About Last Night: Recap Brady Hoke's Former Team

"I'm sorry I left for my dream job in the middle of the night, but I am pointing so it's OKAY!"

The Big House... How you've changed and how you've managed to stay the same, I hadn't been back to A2 for football since, EMU 2009.  During the first half, I was trying to pinpoint why Seven Nation Army became the new ballad of Michigan football. Why wasn't "The Victors" ringing through the air on repeat, what has happened here? It wasn't until San Diego State's 2nd drive of the 3rd quarter that I realized how much the Big House was still the same... "Hey, down in front..."

Michigan had just recovered a San Diego State fumble, the stadium had gone into a commercial break and Pop Evil's atrocious Michigan song was playing. There was no action to be seen on the field. My eyes curled slowly around to peep over my shoulder, trying to mask my disdain, to see two elderly gentleman who glared at me as if I was stepping on their oxygen tank. Pondering what at all they could possibly want to see going down the field, I obliged their request and briefly smiled. This, was the Big House I remembered...

Two years of 4-0 starts that ended abruptly in league play have brought skepticism upon this 2011 team... For all of the things that are different, there are many things the same.

The highway to success this season, same as last, will be paved by Denard Robinson's legs. That's the same. The difference? Michigan's defense has showed itself this year to be, dare I say, reliable? A not great but supposedly good SDSU offense was held for the most part in check.

Offense:
Denard's legs. That will be the key. His passing has continually been inconsistent and shotty the whole season. The 300 yd passing performance against ND is definitely the exception and will never be the norm this season, unless drastic improvement has happens. But, man, oh man, do those legs move. Chalk another point up to Al Borges. He has shown adaptability once again. Was that speed option we saw? Yes, yes it was. If Borges can find a way to keep the running game interesting for opposing defense while Robinson, finds whatever it is he's looking for in the passing game than I really like our chances heading into, B1G play.

The RB situation isn't resolved yet. I still like what Fitz brings to the table as an every down back, But, just like it has taken me a while to come around on Jordan Kovacs being undeniable, one can not simply deny Vincent Smith. The kid plays bigger than he is and is also able to squeeze through holes that no other back could squeeze through. With Denard's legs opening up plays for both backs I am quite okay with having 2 viable options.

The offensive line is really hard to talk about as well, Denard... He runs they look good. They didn't really allow much pressure getting to Robinson and MANball is becoming less and less a part of the offense so that's good.

Any and all WR performances can be extrapolated strictly from the ND game. If they've shown anything this past week it's that, they block and stay engaged in the offense even when the ball isn't coming there way. That's a good thing because from the looks of it all we are going to need them doing as much of that as possible this season.

Defense:
SDSU came into this game averaging 38 ppg and 428 yds a game. Michigan held the Aztecs to just 7 points and jsut 368 yds of offense. The surprisingly good thing about this feat is that the D was able to hold SDSU when many of their possessions started in or near Michigan territory. The D was also able to continue their streak of timely turnovers, forcing 3, all from inside Michigan territory. Michigan defenses of the past 3 seasons would not be able to do such things, considering SDSU has an NFL prospect QB and one of the nations top rushers this is a well recognized feat. Can the defense continue to causing these timely turnovers consistently into league play? No... it won't happen. Yes this is a bummer but there are other things to hang your hat on.

CB depth!? We has it? I won't go that far, but it's better than I can ever recall it being. As soon as Floyd followed Woolfolk to the sideline, I was waiting for the ball to drop and for Ryan Lnidley to have his way with  the secondary. Highly recruited freshman Blake Countess came in and seemingly picked up right where the defense left off.

There are you are D-line, there you are. In my season previews I said, Michigan's best unit on the field defensively would be the D-line. 4 games into the season, I finally look kinda smart for say that. Mike Martin, was blasting into the backfield causing pressure on Lindley all afternoon. If it wasn't Martin, it seemed like it was VanBergen, if it wasn't VanBergen it was definitely Roh, who inched closer to my 12 sack prediction with another one. If William Campbell can continue to improve which, from my opinion is happening, this unit should be able to keep building momentum into B1G play and be a stronghold for the defense this season.

Special Teams:
Any kicker can miss a 40 yarder on any given Saturday. It just sucks that it happened to be Michigan's kicker, again not relieving any stress out of that position. One more miss and I'll be screaming for a switch to Wile or student body tryouts part 2. Jeremy Gallon is the best punt-return option we've had in quite some time and he's proved it. Now obviously with all special teams my emotions are week to week with them. Right now we've got a good thing going lets keep it that way.

Good Feeling To Take Home With You:
Through non-conference play the team is 4-0. I don't care how they got here or what the last 2 seasons say, I'd rather be here with this team than have any losses in our record. There's something about this team that I'm vibing with. The defense isn't perfect, but they are better and every guy is saying the right thing and it just feels like their minds and approach this year are in a better state than the previous undefeated starts. Every starter on this team has seen and undefeated start and they've all seen how badly they've gone. That experience I believe carries this team through this season and the B1G collapse that has plagued this team previous years won't happen again this go-round.

