With Michigan's 63-10 curb-stomping of NIU over the weekend, Michigan moves to 3-0 and creeps into the top 25. Michigan faces a 3-0 Rutgers team at home next week before heading to Wisco. Rutgers has wins over Temple, Cuse, and Delaware, so they're probably not that good, but it's still a step up in competition. If Michigan takes care of Rutger, Wisco will be a real test.
Starting with the micro, the run game looks potentially elite, the pass game is...existent, and the D looks to be learning on the job quickly. The RBs are far and away the biggest strength of the team and Corum fulfills the prophecy of 'Mike Hart, but fast'. What an incredible player. And to have Haskins there to use 15 additional touches well just means JH/Gattis can protect this OL by keeping them in running plays. The OL doesn't have the crazy good athletes of years past, but the weakest link is potentially stronger than years past. All 5 (sometimes 6) OL know what they're supposed to be doing and they're doing it well. The WR corps is still smarting from the loss of Bell (goddamn he looked good in the handful of touches we got to see SMH) but Cornelius looks very good, and hopefully a bona fide #2 and #3 emerge from the Baldwin, Henning, Sainrisill, Wilson group. The TEs are good blockers and hopefully All can lose the case of the dropsies from last year. Cade looks OK in the 2 non-Washington games. He has better deep ball accuracy than Shea did and that might be enough to keep this offense moving.
On D, it starts with Hutch and Dax. Hutch has been killing it, and he immediately ruins half the field on every play. Dax has found a role worthy of his athleticism as the slot/nickel CB/Viper S. He basically does everything needed of him. The NTs/DTs look OK, with Hinton and Smith leading the way, but surprisingly with some players behind them getting real snaps. The LBs are being asked to do a lot. Sometimes they're up for it, and sometimes they're not. The paper thin secondary looks much more comfortable now that they're working out of both man and zone instead of man exclusively.
Big picture, the only real test thus far was supposed to be Washington, but they didn't hold up their end of the bargain. Nevertheless, 3-0 is 3-0 and none of these outcomes were in doubt. Rutgers likely wont put up much of a challenge but hopefully they're organized and talented enough to make Michigan work, which they haven't really done yet. I still think @Wisco, @PSU, and OSU are losses, but IU is looking surprisingly bad, so that's nice. @MSU and @Maryland are tossups. Going into the year, I think 8-4/7-5 was where this would land (leaning more towards 7-5), but now I'd say it's 8-4/9-3. If the team can't pickup 1-2 wins from Wisco, MSU, PSU, MD, OSU then that will suck.
Has to be said that the coaching has just been eons better than the last couple of seasons. The D is actually multiple and disguising concepts and the O looks alright.
Starting with the micro, the run game looks potentially elite, the pass game is...existent, and the D looks to be learning on the job quickly. The RBs are far and away the biggest strength of the team and Corum fulfills the prophecy of 'Mike Hart, but fast'. What an incredible player. And to have Haskins there to use 15 additional touches well just means JH/Gattis can protect this OL by keeping them in running plays. The OL doesn't have the crazy good athletes of years past, but the weakest link is potentially stronger than years past. All 5 (sometimes 6) OL know what they're supposed to be doing and they're doing it well. The WR corps is still smarting from the loss of Bell (goddamn he looked good in the handful of touches we got to see SMH) but Cornelius looks very good, and hopefully a bona fide #2 and #3 emerge from the Baldwin, Henning, Sainrisill, Wilson group. The TEs are good blockers and hopefully All can lose the case of the dropsies from last year. Cade looks OK in the 2 non-Washington games. He has better deep ball accuracy than Shea did and that might be enough to keep this offense moving.
On D, it starts with Hutch and Dax. Hutch has been killing it, and he immediately ruins half the field on every play. Dax has found a role worthy of his athleticism as the slot/nickel CB/Viper S. He basically does everything needed of him. The NTs/DTs look OK, with Hinton and Smith leading the way, but surprisingly with some players behind them getting real snaps. The LBs are being asked to do a lot. Sometimes they're up for it, and sometimes they're not. The paper thin secondary looks much more comfortable now that they're working out of both man and zone instead of man exclusively.
Big picture, the only real test thus far was supposed to be Washington, but they didn't hold up their end of the bargain. Nevertheless, 3-0 is 3-0 and none of these outcomes were in doubt. Rutgers likely wont put up much of a challenge but hopefully they're organized and talented enough to make Michigan work, which they haven't really done yet. I still think @Wisco, @PSU, and OSU are losses, but IU is looking surprisingly bad, so that's nice. @MSU and @Maryland are tossups. Going into the year, I think 8-4/7-5 was where this would land (leaning more towards 7-5), but now I'd say it's 8-4/9-3. If the team can't pickup 1-2 wins from Wisco, MSU, PSU, MD, OSU then that will suck.
Has to be said that the coaching has just been eons better than the last couple of seasons. The D is actually multiple and disguising concepts and the O looks alright.