Alabama
What can anybody say about Michigan now? Wolverines stars stepped up when it mattered most
PASADENA, Calif. — For every magical finish at the Rose Bowl, there is a team that wants to forget.
Michigan has been that team, haunted by failure and burdened by the past. On the other sideline was Alabama, a program that eats other teams’ dreams for breakfast. As the sun went down Monday night, a familiar pit settled into the stomachs of Michigan fans who could sense where this was all going. Michigan had outplayed Alabama for much of the night, but the Wolverines were watching their national championship dreams slip away. They needed their stars to step up and save them from a lifetime of regret.
Step up they did. Quarterback J.J. McCarthy guided Michigan on a game-saving drive, hitting Roman Wilson for the touchdown that forced overtime. Blake Corum, the running back who has dazzled everywhere but the College Football Playoff, weaved through Alabama’s defense for the go-ahead score. And Michigan’s defense stuffed Jalen Milroe on fourth-and-goal from the 3-yard line, releasing a deep well of emotion that was building throughout Michigan’s long, strange journey to Pasadena.
BLAKE CORUM COULD NOT BE STOPPED‼️
Michigan takes the lead in OT 👀 #CFBPlayoff pic.twitter.com/FfeVQlHAAQ
— ESPN (@espn) January 2, 2024
What can anybody say about Michigan now? The Wolverines are 14-0 and heading to Houston to play Washington for the national championship. They just beat Alabama, the most successful program of the CFP era, and rallied in the final minutes of regulation to do it. With a 27-20 victory in the Rose Bowl, the Wolverines conquered their CFP demons and quieted anybody who still believed their success was a product of stolen signs or unfair advantages.
“FAIR AND SQUARE AGAINST BAMA!” defensive tackle Kris Jenkins shouted, clutching a rose and sitting between the flattened goal posts in the end zone. “No more excuses! Stop trippin’, man! Talking about film, iPads? Better not be none of that today. I’ll be checking the comments.”
As Jenkins celebrated, his mother, Shay Delotch, wrapped her arms around his neck, tears streaming down her cheeks.
“You’re going to cry more than me,” Jenkins said.
“Because I know how hard you worked for this,” she said. “It’s not just a game. I’m crying about a stupid football game because I’m so proud of you.”
Across the field, a mob of cameras surrounded McCarthy. On the back of his arm, peeking out from beneath his shoulder pads, was a tattoo that says, “Attached to nothing, connected to everything.”
McCarthy has been working on his mental game, sharpening his mind for moments just like this one. The game couldn’t have started much worse for him, with an errant throw to the sideline that was nearly intercepted. Entering the final full drive of regulation, Michigan’s offense was in a prolonged funk, having picked up only two first downs in the second half. Yet McCarthy was able to clear his head and complete three of the biggest passes of Michigan’s season: to a wide-open Corum on fourth-and-2, to Wilson for 29 yards, to Wilson again for a 4-yard touchdown.
As McCarthy finished his postgame TV interview, coach Jim Harbaugh barged into the scrum and showered his quarterback with high-fives.
“The last two years being able to watch the opposing team celebrate, it’s just different when I see the maize and blue confetti on the field,” McCarthy said. “I’m nothing without this head coach, nothing without my teammates, nothing without that defense. Everything was so amazing.”
GO DEEPER
Auerbach: Michigan’s Rose Bowl win ‘just means more’ for Wolverines … and entire Big Ten
In the tunnel outside Michigan’s locker room, athletic director Warde Manuel relived the game with Jack Harbaugh, Jim’s father. Manuel has been in the middle of Michigan’s tumultuous season, steering Michigan’s athletic department through a pair of NCAA investigations and a public clash with the Big Ten.
Michigan stood by its coach in the face of controversy, and Harbaugh rewarded the program with a victory on college football’s biggest stage.
“He’s everything that you want in a leader of a group of young men and a staff,” Manuel said. “I love him. He’s just awesome.”
Speaking of which, how’s that contract extension coming along?
“Hey, brother, I’m working on it,” Manuel said. “Believe me.”
Blake Corum scored Michigan’s winning TD in overtime. (Kevork Djansezian / Getty Images)
Inside the locker room, Corum was looking for his helmet, having ended up with Will Johnson’s instead. Corum’s rushing touchdown in overtime was the 56th of his Michigan career, breaking Anthony Thomas’ school record. It’s fair to say there’s never been a bigger one in Corum’s career, nor in the careers of most other players who wore a Michigan uniform.
