DETROIT — What’s that old song by The Temptations? “I Wish It Would Rain”?
Well, the Toledo football team made its Motown wish come true.
As the Rockets polished off a win they wanted for coach Jason Candle every bit as much as their coach wanted it for them, it did not just rain Saturday at Ford Field.
It poured.
Three times in the final seconds of their 17-7 victory over Ohio in the Mid-American Conference championship game, a pair of Toledo players surreptitiously approached Candle with smiles on their faces and a 10-gallon cooler full of ice water in their hands.
And three times, they got him.
By the time Candle made a leaping detour into the arms of star quarterback Dequan Finn as he ran onto the field, he looked like he’d spent the afternoon in the Detroit River.
The coach who betrays so little emotion also looked as happy as I’ve ever seen him.
“There's been years past where I’ve gotten to December and I’ve felt like I've been to hell and back,” Candle said, “and here we are early December, I could go to practice tomorrow and be excited. This is just a fun group to coach, a great group of guys to be around, they love each other and they play hard for each other ...”
He paused, his voice catching.
“I’m lucky to lead them, because not a lot of coaches get that,” he said. “These guys battled, man. They went through tough times.”
Good for Toledo.
Good for Candle.
I don’t know what’s next for him, whether it’s signing an extension or — perhaps deciding the Glass Bowl has become too much of a Fish Bowl — leaving for another job.
But let us appreciate what Candle — who with his second league title in six years has now won two more postseason games at Ford Field than the Lions — and these Rockets achieved on Saturday.
In the cold analysis of a football program, it’s easy to lose sight of the humanity behind the scenes.
What I saw here told me just how much these players love Candle and his staff and this program.
And I’m not just talking about what I saw afterward. I mean what I saw during the game.
A program that’s justly endured its share of scrutiny — from fans, know-it-all columnists, everyone — could have easily gone down quietly with a third straight loss.
Even with Ohio missing star quarterback and MAC player of the year Kurtis Rourke — and Toledo (8-5) installed as a field-goal favorite — few were especially high on UT. (Four of the five pickers on ESPN’s College GameDay went with Ohio, with Kirk Herbstreit the lone believer. So did our Toledo writer, Kyle Rowland, and I.)
But, as uneven as a Rockets team with just five senior starters played this season — and beaten up as they have been — they stood tall when it counted most.
No, it wasn’t pretty, and Finn still wasn’t at full health.
When a reporter asked the Detroit native about his limp, Candle turned to his quarterback and smiled: “He must have saw you walking with the trophy and saw you were limping.”
“That’s just my natural walk,” Finn said.
Regardless, no matter.
Toledo came to play.
From the start, it was the better, tougher team, not surprisingly on defense but also on offense, where its embattled front dominated the line of scrimmage and Finn and friends did the rest.
Finn completed 16 of 25 passes for 154 yards — including a 16-yarder to DeMeer Blankumsee that punctuated Toledo’s backbreaking 16-play, 90-yard drive in the fourth quarter — and gutted out 86 yards on 18 carries.
Jacquez Stuart added another 93 yards on the ground, and, in all, the Rockets ran through the league’s top rush defense for 236 yards.
Then, when it was over, they dashed onto the field, where, amid the crush of joy, most players made sure to find their coach.
“I'm just so proud of coach Candle,” senior defensive tackle Desjuan Johnson said. “This is all a blessing.”
I asked Candle afterward what the day meant for him, given the heat that he and his program have faced.
“We can sit and talk about that another day,” he said. “I'm really happy for this season, really happy for these kids. This will maybe quiet some of the [critics] with the iron thumbs that are hammering on their phone 24-7 that know more than people that do this profession.
“I think Greg Schiano said it best. Every man can do two things. He can man a grill better than everybody else and he can coach a football team better than anybody else. I guess that's in our nature.”
Maybe so.
But, for one special day, at least, any criticism was decidedly muted.
Either that, or it was drowned out by the 10,000 or so roaring fans in blue and gold here celebrating Toledo’s return to the top of the MAC.
First Published December 4, 2022, 1:19 a.m.
