Khaleke Hudson (image via MLive)
Let’s see more of this guy on offense . . . Christian Turner. Turner (10 carries for 55 yards) made his college debut and looked pretty good doing it. He’s very small right now and needs to keep adding weight to his body in the coming off-season, but he showed some decent quickness and toughness. If Chris Evans needs to miss more time with his hamstring injury, it would be nice to see Turner get some snaps behind Karan Higdon and Tru Wilson.
Hit the jump for the rest of the awards.
Let’s see less of this guy on offense . . . nobody. It was a blowout. Let’s see everyone.
Let’s see more of this guy on defense . . . Khaleke Hudson. He missed the second half of last week and the first half of Nebraska because he targeted SMU quarterback William Brown. Then he entered the Nebraska game and promptly targeted Nebraska’s walk-on backup QB, which means he’ll miss the first half of next week’s Northwestern game. He needs to take the next week and learn how to tackle legally.
Let’s see less of this guy defense . . . Jordan Glasgow. You know, once Khaleke Hudson learns how to stop targeting.
Play of the game . . . Donovan Peoples-Jones’s punt return touchdown.
Donovan Peoples-Jones hit the ⭕️ button.
Punt return for a Michigan TD. pic.twitter.com/drWmnaSkU6
— Brad Galli (@BradGalli) September 22, 2018
MVP of the game . . . Devin Bush, Jr. Bush had decent stats (6 tackles, 2 tackles for loss, 1 sack) but they weren’t spectacular. It was the attitude of the plays he made that made the difference. He was all over the field and shut down a couple option plays with his speed and change-of-direction ability. With Michigan’s offense clicking and Bush (and other defenders) playing at such a high level, it’s no wonder that Nebraska quit pretty early on in this game.
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How much of the tackling issue is due to speed? That is, just going too fast to the ball leading to a loss of control? Is there a correlation there, or can speed and technique co-exist?
I ask this because it felt (to me) that Bush had some similar issues last year with maybe being a bit too aggressive and being flagged (or not) for some possible targeting calls. Hopefully, this is something Hudson can get past quickly.
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Hudson has always tackled high. The targeting calls, while frustrating, are something he could mitigate
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Couple of things
1. This was a solid coaching effort for the staff. There have been some games where it looked like they failed to game plan against an opposing team because they simply thought they could exert their will on them. This effort looked like they studied film, figured out some tendencies and mixed things up just a little bit.
2. While this is a poor Nebraska team and this will be a couple of year project for Scott Frost, our offensive line has seemed to improve each week. This is something we have not always seen the last few years. Ed Warinner is earning his paycheck so far. Let’s hope that this keeps building confidence in them.
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I like that when looking to acknowledge the play of the game you have choices (plural) on both offense and defense. Hell, even McCaffrey’s cool and his long run (if it didn’t get called back) or him lowering his shoulder made me punch the sky. We have a backup QB!
I am a proponent of using Mason in short yardage situations and lining him up as a sole deep back is the sort of smashing football and attitude we thought we would get out of Harbaugh. That does not mean I don’t want to see a well executed bootleg or use of our big TEs in the red zone.
I needed a game like this one and even if they are way down, it was still Nebraska. I loved how our defense attacked the ball and seeing improvement in the OL. OK, the DP-J spin was pretty cool too.
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There were a lot of feelings about losing to Notre Dame so it’s nice to see everyone doing better now. 4 games in seems like a good time to take stock of the season.
Nothing has changed in terms of record: still on track with expectations for a 9-3 type season. Everything still rides on results vs MSU, PSU, and OSU. Notre Dame was always the least damaging loss on the schedule and indeed it seems unlikely to affect Michigan’s destiny very much.
Fortunately for M, ND are playing well and look like favorites to advance to the playoff. Though by no means a cakewalk, their impressive schedule is lining up favorably. The level of difficulty is a lot lower than expected for USC, FSU, and suddenly attrition-ravaged Va-Tech. If they survive Stanford this week they’ll be sitting pretty.
Michigan’s level of difficulty also looks slightly more favorable. Wisconsin, Northwestern and MSU all look to be playing a step below preseason expectations. While many grumbled about going to Lansing and Columbus in the same year, I’d gladly take the road trip to EL this year over Madison or Happy Valley.
For now, Michigan still controls it’s own fate. That’s good news considering that two of their biggest talents (Black and Solomon) have been out. Hopefully they are back before OSU.
In the meantime Michigan has been able to demonstrate quality depth at QB, RB, and WR to squash some of the preseason concerns. Wisconsin will be a big test for the lingering questions about OL and DL and Northwestern should at least give us another datapoint about run game.
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Wisconsin would probably be the next least damaging loss. We could definitely have a non-disappointing 10-2 season with losses to ND and Wisconsin, as that would mean a division championship and (probably) a rematch with Wisconsin in the BT championship, with wins over MSU and OSU in the process. 9-3, while still very much in the realm of possibility, would almost certainly be a disappointment, since have almost everyone who matters back from a very young 8-4 team, along with adding a starting QB. A one win improvement is not much to show for that.