Corum has been the backbone of three teams that won the Big Ten and appeared in the CFP. But heading into Monday’s game, his CFP stats consisted of three carries for 13 yards and a fumble against Georgia in the 2021 Orange Bowl. With one last chance at a signature moment in the CFP, Corum made it count with 83 rushing yards, a receiving touchdown and his 21-yard run in OT.
“When we scored and we forced overtime, I knew it was over,” Corum said.
Manuel thought the same, though his head and his heart rate might have told different stories.
“My heart inside was going fast,” Manuel said. “I was trying to walk it off a little bit. I saw our strength coach and looked at him when this overtime started. I smiled, and he smiled back. We both knew this would happen.”
Strength coach Ben Herbert is a pivotal figure in Michigan’s program, credited with instilling the mental and physical toughness that helped the Wolverines go 39-3 over the past three seasons. The burly man with the bald head and the icy stare had tears streaming down his cheeks after the game. Teaching a team how to finish is part of a strength coach’s task, and Michigan’s defense answered the bell.
“The look in their eye, the anticipation they had — there was no sense of uneasiness,” Herbert said. “They had full confidence. You could tell they were looking forward to it. They were smiling. They were like, ‘Let’s go finish this thing.’ That’s what they did.”
GO DEEPER
What happened on Alabama’s last play? Inside Michigan’s OT stop of Jalen Milroe
On the game’s final play, everybody on Michigan’s sideline expected Alabama quarterback Jalen Milroe to keep the ball. The teams called consecutive timeouts before Milroe finally took the snap and plunged into the middle of Michigan’s defense. The Wolverines collapsed the play and buried Milroe at the line of scrimmage. A delirious celebration ensued as players rushed the field to celebrate the program’s first Playoff victory.
Losing this game would have haunted Michigan even more than the previous two CFP defeats. After bitter losses to Georgia and TCU, the core of Michigan’s team returned for one more run at a national championship. The players who came back were the ones who powered through when Michigan needed it most. One week from Monday night, the Wolverines hope to do this all again in Houston.
“This is the best feeling I’ve ever had in my life,” Wilson said. “Now I’m going to one-up it.”
(Top photo: Harry How / Getty Images)
MONTGOMERY, Ala. (WSFA) – Alabama has expanded income eligibility for the Women, Infants and Children nutrition program, known as WIC, meaning more families may qualify.
WIC serves people who are pregnant, postpartum or breastfeeding, as well as parents or guardians of children younger than 5. Applications are handled through local county health departments and WIC clinics.
WIC provides food benefits for each eligible family member, including a monthly cash-value benefit that can be used for fruits and vegetables. Each child receives $26 a month, pregnant and postpartum participants receive $48 a month, and breastfeeding participants receive $52 a month. Other approved foods include whole-grain bread and cereal, milk, cheese, yogurt, eggs, peanut butter, beans, canned fish and infant foods.
Participants can also receive nutrition education, breastfeeding support and health care referrals. Alabama’s WIC program issues benefits electronically.
| Family Size | Annual Income | Weekly Income |
|---|---|---|
| 2 | $40,034 | $770 |
| 3 | $50,542 | $972 |
| 4 | $61,050 | $1,175 |
| 5 | $71,558 | $1,377 |
| 6 | $82,066 | $1,579 |
Under the 2026 federal poverty guidelines, WIC is open to households with incomes up to 185% of the federal poverty level. Participants also must meet nutrition-risk requirements. Families already receiving Medicaid, SNAP or Temporary Assistance for Needy Families generally meet the income guidelines for WIC, though others may qualify as well.
Each unborn infant counts as one in the family size. For additional household sizes, see the Alabama Department of Public Health’s WIC information page.
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Melissa Fortenberry saw a problem and sought a solution, a solution Alabama football is buying into.
Fortenberry invented HeatSense, a fitness tracker that measures athletes’ individual core body temperature with the “goal of proactively managing heat strain.” In August, Alabama will be Heat Sense’s first customer.
“They are all in,” Fortenberry told The Tuscaloosa News. “They very much want their player health to be at the top of the list.”
With a background in technology, Fortenberry came up with the idea of HeatSense as a fan, watching her three kids play youth sports in from the stands. She became sick, feeling dizzy and nauseous and coming to the conclusion that the pads and turf were hotter for athletes on the field.
