Michigan Football: Why it’s not as bad as you think
Michigan football nearly escaped defeat in a hard-fought battle against the Army Black Knight’s. Should Wolverine fans begin to worry?
Fans should not begin to worry about the 2019 Michigan football team.
The team has come out in back-to-back weeks sluggish and unimpressive overall; although, there are many bright spots present during the two otherwise gloomy Saturdays.
In the inaugural game against Middle Tennessee State, the mistakes looked more like experiments on the offensive end and the defensive performance was above average considering all of the losses in the offseason.
It wasn’t until the second game when the panic started setting in.
Watching this game offensively, it was reminiscent of last year, only worse. Justified criticism contributed to the hiring of Josh Gattis, but the promise of a “speed in space” offense was nowhere to be seen against the Black Knights. Although Shea Patterson was 19/29 and Ronnie Bell had a decent day with seven receptions for 81 yards, Tarik Black only went 3 for 24 and Nico Collins 2 for 32. As much as we were running the ball, there should have been some opportunities downfield, but we had zero passing TDs.
The problem appeared to be pass protection which became more apparent with Patterson being sacked four times and losing two fumbles – the second fumble commonly attributed to Christian Turner‘s missed protection assignment that seemed to relegate him to the sideline. Also, the offensive line play appeared to regress from last week.
The rushing attack was one-dimensional and anemic. Zach Charbonnet managed 100 yards, but it took him 33 carries. Overall, UM only gained 108 yards on 45 attempts, for an awful 2.4 average yards-per-rush. There was a total absence of the zone-read option, which leads to the question of whether they were attempting to protect Shea. Perhaps he was dinged up worse than we were told last week against Middle Tennessee. Although it’s difficult to blame the playcalling on injury considering backup quarterback, Dylan McCaffrey, hardly saw the field, with zero rushing attempts and 0/1 passing.
Out of all the problems with the play calling and scheme, after two games, the absence of a dependable short-yardage package stands out. Last week the offense got stuffed on 4th down near the goal line, but Ben VanSumeren managed to score on a second short-yardage situation. Ben – much like the offense line- regressed Saturday as he coughed the ball up on one of the three lost fumbles. In the 4th quarter, failure reared its ugly head again in two short-yardage situations deep in Army territory. The inability to convert on fourth and short provided Army the opportunity to win in regulation, only to give life to the Wolverines by a missed field goal.