After a Poor Season and Turnover, Kerry Coombs is Looking to Revive Michigan Football's Special Teams

Michigan football is in the midst of a new era in all three phases.

Sort of. One final hire from Sherrone Moore before last year’s appearance in the Cheez-It’s Citrus Bowl came on special teams.

Kerry Coombs was hired to fix what was a disastrous unit in 2025, after being a staple throughout the majority of the Jim Harbaugh era.

A Brief Audition Turns Into a Full Time Job

Coombs’ one game audition was a success. Michigan looked competent, if nothing else on special teams against the Texas Longhorns. That audition helped Coombs retain his job when Kyle Whittingham took over as the head coach which was the end of a tumultuous month.

“You don’t have enough time for that story,” Coombs joked about the turnover that took place immediately upon his arrival.

Coombs still has his work cut out for him. Harbaugh set a high standard in the third phase of the game, and that group was still a net positive in 2024 after he left for the NFL.

The big key to that was in the kicking game where Dominic Zvada was one of the best kickers in the country.

Zvada was the hero in the 2024 iteration of “The Game” making two field goals, including the game-winner with 46 seconds to go. Zvada’s performance in 2024 got him on NFL radars, but he chose to stay at Michigan for the 2025 season.

Zvada, along with the rest of the special teams, regressed in 2025. After missing just one kick in his first season with the Wolverines, Zvada was 17-25 in his second campaign.

Zvada was not alone. The return game led by Semaj Morgan was a mess, and only fixed itself when Andrew Marsh was made into the primary returner.

Coverage units were undisciplined, and the lack of attention to detail was astonishing for a group that was typically one of the best in the country.

That led Sherrone Moore to fire JB Brown after the season ended, and hire Coombs.

After Coombs was retained by Whittingham, he went to work on finding players who he could build his side of the ball around.

Confidence in the Kicker

One of those players was transfer kicker Trey Butkowski. Butkowski was recently named to the watch list for the Lou Groza award, which is given to the nation’s top kicker.

“We got a guy who was 21-23 at pitt in one of the hardest stadiums in the country to kick in the wind blows there at all time,” Coombs said. “I’ve learned we get some wind here too. A lot of wind and a lot of tough situations and kicked really well in that environment and I’m excited about Trey and what he will add to our team.”

👀 Watching Trey

The Lou Groza Award is given to the nation’s top kicker pic.twitter.com/4CfIaLgT0i
— Michigan Football (@UMichFootball) August 7, 2026

In the return game, Michigan had their struggles a year ago, especially with ball security, which they're hoping to clean up in 2026.

“The first thing you want to do in every return unit is secure the kick, our job is secure the kick and be penalty free,” Coombs said. “So we gotta catch the ball so that’s where it begins. We gotta catch the ball and we gotta be confident fielding both punts and kickoffs. We’re looking for guys that can make a guy miss in the punt return game, who is a dynamic athlete in space who can make things happen. In the kickoff return game typically those guys for us have been a bigger guy who can not only make a guy miss and more often than not run through smoke which more often than not running backs and bigger receivers have a tendency to do that in practice.”

Coombs would not name a front runner at that position, but it’s possible that Andrew Marsh and Savion Hiter become candidates for those positions as both either have experience doing it in college or have expressed interest in doing so.

Ultimately, this group needs to much better than it was a season ago. With the gauntlet Michigan is set to face in terms of its schedule, they cannot afford to lose games on special teams.

How do they do that? What’s the goal for Coombs as he looks to reset the culture?

“We’re looking for the best in the country, this is Michigan,” Coombs said.

With #Michigan in the process of figuring out who its best five offensive linemen are — Jim Harding revealed Andrew Babalola is right in the mix at left tackle.

The sky is the limit for Babalola and a high draft pick could be in his future.

MORE: https://t.co/SKORXSAOpQ pic.twitter.com/kVo1pp2Iku
— Trent Knoop (@TrentKnoop) August 7, 2026

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