What Michigan's offense might look like under Kyle Whittingham and Jason Beck

Following the hiring of Kyle Whittingham to be Michigan's next Head Football Coach, it was released shortly afterwards that his former Offensive Coordinator at Utah, Jason Beck, is a 'top target' to join his new staff at Michigan in the same role. Beck was only at Utah for one season as Offensive Coordinator, but his offense was both efficient and prolific this year at Utah. Utah ranked 6th nationally in yards per game, 4th nationally in rushing yards, and 5th nationally in points per game. Let's dive into what Michigan fans can expect this offense to look like below.

Offensive Scheme and Personnel Groupings

The system as a whole is predicated on being a physical and an imposing rushing attack that also has modern answers for when teams try to stack the box with RPO's to make it more QB friendly. Beck's offensive system could be described as a blend of the pro-style, west coast type stuff you see a lot in the NFL combined with the more modern college type spread stuff you see a lot on Saturday's. There are a decent amount of RPO's built into it to make it a QB friendly offense and he likes to use the QB run game as well. He also likes to use motion to set up leverage for his players and create disadvantages for the defense.

As far as personnel groupings go, Jason Beck's offense last season at Utah featured a lot of 12(1 back, 2 tight ends), 21(2 backs, 1 tight end), and 11(1 back, one tight end, 3 three wide receivers) personnel groupings. It will look a lot like what Michigan has done recently under both Jim Harbaugh and Sherrone Moore as far as personnel goes with a heavy tight end usage and a stable of good running backs. Overall it's a versatile scheme that is designed to control the line of scrimmage with the run game and make life easy on the quarterback as well.

Dominant Rushing Game

Jason Beck's offenses so far in his career show a large emphasis on having a dominant run game. This year Utah was 2nd nationally in rushing yards per game and also averaged 6.1 yards per carry as a team with 37 rushing TD's. All of these numbers point to the elite rushing attack Utah had in 2025 that was one of the tops in the country.

Utah's run game was difficult to stop because they had a good offensive line and utilized a mixture of zone and power concepts. They also used the QB run game to keep defenses honest and make the most out of their rushing efficiency. Utah had a truly dominant rushing attack in 2025 and I expect that to translate to Michigan 's offense in 2026 under these same coaches.

Quarterback Success

Last year at Utah, Jason Beck helped Devon Dampier to have his best season of his career thus far. Dampier played sparingly as a Freshman at New Mexico and then as a Sophomore with Jason Beck taking over as his Offensive Coordinator, he completed 57.9% of his passes for 2,768 yards with 22 TD's and 12 INT's. Then both of them moved to Utah for the 2025 season, where Dampier completed 63.7% of his passes for 2,180 yards with 22 TD's and 5 INT's despite not making it through the whole season healthy and playing against better competition in the Big Twelve.

In their second season as a QB and OC pairing, Dampier's statistics looked much better and more efficient overall which points to positive growth and QB development under Jason Beck's offensive leadership. Beck also wasn't afraid to feature Dampier's legs in the run game. In 2024 at New Mexico, Dampier ran for 1,166 yards with 19 rushing TD's. In 2025 he didn't run as much at Utah because he missed some time due to injury but he still ran for 687 yards and 7 TD's on the ground.

With how Jason Beck utilized Devon Dampier's versatile skill set at both New Mexico and Utah, I expect him to do similar things in Ann Arbor with an ultra talented quarterback in Bryce Underwood. Underwood is a bigger, more talented version of Devon Dampier and with Jason Beck's scheme and coaching, I expect him to have a much better Sophomore season in Ann Arbor than what he did during his true Freshman season as Michigan's Starting quarterback.

How Jason Beck's Offense Might Look at Michigan

With the work Jason Beck has done with Devon Dampier at both New Mexico and Utah, his offensive system has shown itself to be include both a dominant run game as well as being quarterback friendly. Overall, I expect it to look a lot like it did at Utah in 2025. He will use the 12, 21, and 11 personnel groupings primarily with a lot of shotgun plays as well as some under center plays.

It might end up being the perfect offensive system for Michigan's roster in 2026 if he can convince players like Bryce Underwood, Jordan Marshall, Savion Hiter, Andrew Marsh, and the young core of offensive lineman to stay put and play for him in Ann Arbor in 2026 and beyond. Having coached at New Mexico and Utah these last two seasons, Beck has never had this much talent at his disposal and it'll be very interesting to see what he can accomplish with all of the talent he'll have next season. Michigan fans should be very excited of the potential of this offense under the leadership of Kyle Whittingham and Jason Beck in 2026.

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