The good and the bad from Michigan's 34-17 Week 1 win over New Mexico

Michigan football faced a steeper test than what many expected on Saturday night in the Wolverines' opener against New Mexico against a scrappy Lobos team, but still came away with a comfortable 34-17 victory under the lights at the Big House.

Certainly, there were areas head coach Sherrone Moore's team played well in, along with areas the team needs to clean up before next week's matchup at Oklahoma.

Let's break down the good and the bad from the game:

The Good

Bryce Underwood's debut

Even though Michigan quarterback Bryce Underwood is used to pressure as he has had a spotlight on him throughout his high school career, it's still always interesting to see how a true freshman reacts in their first college start. Overall, Underwood's performance was a success, despite the Belleville (Mich.) product only grading himself a C+ in his postgame interview.

Underwood largely made good reads and decisions on his way to completing 21 of his 31 pass attempts for 251 yards and a touchdown. When there was a bit of game pressure on after the Lobos cut the Michigan lead to 17-10 with under five minutes remaining in the second quarter, Underwood stepped up and delivered his biggest throw of the game on a 3rd-and-14 play, finding Channing Goodwin in stride over the middle for a 39-yard gain.

The Wolverines ended up scoring later in the drive on an Underwood pass to tight end Marlin Klein to give them some breathing room at 24-10 going into halftime. Underwood's poise to deliver a great ball to Goodwin in a high leverage situation at the time was a good early sign for the Michigan offense, and the true freshman leading the offense to a score in his first two-minute drill at the college level was a major positive.

Maybe most importantly, Underwood didn't turn the ball over and only put the ball in harm's way on a couple of occasions at most. He did miss throws here and there at points in the game where he could have delivered better passes or missed a read, but he will hone in on that with more repetition.

Underwood's 251 passing yards was more than any Michigan QB threw for in a game in all of 2024, so Michigan being able to move the ball effectively through the air like they did last night has to be a welcome sight for the Maize and Blue faithful.

Rushing attack finds explosive plays

The Michigan backfield had been advertised as a strength again heading into the 2025 season with the addition of Alabama transfer Justice Haynes and the expected emergence of sophomore Jordan Marshall. On Saturday, that narrative came to fruition as the Wolverines rushed for 201 yards on the ground and three touchdowns, with all of the scores coming via Haynes.

Haynes was the one with the hot hand on Saturday night, although it wouldn't surprise many if there were games where Marshall emerges as the back with more yards and carries depending on how each game is going. Haynes electrified the crowd of over 110,000 when he took the top of the defense with a 56-yard touchdown run off the right side on Michigan's opening drive. Then, in the fourth quarter, Haynes broke another run of 50-plus, this time for 59 yards, on a play up the middle where he was brought down at the 1-yard line. He got in the endzone on the next play from a yard out.

For Underwood to fully thrive, he will need the support of the running games to give the offense balance and that certainly was the case against the Lobos.

Defense comes up with key turnovers

Early in the game, the Wolverines were humming on both sides of the ball. After going up 14-0, the Michigan defense made a big play with 10:22 left in the second quarter when EDGE TJ Guy plucked a pass out of the air that New Mexico quarterback Jack Layne threw off a helmet on first down. The play from Guy was a brilliant display of athleticism and concentration and gave the Wolverines the ball at the Lobos 29.

Unfortunately for Michigan, the offense could only turn that into a field goal, but the Wolverines' forcing turnovers in key moments was one of the themes of the night for the unit.

Early in the fourth quarter, when New Mexico was still hanging around at 27-17, safety Brandyn Hillman came up with an interception on a 4th down play when the Lobos decided to go for it on 4th-and-9 from their own 42 down 10 points. Although it probably would have been more ideal for Hillman to bat the ball down in retrospect to give the Wolverines' better field position, it was still a key play that largely took away any hope the Lobos had for a comeback, upset victory as Michigan's offense scored the very next drive to put the game away.

The Wolverines came up with three interceptions on the night and won the turnover battle 3-1, which is always a key ingredient to winning a football game.

The Bad

Wink Martindale's defense will have to tighten things up a bit

It's difficult to categorize Michigan's defensive performance in the "bad" category as it was certainly not that. Along with the three takeaways, the Wolverines also generated three sacks and definitely kept the Lobos behind the sticks a fair amount while playing solid defense in the redzone.

However, there were some route concepts that the secondary seemed to struggle with, particularly on plays where the Lobos would send a receiver up the field vertically and bring another underneath in the spot that was initially vacated. There were several instances New Mexico was able to gain some chunk yards and pick up some first downs on those types of plays. Whether that was a communication or schematic issue is hard to say, but the Wolverines had to have known Layne wanted to get the ball out quickly to not have to deal with the Michigan pass rush, which he was able to do rather often, to his credit.

First-year head coach Jason Eck helped orchestrate a brilliant offense at Idaho and is bringing those same concepts to the Lobos, so he has to be given credit for scheming some plays open, along with pulling out some trick plays as well, particularly one they scored on in the first half to cut the score to 17-7.

New Mexico snaps it BETWEEN THE QBs LEGS and it leads to a TD. 🤯

📺 NBC and Peacock pic.twitter.com/PF4Wo88ZNS
— NBC Sports (@NBCSports) August 31, 2025

It also must be noted that the coaching staff was rotating a number of players on all levels on defense, especially late in the game. The Wolverines have been keen on doing that to not only keep players fresh, but to try to develop all of their players and get them valuable game reps. However, doing that can cause various issues in communication along with missed assignments from players who may be more inexperienced.

With that being said, the overall performance from Martindale's unit needs to be taken with a grain of salt. At the same time, they are capable of dominance and need to find that next level against the Sooners next weekend.

Special Teams

Special teams don't often win games on its own, but poor special teams play can play a part in losing a game. And the mistakes the Wolverines made on special teams on Saturday night simply cannot happen when the stakes get raised.

First, in the game's opening five minutes, Semaj Morgan—who had a solid game at wide receiver with four catches and 33 yards, muffed a punt on a ball that kicked way over his head as he tried to make an over the shoulder grab. Luckily for the Wolverines, they recovered and maintained possession of the ball, but it was nearly a costly error that would have given New Mexico life early on. Following that, Morgan looked hesitant to come up and catch a couple of punts out of the air and instead let them bounce, which cost the Wolverines some field position.

Halfway through the second quarter, another error on special teams occurred as true freshman Andrew Marsh decided to return a kick four yards deep in Michigan's own endzone. He ended up getting to the 25 and fumbling the ball, with New Mexico this time jumping on it. The error turned into just three points for the Lobos on the next series,

Being where Marsh fielded the kick, the decision there should probably be to take a knee and start with the ball at the 25 from an analytical standpoint. At the same time, Marsh is a true freshman and was probably antsy to make a play in his first college football game.

For Michigan, hopefully they got the special teams errors out of the way in Week 1 as those types of errors could be costly in what is expected to be a close battle in Oklahoma.

Aug 30, 2025; Ann Arbor, Michigan, USA; Michigan Wolverines wide receiver Semaj Morgan (0) runs the ball in the first half against the New Mexico Lobos at Michigan Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Rick Osentoski-Imagn Images | Rick Osentoski-Imagn Images