Preview: San Diego State

Preview: San Diego State University
Who: San Diego State (Line -10.5)
What: Brady Hoke left this school for ours fergodsakes
When: 12:00 eastern. Big Ten Network
Where: Big House
Weather: 67 40% chance of rain

Offense vs. Aztecs
The Aztec D comes into this match-up 80th nationally, allowing 383 yds/gm. The rushing defense is 99th in the country giving up 197 yds/gm. Passing the Aztecs look better, 36th nationally allowing just 186 yds/gm through the air. Those rushing numbers could be skewed as, Army compiled 407 yds on the ground against SDSU. Army is a triple option team and only being 1 of like 2 teams in the country that still runs that crazy scheme gives them a schematic advantage. Cal Poly doesn't count and Washington State was mostly held in check rushing the ball, they were also held in check against UNLV so there's that. SDSU runs that 3-3-5 thing we attempted to run on defense last year, but their coach Rocky Long actually knows how to run it. Michigan needs to run what they are good at because not doing so will make the 3-3-5 look like a plausible defense with zone-blitzes coming from places the O-line most likely won't be able to pick up.

SDSU's defense returns 5 from a defense that finished 44th nationally last season. Their glaring weakness that Michigan should be able to exploit is on edges where the Aztec roster has only 1 DE out of their top 4 over 250 lbs. Taylor Lewan should hopefully be bulldozing lanes all day. Does Al Borges line up under center or use that Denard Robinson guy like he's supposed to? I hope the latter. He seemed to get the hang of it last week and from what I saw had great play-calling with the succession of zone-read plays.

It'll be nice if Michigan can run the ball effectively, because I am getting agitated watching Denard learn footwork on the fly. Borges' new found love of the spread will hopefully filter into the passing game as well. I'd like to see more hitches, curls, bubble screens, and the things that made our passing game mildly effective last season. This season other than jump-ball bombs it has not been. Washington State was able to get big plays last week on the deep ball so if needed it appears that will be there for Michigan. I hope we don't need it. If it is, look for Junior Hemingway to have a monster day.

What To Watch For:
Taylor Lewan and Mark Huyge blowing up tiny DE's allowing Denard and presumably Vincent Smith to run wild.

Defense vs. San Diego State
The Aztec offense is lead by Sr. QB Ryan Lindley and Soph. RB Ronnie Hillman. Hillman was 10th in the nation in rushing and Lindley has a cannon arm. Lindley lost his top 4 WR's from last year thanks to the NFL draft, graduation, and injury. Hillman picked up right where he left off and is the nations second leading rusher. Michigan's defense just got gashed for over 4 YPC against Eastern and appears to only be able to stop 3rd down halfback draws against Notre Dame. Hillman scares me.. SDSU also returns 4 lineman  from last season as well.

The Michigan rush defense has had a tough time holding contain on the edges this season. Roh, Black, and whomever else line up at DE need to keep contain. The LB's have had a tough time being consistent and with a back like Hillman, keeping contain and gap coverage is more vital than normal. Did I mention this facet of the game really frightens me? Mattison has shown ample ability to be able to adjust on the fly this year so hopefully the D won't be getting gashed too long before we find a way to slow Hillman down.

Lindley is throwing a pedestrian 207 yds a game. As mentioned Lindley doesn't have the same targets he had last season and when you have the nations second leading rusher, ride that horse right? Michigan's secondary is better than they were a year ago if only because they couldn't get any worse. But for reals, they are noticeably better and are doing more than just standing and watching on the field. Michigan's major task here will be applying pressure. Eastern didn't throw the ball and Michigan adjusted well to Carder and Western but were in able to do so against ND. San Diego State's O-line is experienced and good but hopefully not as good as ND's.

What To Watch For?
Brady Hoke is a defensive guy and knows this offense better than any other coach in the country. Hopefully he can give Mattison some pointers. Mattison adjustments vs. Hillman running game will be the major match-up on the day. If SDSU is pounding the rock all day and getting big chunks it could be a long day in the big house. If Michigan is to even moderately contain SDSU I like our chances.

Special Teams:
Gallon has proven to be a solid punt-return man which is good. I'm not sold on Vincent Smith being the kick-off return man but the jury is still out. Kick-off and punt coverage is scary. Michigan is 1-1 on field goals right now. I don't care that it was a glorified PAT, after last season I will take it.
As always, Hold on to ball and please do not give up any crushing returns.

