Michigan football has a great chance to keep its momentum rolling down hill with the ReliaQuest Bowl against Alabama on New Year’s Eve.
Almost exactly a year ago, the Wolverines and Crimson Tide met in the Rose Bowl on New Year’s Day as part of the College Football Playoff with everything on the line. As everyone knows by now, the Wolverines came out on top with an epic win in overtime over Alabama, ending Nick Saban’s coaching career while moving on to the national championship, where Michigan dismantled Washington.
This time around, the stakes are much lower, but that’s not to say there’s nothing to play for. Sherrone Moore and the Michigan football program have slowly but surely stock piled something that is important but not necessarily quantifiable: momentum.
It started when the Wolverines stopped the bleeding around the midpoint of the season for a key rivalry win over Michigan State at the Big House. They did lose their next two games, but they were both very respectable efforts against two teams who eventually made the College Football Playoff in Oregon and Indiana. Then, the Wolverines played their best game of the season, beating Northwestern, 50-6, then pulled off the upset of the season, knocking off Ohio State with a 13-10 stunner on the road.
Somewhere along the way, Michigan also secured the commitment of Bryce Underwood, the nation’s No. 1 player out of Belleville High School, pulling off a long-rumored flip from LSU and giving the program more of that aforementioned momentum.
With Underwood helping to drive excitement, Michigan locked up the No. 9 2025 recruiting class in the country.
Now, another opportunity presents itself for the Michigan football program, a chance to knock off an Alabama brand that is still one of, if not the strongest in the country in front of a national audience on a holiday.
Both teams have had a litany of opt-outs, including all over the Wolverines’ defense, but with two top tier programs like Michigan and Alabama, there should be plenty of guys who have been waiting and are ready to take their opportunities.
Here’s everything you need to know about the Michigan vs Alabama football game:
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The Michigan vs. Alabama game starts at noon Eastern Time from Tampa, Florida, at Raymond James Stadium, home of the Tampa Bay Buccaneers. Michigan has played in the Bucs’ home many times over the years and are 3-3 in the game once known as the Outback Bowl and Hall of Fame Bowl, including most recently a 26-19 loss to South Carolina in 2018.
Former Denver Broncos quarterback Brock Osweiler will join familiar ESPN face Dave Flemming from sunny Florida to call the rematch of last year’s Rose Bowl in the first of many New Year’s Eve games, leading into the first quarterfinal game of the 12-team College Football Playoff with Penn State playing Boise State in the VRBO Fiesta Bowl in Arizona.
[ MUST LISTEN: Make “Hail Yes!” your go-to Michigan Wolverines podcast, available anywhere you listen to podcasts (Apple, Spotify). ]
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Odds provided by BetMGM as of Tuesday morning.
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