Fortenberry conducted her own research and saw more reactive solutions than proactive.
“You can see heat strain forming in people and proactively cool them or keep pushing, where today, you’re flying blind,” Fortenberry said.
Jeff Allen, senior associate athletic director for health and performance and Alabama football’s head athletic trainer, has already been on the forefront of innovation for player safety, introducing the injury tent in 2015 to allow training staff and medical personnel to examine athletes privately on the sideline during games.
When Carson Tinker, a former Alabama and NFL long snapper and Fortenberry’s neighbor, heard about her idea, Allen was the first person Tinker thought of.
“Jeff was like, ‘Man, this sounds super interesting. Keep me in the loop with this,’” Tinker said. “It’s something he felt he knew that he could use. That was over a year ago now. … Now it’s all kind of come together. It’s crazy how it all kind of works out.”
“Once we got Jeff’s attention, he was really intrigued,” Fortenberry said, adding Allen “wants to be on the forefront of making the game better.”
Members of the HeatSense team attended an Alabama practice during its fourth-quarter program in March and put sensors on 10 players.
“I think the feedback they heard from players was validated in what we saw,” Fortenberry said.
Tinker views this not only as a safety tool, but an advantage overall to find a player’s peak body temperature.
“You want to be able to use the heat to your advantage. You want to be able to play your best in all conditions, but nobody knows until it’s too late and you got to get through in the cold tub because you overheated.”
Alabama is just the start for HeatSense, which has the goal of reaching three to five Division I programs this summer.
According to Weather Spark, the average temperature in Tuscaloosa eclipses 90 degrees during Alabama’s fall camp. Fortenberry now has a way for the Crimson Tide to respond.
“People, I think, are afraid of the heat, but you don’t know you can do something about it,” she said. “Now you can.”
Colin Gay covers Alabama football for The Tuscaloosa News, part of the USA TODAY Network. Reach him at cgay@gannett.com or follow him @_ColinGay on X, formerly known as Twitter or Instagram @colingaytnews.
A new survey of likely Republican runoff voters in Alabama suggests the state’s four statewide runoff contests remain at different stages heading into the June 16 election, with one race showing a clear leader, another appearing highly competitive, and a third remaining largely unsettled.
According to The Alabama Poll, which surveyed 600 likely Republican runoff voters on May 28, U.S. Senate candidate Jared Hudson leads Congressman Barry Moore 48.7% to 39.2%, while 12.1% of voters remain undecided. The poll indicates Hudson has built support among voters whose preferred candidates did not advance to the runoff.
In the race for lieutenant governor, Secretary of State Wes Allen holds a narrow overall lead over Alabama Republican Party Chairman John Wahl, 41.9% to 38.4%. However, the survey found Wahl performing slightly better among voters who report they are certain to vote and among the most frequent Republican primary voters, highlighting the potential importance of turnout in the contest. Nearly one in five voters, 19.6%, remain undecided.
The attorney general runoff shows the largest margin among the four statewide races surveyed. Katherine Robertson leads Jay Mitchell 49.1% to 31.2%, with 19.7% of respondents undecided. Poll analysts noted that Mitchell’s path to closing the gap would likely depend on winning support from voters who view him favorably but have not yet committed to a candidate.
Meanwhile, the Republican runoff for commissioner of agriculture remains the most unsettled race in the survey. Corey Hill leads Christina Woerner McInnis 33.1% to 27.3%, but nearly 40% of likely runoff voters remain undecided, leaving substantial room for movement before Election Day.
Beyond the candidate matchups, the poll found Republican voters generally optimistic about the direction of Alabama, with 63.6% saying the state is headed in the right direction. At the same time, economic concerns continue to dominate voter priorities. Nearly 79% of respondents identified an economic issue as the most important problem facing the state, with grocery prices and utility costs cited most frequently.
The survey also found President Donald Trump’s approval rating among likely Republican runoff voters at 83.2%. Researchers reported that endorsements from both Trump and U.S. Senator Katie Britt carried similar persuasive weight among respondents.
The Alabama Poll surveyed 600 likely Republican primary runoff voters using a combination of live telephone interviews and text-message surveys. The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points and was conducted May 28 among voters who said they are likely to participate in the June 16 Republican runoff election.
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