Michigan Football: Starting O-line, secondary revealed as spring closes

Michigan football will hold its spring game on Saturday and in interviews with reporters, players revealed who the starters are in the secondary and O-line.

It’s never easy to learn what’s happening behind the scenes with the Michigan football team, such as what’s going on during spring practices.

The Wolverines keep their practice sessions closed to the media and even Michigan football’s spring game on Saturday is closed to the public.

Jim Harbaugh also isn’t known for saying much. His assistant coaches have revealed some things this offseason such as when Josh Gattis called Zak Zinter the Wolverines best offensive lineman.

On Thursday, we did get a glimpse of an impressive throw by five-star freshman quarterback J.J. McCarthy but that’s been among the only video seen from practice this spring.

Yet, on Friday, as players met with the media leading up to the spring game, we got an idea of what the starting offensive line looks like right now, as well as the secondary.

Ryan Hayes was speaking with the media. Hayes has started some games at left tackle and played well and he’s holding down that position right now. Starting next to him is Trevor Keegan at guard, Andrew Vastardis at center, Zak Zinter at guard, and Andrew Stueber at right tackle.

Obviously, things move around and it’s still very early in the process but that starting line makes a lot of sense to me. Zinter has been a stud and if Stueber is healthy, he can be a solid right tackle.

Vastardis is going to be a guy to watch. He’s a sixth-year senior and wasn’t all that impressive a year ago. We’ll see how that plays out. I also wouldn’t be surprised to see Karsen Barnhart in the mix and possibly Willie Allen, the grad transfer from Louisiana Tech could be in the mix too.

Where things stand in the secondary

Michigan cornerback Gemon Green also spoke to the media on Friday and talked about the guys playing the most with the first unit in the secondary.

At corner, along with Green is DJ Turner and Vincent Gray. At safety, Green listed Daxton Hill, RJ Moten, and Brad Hawkins.

If those names seem familiar, it’s because they are the same guys essentially who manned the secondary last season, with the addition of Moten at safety.

It will be interesting to see how much the new staff uses Hill as a cover guy because even though his position is listed as a safety, he’s Michigan’s best corner.