Michigan football: Everything you need to know about Rutgers

Watch out for Fogg

In spite of the fear of sounding pretentious, I am going to quote a famous writer.

The great novelist, Charles Dickens, when describing London in his book Bleak House, wrote, “Fog everywhere. Fog up the river, where it flows among green aits and meadows; fog down the river, where it rolls deified among the tiers of shipping and the waterside pollutions of a great (and dirty) city.”

Fog is what you are going to get from the Scarlett Knight defense, only a different type of fog. The fog that rolls in from New Jersey is team captain Tyshon Fogg. The 240-pound junior linebacker is the teams leading tackler, accounting for 38 tackles so far, a dozen more than the man behind him.

Fogg relies on a combination of his intellect and brute force to disrupt each play. His intelligence, however, is what has been most recognized to date. Tyshon was named to the 2018 Academic All-Big Ten and is a 2019 Big Ten Distinguished Scholar.

A familiar name will also make an appearance at linebacker for the Scarlett Knights. Michigan transfer Drew Singleton – a top 100 football player from the 2017 class – has 13 tackles this year for Rutgers.

Overall, the defense gives up an average of 175 yards passing, and 216 yards on the ground. They allow a few extra yards rushing with an undersized defensive line but the Knights are very skilled at pass defense. In fact, they haven’t allowed over 250 yards through the air this season. Even with the hard loss to Boston College, the secondary surrendered just 159 yards passing, a season-low for the Eagles.

Led by senior defensive back Damon Hayes, this secondary is going to cause offensive coordinator Josh Gattis some headaches.