It took awhile for anyone on the outside to believe that the 1997 Michigan football team was any different than its predecessors.
The program entered the year with four consecutive four-loss seasons and hadn’t directly played for a national title, let alone won one, in the previous 48 years.
The head coach, Lloyd Carr, received the job by default, after the previous coach, Gary Moeller, was forced to resign two years earlier after a bout of public drunkenness.
There were new offensive and defensive coordinators and the quarterback situation was far from defined.
But internally, the Wolverines from Carr down the student equipment managers, felt something different.