Michigan University in Ann Arbor is one of the most prestigious institutions in the US university system. In the rankings and rankings of the best North American universities it is always in the top positions, just after the most famous institutes of the Ivy League, those that are also well known abroad, such as Harvard, Princeton and Yale. In addition to their educational function, US universities have an essential role in the national sports system, constituting with their teams the last level before professionalism. If we consider only the sporting part, and in particular that linked to football, the national sport, Michigan is at the top.
His Wolverines are the fifth team with the most national titles and many have passed through there, including Tom Brady, the winningest quarterback ever, and the former president of the United States Gerald Ford. The team plays its games in a stadium that holds nearly 110,000 spectators, and nearly 110,000 spectators show up for every game of the season. It is for all these reasons that for days in the United States there has been talk of the espionage case involving the Wolverines, their well-known coach Jim Harbaugh and a former captain of the US army.
The case became public at the end of October, when the NCAA – the organization that manages and supervises the American university championships – had already begun to investigate, going so far as to claim that Michigan would have used a network of collaborators for at least three seasons to record and personally observe opposing teams during their games, especially communications between staff and players, which is prohibited by NCAA rules. And in the last two seasons Michigan has returned to obtaining consistent results, qualifying for two consecutive editions of the playoffs.
Unlike professional football, college football prohibits direct communication via devices between staff and players, who then communicate with each other from the sidelines with visual cues and gestures. According to the accusations, Michigan set up a network of observers specifically to capture and subsequently decipher the coded signals of the other teams. In a sport where you advance through schemes, which are often very complex, knowing them in advance or at least knowing what to expect is a huge advantage which alone can represent the difference between winning and losing.
Jim Harbaugh with the rest of the team (Leon Halip/Getty Images)
At the center of this espionage network was a former US Army captain and Wolverines fan, Connor Stalions, who joined the team’s organization first as a volunteer and then as a player recruitment analyst after writing a 600-year manifesto. University of Michigan identity pages. In recent years Stalions has been present among the Wolverines staff on the sidelines during championship games and therefore in contact with the main figures of the team. The Wall Street Journal he also wrote that in 2022 he would buy a half-million dollar house right next to the university campus.
Stalions appears to have been fired after the NCAA began its investigation, and he himself, through his lawyers, said that no member of the Wolverines’ staff was aware of what he was doing, effectively admitting the wrongdoing: even because ever since his name was mentioned, opposing teams have found him both in spectator lists and in certain television recordings, sitting directly in front of opposing staffs, hidden behind a hat and sunglasses. But Stalions would also have gone further: photos have emerged showing him on the sidelines, disguised as an assistant for Central Michigan University, during a championship game against Michigan State, another university team in the state.
NEW: @TheAthletic has obtained more photos of the goatee’d sunglasses person on the Central Michigan sideline at Michigan State.
CMU is looking into whether this is Connor Stalions.
Story: pic.twitter.com/R5AyslTIWF
— Chris Vannini (@ChrisVannini) October 31, 2023
The levels achieved by this spy network, if confirmed and associated with other members of the Michigan staff, could have serious repercussions on both the Wolverines’ season and the University’s reputation, which could in turn be reflected in player recruiting and therefore in the future of the institute’s sports program. Michigan’s defensive line is placing all responsibility on Stalions, who therefore acted alone, and a dossier is also being prepared with documents that would prove how three opposing universities (Ohio State, Rutgers and Purdue) joined together to decipher the signals of Wolverines game.
Michigan will have to prove that the conduct of rival universities actually violated the rules, given that the interpretation of opposing signals is allowed, or at least not prohibited, through the analysis of official films. All teams have departments that specifically deal with this, not to mention personal relationships: the various staff members, in fact, may be aware of the signals from multiple teams, due to friendship with other colleagues or having worked there in the past. It is also for this reason that each team does not rely on just one code system.
In any case, judging by the first measures, things aren’t going very well for Michigan. Last week coach Jim Harbaugh, a former NFL player and coach who grew up with the Wolverines, was suspended for the rest of the season by the Big Ten, the association that brings together some of the most prestigious teams in the country, whose proceedings are more quicker than those of the NCAA, which is still investigating. Harbaugh will be able to participate in practices and other activities, but he will not be able to be part of the team on game days. Meanwhile, within the University, support for the football team is widespread and a motto has already spread, “Michigan against everyone”.
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2023-11-14 11:29:55
#big #American #college #football #espionage #case