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Agree about Wisconsin.
Disagree about the overall record. I would not be disappointed with a 9-3 season where we beat MSU and OSU but lost to ND, Wisc, and say Maryland. I would be disappointed with a 10-2 (now purely hypothetical) season where we lost to both.
The current best guess for the season (losing to ND, PSU, and OSU) is about exactly what would be expected. I wouldn’t call that disappointing but I understand other Michigan fans feeling differently.
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Two things:
ND will drop one or two that they shouldn’t. It’s the Brian Kelly way
We do not have quality depth at RB. Higdon is good not great. Evans is good in space. Then we have a walk-on…
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People very often take the number of bodies who all look similarly competent as “depth”. While that may mean you don’t have much of a drop-off in case of injury, it really says nothing about how good you are relative to other teams.
And if you want to see “quality depth at QB”, consider that Clemson just replaced the QB who took them to the playoff last year with a true freshman, and not because Bryant looked bad, but because Lawrence was even better. Alabama did the same thing last year. Our standards are still a bit low in that regard.
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Me in your living room:
“I like this painting. Very cool.”
WCB:
“JAY Z OWNS 3 PICASSOS”.
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If there weren’t high expectations that we’d be competing for national championships under Harbaugh, your post might make some sense. If you’ll be happy with perennial 9-3ish finishes and a regular rotation among the Citrus, Outback and Alamo bowls, that’s your business. I hope for a bit more, and expect it from a coach being paid as much as Harbaugh.
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It’s abundantly clear that you are setting the bar at the elite tier currently occupied by Alabama, Clemson, and Ohio State. That’s your shtick in most every post. That’s fine if you want to do that. I generally find it amusing to read.
I hope though that you understand that your expectations have zero effect on team outcomes. They only affect your level of enjoyment.
For the sake of discussion if nothing else, you might recognize the validity of other views. That these other views are more conventional and accepted, and perhaps most critically, that they don’t harm you or anyone else.
——————–
Most people’s ‘expectation’ is not an idealized vision. Most people’s expectations are grounded in some reality. Most people re-calibrate based on what they see.
When I say we have “quality depth” at QB, I mean the situation is pretty good in comparison to what we experienced last year and what we thought we might experience this year heading into the season.
I do hope we return to 90’s era of QBs where every year there was a future NFL QB starting and backing up, but we haven’t seen that in well over a decade.
If you don’t want to re-calibrate expectations based on what’s happening, you don’t have to. Me – I’m going to enjoy the fact that we have a likely NFL draftpick as the starter when we didn’t a few months ago. I’m also going to enjoy that, somewhat surprisingly, the backup who didn’t see the field during last year’s shitshow suddenly looks like he might be on track to live up to his bloodlines and end up there as well.
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Expectations are opinions. I choose mine based on objective ‘experts’ whose opinions I respect and what I see for myself in reality. Others base theirs on hopes and desires.
If you are upset that your expectation is not being met, you should know that is 100% your choice.
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@je
I’m not arguing on Evans or Higdon. I’ve repeatedly said these guys are B+ backs, not difference-makers.
My point about quality depth is in response to pre-season concern. Specifically that we didn’t have enough guys after Isaac and Walker left.
Those guys are being replaced by walk-ons and freshman without any significant effect on team outcomes.
This is consistent with my hypothesis that RB depth is never a worry. You can use a FB to carry the ball (as Schembechler did for ages and as Harbaugh has done with Houma, Hill, and now Mason) particularly in short-yardage. Freshman or walk-ons can handle the meaningless backup carries that make up the bulk of what a 4th string back like Walker is used for.
Now, there still could be some meaningful effect resulting from a presumed dropoff from the B+ rotation players (Evans & Higdon) to the C- backups (Wilson & Samuels). If the injuries that have struck so far continue into the meat of the schedule it could, maybe, make a difference. So far, it hasn’t.
With each solid performance by the walk-on and promising garbage-time carry by a freshman the chance of there being a negative outcome from the presumed depth issue decreases. The fumble by Samuels shows the that the risk is there.
The question is if it’s a big enough risk to worry about relative to other risks chosen instead under a typical recruiting approach.
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I”m seeing Harbaugh’s wisdom in scheduling the ND game away. Most of us bitched big time about playing that game in South Bend when MSU & OSU are also away; and we all pretty much hate ND anyway.
The Team tho, now has first hand game experience going on the road into a hostile arena to play against top notch rival competition when it counts for the division ranking. Hopefully this will payoff against both MSU & OSU.
Go Blue…………..INTJohn
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I think it’s helpful, though it must be noted that the meaningful difference wouldn’t be evident till later in the schedule.
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