By Kyle Golik
What the Big Ten has seen since Michigan’s rebirth during the 2021 season is a familiar blueprint of what we saw Saturday against Southern California. For the Trojans, it was a painful and excruciating introduction to what has made Michigan successful the last three-plus seasons, they dominate on defense, they dominate the trenches, and their ground game shortens the game for the opposition.
If you had told me Michigan would only have 32 yards passing, I would have expected that. I am not sold on either quarterback Michigan has. I feel that Alex Orji complements better what Michigan wants to do versus what Davis Warren brings to the table. But the recipe of success I have seen first hand before.
Last season, when Michigan visited Penn State, I got to see firsthand how Michigan can be quite ineffective through the air and just dominate on the ground. J.J. McCarthy had literally no time to pass, it seemed anytime he would drop back Chop Robinson was already front and center for the Nittany Lions.
What did Penn State in last year is the same thing Southern California could not overcome on Saturday. It was a ground game that suffocated the clocks, while the time of possession was even overall, in the fourth quarter it was the perfectly executed four-minute drive that the Wolverines took the lead on that gave the Trojans very little time to attempt a comeback.
“We talk a lot about situational football, Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore said during postgame. “When you have four minutes on the clock, there’s no need to be in a hurry, especially when you’re trying to keep the ball and possess the ball. So there was a lot of situational football there.”
It is no secret the Wolverines have prided themselves as a run-first team. Between the 2021 and 2023 seasons, Michigan averaged 207.5 yards per game on the ground. This season, Michigan is averaging 204.8. Moore does’t mind their identity being a run first-team either. Postgame, he said the following:
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“I think it was a pretty good sense to who we want to be and what we want to do. Obviously, we have to have different things to help us in wrinkles and games, because people are going to adjust. But I think our guys did an unbelievable job of just going and executing the plan to go win the game.”
What is fueling the ground game is redshirt senior running back Kalel Mullings, who has been the true heir apparent to Blake Corum. A season ago, Corum averaged nearly five yards a carry and had a school-record 27 rushing touchdowns. This season Mullings is proving to be a worthy successor averaging 8.1 yards per carry this season.
“I think he’s averaging like eight point yards of carry on the season. He could take it the distance, he’s shown. He can run you over. He’s just done everything for us. He’s a great pass protector,” Moore said of Mullings, “He’s been incredible. Last year, he averaged six yards a carry. So it’s not a surprise of how good he is and what he’s done. To see him take the next steps and really make those explosive plays and when the game’s on the line, he wants the ball in his hands and he made plays happen. So, yeah, I mean, he’s a star. He’s a game breaker.”
Defensively, Michigan was full of game breakers that kept the potent Southern California offense in check.
Michigan dominated in the trenches, and to me, this is where the game was won by the Wolverines and lost by the Trojans. The Wolverine defense hit Trojan quarterback Miller Moss 10 times and sacked him four times.
One of the Wolverines impact defenders who played a great game was outside linebacker Josiah Stewart. Stewart filled his stat sheet with four quarterback hits, three tackles for loss, two sacks, and a forced fumble. Stewart was such a problem for Southern California, the Trojans had to move starting right tackle Mason Murphy over to replace Elijah Paige who struggled with the pass rush coming off the edge.
“I thought Coach Wink Martindale did an outstanding job — gave him game ball in the locker room — with the mix of coverage, with the mix of blitz, the mix of looks, twists, games, all types of things that kept that guy guessing, kept seven guessing, because Miller Moss is a good player. And we hit him a lot. And those guys took a lot of pride in the four-man rushes and the guys in coverage. It was a great job, great gameplan by the defense and proud of them,” Moore said of the defensive game plan the Wolverines employed to slow the Trojans potent offense.
If any player on defense stood out, it was arguably Michigan’s best in cornerback Will Johnson. Johnson has a claim of being the best in college football and he displayed his reasons on the pick-six of Moss. Johnson seemed to bait Moss on the play. Johnson played back in what Moss perceived was zone, but Johnson’s closing speed shocked the Trojans and something Moore said Martindale predicted, “Two drives before that, Wink’s like, ‘He’s going to get one. They’re going to test him. He’s going to get one. And all I saw was Will like a missile — shoot it, pick it off, and I knew it was gone.”
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Johnson had left the game in the second half, Moore confirmed that Johnson could have returned but he was held.
Overall, the demise of Michigan has been exaggerated, including by yours truly. The blueprint Michigan builds its success on is still executing on high cylinders. All roads are still open for a fourth consecutive trip to Indianapolis. The path for a fourth consecutive College Football Playoff berth is obtainable if the Wolverines take care of business against who they should and split the Oregon and Ohio State games. There isn’t a mystery moving forward of what this Michigan team is going to do, the blueprint has been the same as years past and will be moving forward.
