Michigan 35, UNLV 7: To Avoid the Rush, or Not to Avoid the Rush
The Michigan Wolverines are primarily a running team. The Michigan Wolverines are primarily a running team. The Michigan Wolverines are primarily a running team. The Michigan Wolverines are primarily a running team. The Michigan Wolverines are primarily a running team.
"It's not a lie, if you believe it." -George Castanza
"Being able to run the ball when the other team knows you're going to run the ball. That's what I really respect about (this) team." -Jim Harbaugh, July 2023
"The coach doth protest too much, methinks." -Queen Gertrude from Shakespeare's Hamlet, modified by this author
A potential crisis is rearing its ugly head in the state of Michigan.
I'm not talking about the dumpster fire in East Lansing. The one where Michigan State University, still efforting to overcome the largest sexual abuse scandal in modern college athletics history while separating itself from the more recent gang assaults of two Wolverine players after the Spartans' humiliating 29-7 defeat last season, just suspended the coach they desperately signed to a $95-million contract for allegedly sexually harrasing the sexual abuse survivor he hired to speak to his team about sexual harrassment, and temporarily replaced him with his predecessor who resigned abruptly amid allegations of NCAA violations, specifically the cover-up of multiple sexual assault charges among players on his team. (I can't believe none of that was made up. Just wow.)
I'm not talking about the current crisis with Michigan's head coach either. The combination of returning productivity, overmatched opponents and a #2 national ranking has turned September into a walkthrough for this team. An AI application.
I'm talking about the belief that the key to success for this Wolverine football team is its rushing attack.
You know, the
real crisis.
Michigan came into the 2023 season with arguably the country's best backfield duo. No, wait. There was no argument. This is the country's best backfield duo. Blake Corum (who happens to be this week's Sports Illustrated cover boy) and Donovan Edwards (who's still running from one end of Ohio Stadium to the other untouched) are as destined for Sunday careers as a Catholic priest. The offensive line, while losing its only Outland Trophy winner at center, still has no less than two future NFL starters and is expected to make a run for its third straight Joe Moore Award (no school had ever won two straight).
So why, so far this young season, has this attack been so easy for schools like East Carolina and UNLV to neutralize?
Witness Saturday's impressive working over of the Rebels. At the half Michigan was dominant, with a 280-40 total yards edge. But only 92 of those yards were gained on the ground, on 19 rushes no less. For the game, the Wolverines gained a meager 179 yards on 33 tries. Meager considering the competition, paltry compared to the previous season. Michigan gained 201 more yards over the first two games of 2022, and needed just 9 carries to get there. Against two middle-tier Group of 5 teams, this run-happy squad has amassed a grand total of 301 yards. The sledding won't get any easier in the colder months with the B1G schedule awaiting them.
Fortunately, for anyone with two eyes and a healthy imagination, offensive efficiency isn't a problem at Michigan. It comes by the name of JJ McCarthy.
Michigan's feel-good story of the year so far, McCarthy effortlessly completed 22 of 25 passes for 278 yards and two touchdowns. In two games, he's 48 for 55 for 558 yards and five scores––all to his new #1 target, literally, Roman Wilson. McCarthy is fourth nationally in passing efficiency and leads the FBS in completion percentage. In fact, only two quarterbacks this century with at least 50 attempts through the first two games of a season have completed a higher percentage of their passes.
No other school would consider this a paradox. But no other school is the University of Michigan.
Instead of being happy exploiting any defense that tried to take away one element of its multi-dimentional offense, the Wolverines are frustrated. Instead of willfully using the pass to open up the run just as they've used the run to open up the pass, the Wolverines are unsatisfied. As Harbaugh himself stated, as Bo stated before him, there's no better joy than running through a team that's committed itself to stopping the run at all costs.
Wasn't last November's win in Columbus satisfying enough? McCarthy made Ryan Day and his DC Jim Knowles pay for the gamble they made to fill the box and deny the run, by throwing over them time and time again. To the point that the Buckeyes were paper thin and helpless to stop the two quick bursts by Edwards that sealed their fate. You wouldn't have had those runs without the wide-open passes. One helped the other, and both helped the maize and blue that day.
That should be the model, right? So why can't this coaching staff embrace this? It's the baseball equivalent of a team moving its entire infield to one side of the diamond, leaving half the infield wide open, just daring the pull hitter to hit opposite field. And the guy keeps hitting it on a rope, right into the crowd for the easy out.
But nothing could prevent an easy win on this sunny and shiny afternoon. An afternoon that was also historic, because for the first time in its 144-year history, a black head coach walked the Michigan sideline for the first time. Mike Hart, the school's leading rusher, became the first African American to coach and win a football game for the University of Michigan.
Still, the results, while not as lopsided as the previous year, have been just as one-sided. The offense has many weapons and the defense is suffocatingly effective, evidenced by Michigan's starters outscoring their opponents 65-0 through three quarters.
And you just know, heading into their final non-conference matchup with Bowling Green before a homecoming matchup with Rutgers starts the conference season, that despite McCarthy seemingly on his way to a season not seen in Ann Arbor since his coach led the nation in passing efficiency in 1985, the Wolverines will continue to be a run-first team.
"When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time." -Maya Angelou
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