In case you missed it, Michigan knocked off Ohio State today for the first time since 2011, sending a big shockwave through the world of college football.
The Fox broadcast wasn’t perfect; there was a paucity of replays and replay angles, for one thing.
Not disputing the call. Wasn’t CONCLUSIVE evidence to overturn. Just surprised there weren’t more than the 2 angles they showed.
— Ian Casselberry (@iancass) November 27, 2021
Though there was this neat bit of camera work:
Camera guy with a nimble move to crop out Michigan double birds bro pic.twitter.com/015QQW3FlM
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 27, 2021
Gus Johnson and Joel Klatt are both total pros, though, and unless you’re in the Never Gus camp, it’s hard to ask for a better booth to set the stage for legitimately huge college football games. Today’s certainly qualified, and when Michigan officially took the win, Johnson was ready with an appropriate call.
"Finally!" Gus Johnson calls Michigan beating Ohio State for the first time in the Jim Harbaugh era. pic.twitter.com/xiMuE1utYE
— Awful Announcing (@awfulannouncing) November 27, 2021
Listen to what happened after the Gus call, though: silence. The booth went quiet for essentially thirty seconds, letting the roar from the Big House and scenes of students spilling onto the field stand on their own. Gus brought in Jenny Taft for an interview with Harbaugh (and kudos to Taft and the on-field media in that particular scrum for making things like this work), but Fox stuck with the stadium shots for the rest of the broadcast.
Johnson and Klatt were minimal presences, offering context, yes, but never overshadowing or distracting from the outpouring of a decade’s worth of pent-up emotion.
Here’s the nearly thirty seconds between Johnson’s “Finally!” call and when Gus threw it down to Taft:
— Clips & Quips (@Clipselberry) November 27, 2021
And later, another similar stretch of silence before Gus tossed it to the postgame show.
— Clips & Quips (@Clipselberry) November 27, 2021
This was almost certainly by design. I don’t personally speak to many television analysts, but I have talked to Joel Klatt before about this exact same situation, where the sights and sounds of a moment are such that anything said by a broadcaster would only serve to detract. Klatt is a strong believer in this, Gus Johnson clearly is as well, and today served as a great example as to just how that understanding of the stage and what the audience will actually want can lead to something more memorable than anything they could have said.
