Michigan left Piscataway with a win, but the way it got there said plenty about where this team is right now. The Wolverines survived Rutgers in a game that stayed far too tight for comfort, and the most revealing part wasn’t the final score. It was how familiar the problems looked.
The run game is still a drag on everything else Michigan tries to do. On paper, 161 rushing yards and 427 total yards can pass for a decent afternoon.
But that number doesn’t tell the real story. Rutgers came in with one of the worst rush defenses in college football, giving up 199.1 yards per game and 5.83 yards per carry, and Michigan still managed only 3.6 yards per rush on 45 attempts.
That was the worst efficiency Rutgers had allowed all season, even worse than what Boston College, UMass, and Howard put up.
The play-calling didn’t help, with the delayed handoff that never works, the outside run, and a complete lack of identity on the ground. But the bigger issue is that the offensive line has been injured, underperformed, and left the quarterback having to play Superman on plays like this:
Rutgers’ defense was bad enough that Michigan should have been able to lean on it without needing heroics. Instead, the offense kept showing just how far it has fallen.
And yet the defense almost made it all irrelevant. Michigan’s margin for error on that side of the ball is tiny, and this game showed it again.
Rutgers completed only three passes all day, and none after halftime. For the second straight week, Michigan’s opponent failed to complete a pass in the second half.
That should usually be enough to put a game away in a hurry.
It wasn’t here. The Wolverines allowed just 249 yards on 38 Rutgers possessions, and 134 of those yards came on two plays.
The defense did enough to win comfortably. The rest of the team didn’t hold up its end.
Michigan failed to finish drives, Trey Butkowski missed two more kicks, and the game came down to a fourth-quarter drive in a matchup that should never have been this close.
That’s the uncomfortable part: this team can’t just be solid on defense and expect the rest to sort itself out. In its current form, Michigan needs the defense to be close to perfect. Against better opponents, that is not a sustainable formula.
The postgame comments only added to the unease. For the second week in a row, Kyle Whittingham sounded like a coach trying to explain away results that don’t really add up.
After the loss to Indiana, he said, “We’re two or three plays away from 6-1 or 7-0”. This time, when asked why the Rutgers win wasn’t more convincing, he said:
“It would have been nice if it were easier. But we’ve had one game all year that has not been a one-score game.
So, more of the same. I don’t have a great answer.”
Put those two quotes together, and the message gets harder to ignore. Close games can be chalked up to a few breaks going the wrong way once or twice. But when the same team keeps failing to separate from Western Michigan, Penn State, and Rutgers, it starts to look less like bad luck and more like who this group is.
Right now, “we play close games” feels like the identity. And the bigger question hanging over Whittingham and his staff is where the line is for acceptable results. The standard set by the program’s recent past would suggest it should be a lot higher than barely escaping a struggling 2-6 Rutgers team.
In Other News...
Michigan AD Search Just Got More Serious For Two Major Programs
Michigans search for its next athletic director is no longer a quiet background project. The university has brought in TurnkeyZRG to help replace outgoing Director of Athletics Warde Manuel, and the firms involvement gives the process a more formal, high-stakes feel as the school works toward a decision that will shape the departments next era. The search began on Oct. 1, 2026, and the eventual hire will be made by the university president and Board of Regents.
The timing matters because the new AD will inherit two of the schools most visible programs at a moment when both football and basketball are under plenty of scrutiny. Michigans coaching contracts already include performance benchmarks, so the next athletic director will not just be managing budgets and facilities, but also overseeing expectations that are built into the job. For a department with championship-level ambitions, this is the kind of hire that can ripple well beyond one office. [Read more 🡒]
Michigans Defensive Standout In Rutgers Win Might Surprise Wolverines Fans
Michigans defense steadied itself after halftime in the 28-21 win over Rutgers, and the turnaround showed up in the kind of details that usually get coaches talking. The Scarlet Knights were held in check after the break, with Michigan preventing a completed pass in the second half while the front seven did much of the heavy lifting against the run and in the pocket.
Pro Football Focus grades pointed to an unexpected trio at the top of the defensive report card, with linebacker Chase Taylor and defensive tackles Jonah La'ea and Enow Etta drawing the best marks for their work in run defense, tackling and pass rushing. Michigan finished with 14 total quarterback pressures, a sign the pressure was there even if some secondary issues in coverage still need cleaning up. [Read more 🡒]
Michigan Faces A New Hurdle In Its 2028 Quarterback Chase
Michigans quarterback board for the 2028 cycle took a hit with Levi Kerr choosing North Carolina, a development that stings because the Wolverines had been viewed as one of the schools most likely to land him after bringing him in for a game visit. The four-star passer from Waxhaw, North Carolina, had been a name to watch for Michigan as it kept building out its future recruiting picture at the games most important position.
The good news for Michigan is that the chase is far from over. Five-star quarterback Jayden Wade remains committed to Georgia, but he has continued to speak positively about Michigans program, keeping the Wolverines in the mix as they look for another high-end target to anchor the class. [Read more 🡒]