Can Michigan Avoid 1-3?
Michigan hasn't started a season 1-3 since 1967 but that's exactly what they'll be if they can't get it done against Wisconsin this Saturday.
In year six, Jim Harbaugh would start the season with a worse record than Rich Rodriguez or Brady Hoke ever did. That's alarming.
So the question is, what does Michigan have to do to avoid its worst start in almost 70 years?
Run Joe Milton
It looked like Joe Milton was dealing with some sort of hand or thumb issue against Indiana, but to me that's no reason to completely abandon the quarterback run game. He only carried the ball five times in the entire game and I believe only one was by design. That makes no sense even if he is a little dinged up.
Milton is described as an "insane athlete" by one of the other top players on Michigan's roster, so not running him seems like a massive waste of his talents. Even with an inflated 12 carries against Michigan State, he's carrying the ball just 8.3 times per game. That's less than Ohio State's Justin Fields (9 carries per game), Notre Dame's Ian Book (9.3), Miami's D'Eriq King (11.7) and way behind Penn State's Sean Clifford (17.3). The point is, there are different types of quarterbacks all over the country, who are very important to what their respective teams do, carrying it more than Milton, who could and likely would, be very effective as a runner.
Mix Up Defensive Coverages
Michigan got torched by Michigan State's Ricky White, which led Don Brown installing some zone schemes. Early on, Indiana's Ty Fryfogle got off against Michigan's man to man, which led to Brown calling some zone plays. The problem is that the defense wasn't prepared enough to play it against a pretty good Indiana team. When Brown finally started to mix in some zone coverages against the Hoosiers, it was very apparent that the unit hadn't practiced it very much and it proved less effective than the man approach.
It sounds like Brown is still going to utilize mostly man to man, but there's belief around Schembechler Hall that the defense is better prepared to play zone this weekend against Wisconsin than it was against Indiana. That might help, but it might also be too late to ask an old dog to learn new tricks.
Settle On A Running Back
I don't care who it is, but pick one or two guys and run the ball with them. Preferably you just pick one guy, use him much more than any other ball carrier, and let the other guys come in to give the lead back a break. That's the formula in college. This isn't the NFL. You don't need to have four or five running backs carrying the ball four to six times per game.
Only 10 carries separate the leading carrier, Hassan Haskins with 20 carries, and the back with the least amount of carries, Zach Charbonnet with 10. That just doesn't make any sense and it's now how the best rushing teams in the country do it.
When looking at the top ten rushing teams in the country, they basically all have one bell cow and then a committee of guys who get scraps. Air Force's leading rusher has 21 more carries than the next closest guy in just two games. Appalachian State's top back has 70 more carries than the next closest guy. At Virginia Tech it's 35. At Georgia Southern it's 72. Even at Oregon, who has only played one game, already the gap is 14.
Pick a guy, feed him, let him get into a rhythm, get comfortable and settle into the lead role as the main carrier and protector, and let the rest of the backs fill in around him.
Get On The Edge
Michigan has been the faster team against all three of its opponents, but you'd never know it because none of the offensive weapons have been able to showcase it.
When Josh Gattis was hired, all we heard about was "Speed In Space", but we've yet to really see it. There have been flashes, but they've been too few and far between. The very first play of the season against Minnesota was a shining example of what it should look like. A fake zone read to Charbonnet leading to a swing pass out to Corum in SPACE. He put a tiny wiggle on one defender and was off to the races for a 24-yard gain. Michigan has several guys who can do that, but rarely are they put in those kinds of positions.
Where are the jet sweeps? Where are the bubble and tunnel screens? Where are the push passes? Where are the toss sweeps? Where are the keepers on zone reads, referencing back to point No. 1? Where are the true RPOs? Where are the several different types of option plays you could run with these athletes? Where are the misdirection plays? Where are the motion plays where receivers are running at full speed before the snap?
It blows my mind that we've seen such a vanilla approach when Michigan literally has a stable of offensive players tailor made for a wide open offensive system. Corum, Chris Evans, Mike Sainristil, Giles Jackson, Roman Wilson, AJ Henning and Ronnie Bell are all 6-feet or shorter and possess great quicks and run-after-the-catch ability. Give them a chance to embarrass defenders and turn short, routine plays into highlight touchdowns.
Can Michigan beat Wisconsin? Absolutely. The talent is there, Wisconsin hasn't played in two weeks and it's do or die for the Wolverines in Ann Arbor. Will it happen? I don't think it will. I was in disbelief after the Michigan State game and I was duped into thinking the coaches and players would bounce back in a big way and do something different against Indiana. They didn't, and I won't be fooled again.
