Michigan football coach Jim Harbaugh calls out James Franklin as "ringleader" of tunnel issue from Penn State game

It got tense in the tunnel at Michigan Stadium during halftime of the Penn State game, the Harbaugh is pointing the blame in one direction

The fallout from the scuffle between Michigan and Penn State in the tunnel during halftime of their game two weeks ago is still raging.

Now it's Jim Harbaugh going on the offensive against James Franklin, who the Michigan coach is now directly blaming for instigating the whole thing.

"Really got bigger fish to fry than Franklin's opinion on the halftime tunnel from a game ago," Harbaugh told reporters on Monday.

"All you got to do is walk into their locker room. Like, you saw pretty clearly that they completely stopped. They weren't letting us get up the tunnel. 

"And it just seemed like a sophomoric ploy to keep us out of the locker rooms. And [Franklin] looked like he was the ringleader of the whole thing. I got bigger fish to fry than worry about that kind of whining."

Some halftime tunnel shenanigans happening. pic.twitter.com/FwxgXdO7jj

— Isaiah Hole (@isaiahhole) October 15, 2022

The "whining" in question relates to Franklin's recent comments that there should be a rule about how to file teams in and out of Michigan's tunnel, which the Wolverines' stadium is unique in there only being one.

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Franklin opined that there isn't enough time allowed between teams as they go into and out of the tunnel before and after the halftime breaks.

"There really should be a policy that the first team that goes in, there is a buffer," Franklin said last week.

"If not, this team starts talking to this team, they start jawing back and forth, and something bad is going to happen.

"All there has to be [is] a two-minute or minute buffer in between the two teams."

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