Today, P.J. Fleck won for the second time this week. On Monday, Fleck dismissed two Western Michigan football players who were arrested on very serious criminal charges.
He then performed an action that few, if any, college football coaches ever do. P.J. Fleck put the onus on himself for what the players did. Yes, on the Mid-American Conference weekly coaches call, he took ownership of the situation, a bold, admirable move that’s almost without peer.
It was reminiscent of fictional college football head coach Ed “Straight Arrow” Genero, who led the Texas State Armadillos in the 1991 comedy “Necessary Roughness.”
Taking the moral high road, and showing true character was a big win for Fleck.
Today was the second huge win, and it came on the field, as five point underdogs WMU pulled out the 22-21 win at Northwestern.
In front of a Ryan Field crowd of 30,635, the Western Michigan football program got their first win over a Big Ten team since 2008 (Illinois at Ford Field in Detroit). The win snapped the 15 game losing streak that Western Michigan had against Big Ten opponents.
They’ll face another Big Ten opponent in two weeks when they visit the Fighting Illini on September 17th.
Although the victory was extremely controversial, it was certainly not fluky. When Northwestern was knocking on their door, at the Western Michigan goal line, the Broncos almost made a very bone-headed play, by throwing a fumbled ball back into the end zone.
Luckily for Western Michigan, the call went in their favor, and after it was reviewed again by officials, the original call stood. WMU narrowly avoided giving up what would have been the decisive, game winning touchdown for Northwestern.
Western Michigan upsets Northwestern after crazy fumble in end zone: https://t.co/nnt0OtiZo5 pic.twitter.com/yUh52EXk8f
— Yahoo Sports College Football (@YahooSportsCFB) September 3, 2016
Western Michigan gentleman flirts with disaster by throwing fumble back into own end zone https://t.co/dWYe7kAzaO pic.twitter.com/UEnROklzlg
— VICE Sports (@VICESports) September 3, 2016
It may have been an extremely questionable, controversial play, but WMU certainly earned this victory. There was nothing fluky at all about how they outmuscled, and generally beat Northwestern in short yardage situations.
It showed in the stat sheet too. Western Michigan out-gained Northwestern 416-319 in total yards, 198-123 on the ground (NU’s specialty) and 218-196 through the air.
Here is the video of the P.J. Fleck opening statement from the Western Michigan postgame press conference:
Fleck gave a very interesting, very exciting post game media session. We’ll have full audio of that up shortly.
https://twitter.com/PaulMBanks/status/772167498343088129
Paul M. Banks runs The Sports Bank.net, partnered with FOX Sports Engage Network. and News Now. Banks, a former writer for the Washington Times, currently contributes regularly to the Chicago Tribune’s RedEye publication and Bold Global.
He also consistently appears on numerous radio and television talk shows all across the country. Follow him on Twitter and Instagram and Sound Cloud.