Michigan’s defense was looking forward to a bigger test than Rutgers was likely to provide, and K.J. Duff was the matchup that had its attention. That challenge may never materialize.
Duff was listed as doubtful Wednesday night with an undisclosed injury, and that status remained the same Thursday evening. On top of that, Rutgers confirmed quarterback Dylan Lonergan is out for Saturday’s game, leaving the Scarlet Knights to turn to either A.J Surace or Sean Ashenfelder under center.
For a Michigan defense that has spent the season doing the heavy lifting while its offense has struggled, Duff represented the kind of individual matchup that can still sharpen a group. Safeties coach Tyler Stockton made that plain Wednesday.
“We just went from playing two first rounders to playing one first rounder,” Stockton said Wednesday. “If that don’t motivate you from a DB standpoint, a corner standpoint, and safety standpoint, I don’t know what does.”
But the injury report changed the equation. Instead of getting a chance to line up against one of the country’s most dangerous receivers, Michigan may be left without that extra edge altogether.
Duff has been a load all season. At 6-foot-6 and 225 pounds, he’s the kind of target defenses have to scheme around, and the production backs it up: ninth nationally with 774 receiving yards and nine touchdowns. Michigan’s secondary, which doesn’t have a defender taller than 6-foot-2, had reason to be interested in the matchup.
Stockton even sketched out the approach.
“Go ask the basketball coaches to have their guys high point the ball and see if we can get it,” Stockton said. “Really, it’s going to be an unbelievable challenge for us.
I mean, obviously he’s 6-foot-6 plus, and we just got to do a great job at winning those high-point balls because whether it’s single team, double team, triple team, they trust him, and I would trust him too. So we got to do a great job of tracking the ball in the air and understanding that we have to be able to jump before he does.”
If Duff does suit up, the quarterback situation would still make life harder on him. Last week against Northwestern, he was targeted nine times but came away with only three catches for 33 yards, both season lows. That came with Surace and Ashenfelder splitting snaps, and Rutgers is expected to keep using both if Duff is available Saturday.
Michigan’s defense has already shown a tendency to rise with the moment. It did it in the 17-10 win over Oklahoma in Week 2, and again last week when it held Nick Marsh and Charlie Becker to 57 combined yards in the loss to then-No.
6 Indiana, their lowest combined total all season by a wide margin. This matchup had the look of another chance to do the same.
Instead, the Wolverines may catch a break in Piscataway on Halloween.
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