Michigan Football: 3 Keys for Wolverines against Wisconsin

1. Create pressure on the quarterback

The Wolverines cornerbacks have been bad. That is not something that can be questioned. They need help, better coaching, or both. Whatever it is, probably is not going to all of sudden be fixed by Saturday night.

What might be more surprising is the complete lack of pressure Michigan’s defense has got on the quarterback the last two games. They got pressure on Tanner Morgan of Minnesota in the first game and he didn’t pick them apart. The corners looked respectable in that game, but they didn’t have time to get picked on.

Michigan is now down one of their best defensive lineman in Aidan Hutchinson, so it makes getting pressure even more difficult, but they still need to find a way. Whether you like Don Brown’s defense or not, one thing was always true, he got pressure on the quarterback. He liked to blitz and create havoc in the backfield.

For some reason, though, we haven’t seen that much this year. Look a good quarterback can beat blitzes, but it can still be effective. Even if you don’t get to the quarterback, it can make them antsy and get happy feet. Just look at what happened to Joe Milton against Michigan State.

Deep routes are successful because the quarterback has time to wait. Michigan needs to combat that by getting pressure on the quarterback. Whether the Wolverines blitz more or find another way, they must do it if they want to win.

Help out your corners by not giving the quarterback time to throw the deep ball. That is the weakness of the defense right now, so don’t give them time to exploit it. Make them dump the ball off and tackle in the open field.

If Michigan can create pressure they have a good shot at winning this game, but if they continue to let the quarterback sit in the pocket they are going to get burned yet again.