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Editor's note: The following is an excerpt from John U. Bacon's book, "Three And Out: Rich Rodriguez and the Michigan Wolverines in the Crucible of College Football." Published by Farrar, Straus and Giroux, LLC. Reprinted with permission. The book goes on sale Tuesday.

After spending weeks poring over films from Notre Dame, Michigan State and Iowa -- replete with future NFLers and professionally produced from three angles in great stadiums with packed houses -- looking at film from Delaware State was like watching a two-bit high school squad.

Michigan paid Eastern Michigan $800,000 for the right to beat up on the Eagles but had to up the ante to $1 million for Delaware State, because DSU had been forced to forfeit a league game to make the date -- another good argument against the superfluous and cynical twelfth game.

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Courtesy Macmillan Publishing John U. Bacon had unlimited access to the Michigan football program for three years.

Rodriguez would honor Ohene's hits by replaying them at Monday's team meeting, where his teammates gave him their ritualistic lead-up -- "ZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzZZZZZ--POW!" It wasn't fifteen minutes of fame, just a moment, but Opong-Owusu would never forget it.

Beyond notching the fifth win, the game was almost completely inconsequential. But what happened off the field that day would have a much greater impact on Rodriguez, his staff, and his team.

Bill Martin, on his way to the Regents' Guest Area in the press box -- where big donors and VIPs get schmoozed by President (Mary Sue) Coleman and others -- was asked by a student security guard to show his pass. According to The Michigan Daily, Martin said, "I am the athletic director. I can go in." Then he walked past the young man into the room. Whether he brushed by him, shoved him, or grabbed his shirt depends on who's telling the story. But no one disputes that, later that day, the student related the incident to a fellow security guard, who told him of a similar incident earlier in the season.

The two students decided to file reports with U-M chief of police Ken Magee. As one regent told me, Magee might consider you a close friend, "but if one of his officers gives you a parking ticket, you're paying the full amount."

The by-the-book Magee processed the complaint the way he would any other. Although no charges were ultimately filed, four days later, on Wednesday, the university sent out a press release announcing Martin's retirement. Whether the reports had any impact on the announcement is difficult to say, though the timing -- midweek and midseason -- seemed unusual. Martin has maintained throughout, however, that he planned to retire with the opening of the skyboxes in 2010, and there certainly is a logic to that.

Martin's already limited power to guide and protect Rodriguez would be all but eliminated, and whoever followed Martin would be less committed to a beleaguered coach whom he hadn't hired. For Rodriguez, it was just more snow on the rooftop, threatening to cave it in.

And it was against this backdrop that Martin, whose support for Rodriguez had always been sincere, sat down the very next day to a previously arranged lunch at the Michigan Union with Rodriguez and (former Michigan coach Lloyd) Carr. All three walked up State Street together, with horns honking the whole way up the hill, and fans shouting their names. When they made their way up the steps to the Union, Martin recalled, Denard Robinson happened to be walking out. Carr had never met him, so they had a brief chat. At lunch, they sat next to former Purdue quarterback Mark Herrmann, whose daughter was considering Michigan.

Otherwise, Martin says, "there was a lot of small talk, and some football talk. There was tension."

Although stilted, it would be the longest conversation between the two since Carr called Rodriguez in December of 2007 to sell him on the job.

After the chilly pleasantries were dispensed with, Carr sent the first volley. "Tell the people in your camp to quit attacking me in the press," he said, as Rodriguez remembered it a couple hours later. The catalyst for this was undoubtedly Rick Leach's public lambasting of Carr on the radio that week for sitting with Iowa's coaches and dignitaries -- people Carr had known for years -- in an Iowa stadium luxury box, instead of sticking with the Michigan contingent. Leach, who had no more media training than Rodriguez or Martin, quickly suffered a backlash.

"I don't have a camp," Rodriguez replied, "and whatever they're doing, they're doing it on their own. Rick Leach speaks for himself."

Rodriguez ticked off all the reasons Carr shouldn't feel any threat from him, including Carr's five Big Ten titles and Michigan's first national championship in a half century. What Michigan football needed now, Rodriguez said, was Carr's unambiguous support. "When the Free Press came out with this story," he told Carr, "saying how hard we are on the players, we could have used you speaking up."

Carr said nothing.

"You're either all in or you're not," Rodriguez continued. "You're either inside the Michigan family or you're not." But the closest he came to accusing Carr of anything more than silence was this: "Somebody inside the department is talking to the press and doing us harm."

The suggestion was that, if there were moles in the department, Carr most likely knew who they were, and Rodriguez would appreciate it if Carr told them to knock it off. As Rodriguez recalled, Carr remained silent at that, too.

Walking back down the hill to their offices, Martin asked Rodriguez, "Why don't you ask him to talk to your team before the Penn State game?"

"Because I've got my team right where I want them," Rodriguez replied. "Gary (Moeller) comes to practice every Thursday -- he's a regular -- and we're not even asking him to talk to our team."

This little exchange might be more telling than the strained conversation over lunch. It displayed the blind spots of both men. Martin was naive enough to think Rodrigues would have no problem asking Carr to speak to his team after that ice-cold lunch, and that the clearly reticent Carr would accept. Likewise, Rodriguez failed to take advantage of what the Michigan family could do for him by declining to invite respected and supportive Michigan Men to address his team.

The latter echoed Rodriguez's refusal to visit the M-Club for their Monday luncheons during the season, too, which every coach had done going back to (Bo) Schembechler's early days. The club's members are not, as a rule, the big money donors or power brokers -- the VIPs tended to live in the suburbs or on the coasts -- but their passion and loyalty were unequaled, and they served as opinion leaders for the Michigan community. It was, in many ways, an ideal setting for a new coach: a home crowd, with a strict no-press, everything-is-off-the-record policy. Further, it would give Rodriguez, an effective public speaker and a genuinely likable guy, a platform to earn some brownie points with the faithful. Here was the help he could have used, in a format in which he could excel.

Yet Rodriguez typically sent Dusty Rutledge in his stead. When a patron asked Rutledge why Rodriguez rarely came, he said, "Would you rather have him here or recruiting next year's class?" It was a good point, especially because Rodriguez was the lead coach for both the offense and the special teams. Ultimately you could argue getting even one blue chipper outweighed a season of speeches, but it robbed Rodriguez of the support he would need when the (Detroit) Free Press story hit. A few hundred influential character witnesses and amateur PR workers couldn't have hurt during an investigation that would drag out for a year.

Back in his office, reflecting on the day's events, Rodriguez said, "Well, that didn't accomplish a whole lot. We're going to extend an olive branch one more time -- ask (Carr) to be the honorary captain for Penn State -- and then when the season ends, that's it."

Nothing, of course, could help Rodriguez more than winning another football game. With center David Molk finally returning from his broken foot and many pundits calling the upcoming Penn State game for Michigan, there was good reason to hope. Once again, the incentives were many: a 2-2 Big Ten record, bowl eligibility -- and proof to the rest of the nation they were back.

In the two weeks since the Iowa game, still more drama swirled around the program. From Leach's outburst to Martin's retirement to suspending (cornerback Boubacar) Cissoko for missing class to the NCAA investigation, Rodriguez's options for surviving the experience were becoming narrower by the day. He had only one way out: He had to win games, and fast.

Ann Arbor native and Michigan grad John U. Bacon has written six books on sports and business.

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