Michigan’s 15-6 loss to Michigan State was ugly enough on its own. But the bigger problem for the Wolverines was how many players came out of it looking either energized or completely out of sorts.
There were a few bright spots, starting with John Henry Daley. After missing a couple of games with an injury, he jumped right back in and made his presence felt early.
Daley piled up two sacks in the first half, including a strip sack, and he finished with 7 total tackles. Michigan clearly gets more juice in the pass rush when he’s on the field, and he showed that again here.
Zeke Berry was another player who seemed to bring the right edge. He looked amped up from the start and played with plenty of urgency.
Berry held up well in coverage, came up hard in run support, and finished with 7 tackles. For a cornerback, that’s a strong workload, and he was one of the few Wolverines who looked fully engaged.
Troy Bowles also kept flying around. He was credited with 15 total tackles and added a couple of quarterback hits as a blitzer.
The most talked-about moment involving him was a late-hit call out of bounds, but the replay made that look like a rough break for Bowles, since the Michigan State ball carrier pulled him down by the facemask when he tried to get free. Bowles has been playing well enough this season that he may have an NFL draft decision coming soon.
On the other side of the ledger, Jordan Marshall’s day was baffling. He got the start, but he only carried the ball twice for 4 yards.
There wasn’t an obvious injury explanation, which makes the usage even harder to understand. Marshall has been a captain and a steady leader for this offense, so the way his workload vanished stood out even more.
Tommy Carr had a rough afternoon too. His first pass sailed high, bounced off JJ Buchanan’s hands, and ended up in the hands of a Spartan defensive back for an interception.
That was part of a larger issue, because Carr kept missing high throughout the game. He finished 14 of 26 for 138 yards with 2 interceptions and no touchdowns.
He also ran 7 times for minus-19 yards as Michigan State took away his legs and forced him into a clear step back from the poise he showed a week earlier.
Nathan Efobi struggled badly enough that he was impossible to ignore. He missed multiple blocks at the point of attack, including one on a third-and-1 in the red zone.
On another inside zone play, he didn’t even make an effort to block the defensive tackle, and the result was exactly what you’d expect: Savion Hiter was dragged down for a 1-yard loss, Michigan settled for a field goal try, and the chip shot was missed. It was a sequence that summed up a lot about this offense’s season, and Efobi did not look like a guard who belongs at the Big Ten level for most of the game.
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Michigans MSU Loss Forced A Change Whittingham Couldnt Delay
The loss to Michigan State pushed Michigan football coach Whittingham to make a change he said he could not put off any longer. After reviewing the performance, he dismissed offensive coordinator Jason Beck, the Utah import who had been guiding the offense, and turned the play-calling duties over to offensive line coach Jim Harding on an interim basis.
Whittingham framed the move as a direct response to offensive regression, and he was clear that the decision came from his own evaluation rather than any outside pressure. For a program trying to steady itself after a disappointing showing against its in-state rival, the change signals both urgency and accountability as the Wolverines try to reset on offense. [Read more 🡒]
Michigan Just Hit A New Low And Bigger Changes May Follow
The latest loss only deepened what has become a rough season in Ann Arbor, as Michigan fell to Michigan State 15-6 and kept searching for answers on both sides of the ball. The offense has sputtered for much of the year, the defense has not been able to carry the load often enough, and the result was another reminder that the Wolverines are dealing with more than just a bad night.
Kyle Whittingham has already signaled that bigger roster changes could be coming next year, which adds another layer of uncertainty to a program already staring at a difficult stretch ahead. With ranked opponents still on the schedule and questions hanging over key leadership roles, Michigan is running out of time to stabilize the present while also figuring out what the future should look like. [Read more 🡒]
Michigans Quarterback Debate Is Back At The Worst Time
The quarterback picture at Michigan has shifted again at exactly the wrong moment, with Kyle Whittingham saying the starter for the upcoming game against Oregon is still undecided after the firing of offensive coordinator Jason Beck. Freshman Tommy Carr has opened the last three games, but his most recent outing raised fresh questions after a noticeable dip in performance, while Bryce Underwood remains in the mix because of the athleticism and leadership that made him the previous starter.
Whittingham has been here before with quarterback changes, and he is not tipping his hand this time either. For Michigan, the uncertainty adds another layer to a week already defined by change, with the Ducks looming and the offense still searching for the right answer under center. [Read more 🡒]