The Big Ten owns the last two college football national championships, with Michigan and Ohio State claiming titles in 2023 and 2024, respectively. But despite the Buckeyes’ recent national crown, their ongoing losing streak to the Wolverines in The Game — now at four consecutive defeats — still looms large in the rivalry. And Michigan defensive end Derrick Moore isn’t letting them forget it.
“I’ll congratulate them on the win. But you know it’s not a real win if y’all ain’t beat us,” Moore said via The Michigan Insider. “I’m gonna congratulate them on their win, but this year, it’s gonna be different.”
Moore said he was “hoping” the Buckeyes would lose but conceded that they “deserved it” and “worked hard for it.” However, he couldn’t play nice for too long.
“If the playoff [expansion] wasn’t around, they wouldn’t have won the national championship,” Moore added.
Moore’s jab isn’t without merit. After falling to Michigan for the fourth year in a row in the regular-season finale, Ohio State missed out on the Big Ten title game again. But thanks to the debut of the expanded 12-team College Football Playoff, the 10-2 Buckeyes still received an at-large bid as the No. 8 seed and hosted a first-round game.
Big Ten QB rankings: Drew Allar tops list, while Bryce Underwood and Dante Moore have something to prove
David Cobb
Ohio State certainly validated its run to the national title, dominating all four playoff opponents by an average margin of 17.5 points. The Buckeyes’ dominant playoff performance silenced most doubters, but Moore isn’t backing down on his take about the rivalry.
“We look at it like, ‘Y’all had a nice run, but we helped y’all along the way. We helped y’all build back up.’ After that game, they dominated everybody that came in front of them. So I’ve got to give all the credit to them,” Moore said.
The tension between the rival sides boiled over after the 2024 meeting when Moore carried a Michigan flag to midfield inside Ohio Stadium following the 13-10 victory. A massive fight broke out, with law enforcement and security stepping in to break up the chaotic scene.
In December, several weeks after the game, Ohio State Rep. Josh Williams introduced a new bill — titled the O.H.I.O. Sportsmanship Act — that would make it a felony to plant a flag at midfield of Ohio Stadium.
“For like a whole month straight they had a picture of me with the flag on the field, and they pretty much said, like, ‘criminal’ or something like that,” Moore said when asked about the bill. “I’m like, ‘Bro, wow.’ Like, I’m a criminal now? … But all I gotta say, man: Hey, that’s Ohio for you.”
Michigan, which went 8-5 in 2024, hosts Ohio State Nov. 29 in Ann Arbor where a win would give the Wolverines their longest win streak over the Buckeyes since the 1920s.
Ohio State enters the season as the Big Ten favorites, listed at +185 to win the conference at FanDuel. Michigan has +1100 conference title odds, trailing the conference’s three CFP participants from last season — OSU, Penn State (+240) and Oregon (+330).
