Michigan Football: 3 takeaways from Penn State heartbreaker

Michigan’s Miscues

All three facets of the team had issues last night. Penalties, dropped passes, wrong coverage schemes and plain bad decisions.

Even with all those issues Michigan football still had a shot to win in Beaver Stadium. It almost proved it could overcome itself and come out on top. That should be a positive when peeking at what lies ahead of this program.

The biggest miscue of them all was letting Hamler get loose. If not for a holding call, Hamler would have had a third score with a kick return in the third quarter. He single-handedly put Penn State’s offense on his back and carried them to victory. Harbaugh even admitted in the post press conference that his defense was lined up wrong and wanted to call a timeout on Penn State’s final scoring play. Hamler was a Michigan killer, the likes of Saquan Barkley was two years ago.

Ronnie Bell’s dropped touchdown pass was the other key to the outcome of the game. Bell has had these issues all season long and it bit him in the behind in the most important spot of this one. All he can do now is learn from it and work tirelessly to make up for it. Fortunately, Bell has what it takes to do so given the opportunities upcoming.