Following the game, Moore spoke of the accomplishment and what it meant to him individually.

"Unbelievable," he said. "I mean, it means a lot. Every win means so much to me, to win anything for this program and win a game for this program, but it means a lot to be able to have that, have that record. But really the most important thing is that we got the win and we’ll be ready to go play next week."

Michigan Wolverines football head coach Sherrone Moore

Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore fires up fans before the Michigan State game at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Saturday, Oct. 26, 2024. / Junfu Han / USA TODAY NETWORK via Imagn Images

During that 1948 season, Oosterban and the Wolverines opened their year with a 13-7 win over Michigan State, en route to a perfect 9-0 season and a second consecutive national championship. Since then, however, Michigan head coaches had gone 0-6 in their debut matchups against MSU.

With former Oregon State head coach Jonathan Smith taking over at Michigan State this past offseason, the 2024 meeting between the two in-state rivals was the first in which both programs had first-year coaches since 1995, when Nick Saban's Spartans defeated Lloyd Carr's Wolverines, 28-25.

The other unfortunate first-year outcomes for Michigan head coaches against Sparty over the past 75 years include Bump Elliott's 34-8 defeat in 1959, Gary Moeller's nail-biting 28-27 loss in 1990, Rich Rodriguez's 35-21 shortcoming in 2008 and Brady Hoke's 28-14 defeat in 2011.

However, Moore and the Wolverines bucked the trend on Saturday night and gave Michigan its third consecutive victory over Michigan State, the longest winning streak for the Wolverines in this series since a six-game stretch from 2002-07.

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