Prediction:
I hate myself as a fan sometimes and get extremely nervous for these types of games. Brady Hoke knows this team and is going to have a good idea of what they are trying to do. For this reason alone, I give Michigan the edge. Hillman and Lindley will move the ball for SDSU but so will Denard & Co. I like this one to be a little more high scoring and I think Vegas is crazy on giving Michigan 10.5. This hasn't been touched on yet, but the time change should have an effect on SDSU's performance. Here's to hoping Hillman is sleeping the whole game. I am going with 34-31, Meeeechigan.

Quickies: The Committee In The Backfield

The Low Down: Did Denard Robinson count as a running back last year? No? Shoot... Unlike the days yore, Michigan's running back situation was more of a running back by committee last season. If you would've asked Fred Jackson he would've said the committee had the same skill set but only better than this committee...
 

Remember these guys?

We know this not to be true... So what was the committee?
Presumed starter last year, I guess was, scat-back extrordinaire Vincent Smith. He did lead the team in rushing yards outside of Shoelace. Behind him was Brandon Minor version 2.0, Mike Shaw, who ran with rage right into lingering injuries. The 3rd back in the mix was meaty freshman, Stephen Hopkins. Next up, was high-school highlight tape super-star, Fitz Toussaint. Toussaint has been victim of the nagging injury plague seemingly, since his arrival on campus. He did take his first career carry 61 yds and followed it up with a TD on his next run. The official MGoBlue website lists his position last year as "superback", so that must be good... Lastly, we had Mike Cox who's career stat-line looks like one helluva good game: 19 carries 169 yds 2 TD's... The big problem with Cox, has been his lack of knowledge on the playbook.

If the committee was one, the committee back would've come in 19th in the country with 1297 yds on 264 carries. Not to shabby... The problem in my mind is that's 4 dudes who totaled just a smidgen under 400 yds less than your quarterback. But, then my mind is all like, "Denard though?"... "Denard..." Rich Rodriguez was fighting for his job and he needed to do what he had to do to win. None of the backs stood out more than the others so he stuck with what worked, Denard left, Denard right, Denard pass, Denard left, so on and so forth...

1 Year Later:
MANBALL!!! 1 RUNNING BACK!!! I wanted to stop here, but better judgement said I'd be selling you short.

Since Brady Hoke came in, he has placed an emphasis on this team establishing a power run game with a feature back to take the work load. I would suspect that of the 264 carries all the running backs combined got last year, Hoke and Borges would like to see about all of those go to 1 guy. The rest of the carries that don't go to Denard will be divided up between everybody else.

General consensus back in the spring was probably that you'd see Michael Cox or Stephen Hopkins take charge by the fall as the lead back. Both are bigger, stronger, bruising backs. Cox, who committed to this style of play for Lloyd Carr, was definitely excited to be back to running downhill...

“When I came in, I committed to coach Carr, and I committed to this type of system,” Cox said. “I'm definitely happy to be back in the system that I came here for.”

Much has seemed to change from then till now however. Michigan brought in two pretty highly-regarded recruits in consensus 4* Justice Hayes and under-the-radar 3* Thomas Rawls. Hayes was more fit for the spread and is likely to be a slot-type player for Michigan. He likely won't see the field for Michigan this year as a running back, but fall-camp reports suggest that, he could return punts or kicks. Rawls is like Mark Ingram only better. What say you Fred Jackson?

“Honestly, I did get a chance to watch Mark Ingram a few times,” Jackson said. “Mark is probably one of the best guys ever to come through here. Mark was great, but there’s something about this kid Thomas. If I was to compare them as high school backs, give me Thomas Rawls.”

So there's that... And then there's this..
Fitz Toussaint apparently blew up at the scrimmage last Saturday causing the internetz to go into an uproar and as recent as 8-23 Shaw is the projected default starter due to consistency.Vincent Smith is also pretty much locked into a 3rd down back. He's a great blocker and causes some matchup problems out of the backfield, with his pass catching abilities. There hasn't been much news on Cox or Hopkins, so with those guys we'll see.

I Know I'm Forgetting Something... OHH YAH... Fullback... Guess What? We will use one this year. John McColgan will be it and  I suspect that he will be relieved by Stephen Hopkins (maybe Steve Watson too) from time to time. 

Expectations: What is them?
Umm...

Seriously, I want to sound smart here and say X, Y, & Z are for sure going to happen, but really if you have an idea, maybe you could email me and I'll post it. So, since this is my blog and nobody takes me seriously I am just going to take what I do know and mix it in with my best educated guess.

EDIT: I had this post about ready to go, got busy, and over the weekend Michigan had their scrimmage. Brady Hoke announced Shaw would most likely be the starter, more than likely backed up by Fitz.

So before the presser, I would've said Shaw starts by default, maybe gets backed up Fitz and only that because of practice hype. Thanks for reaffirming my thoughts Brady, I appreciate it.  Yeah, Shaw will start, how long his body can take the pounding of being the man at running-back, is yet to be determined. I like Fitz backing him up and taking over if Shaw goes down, if only for the reason I've had an affinity for Fitz since the first time I saw the gold that was his high-school highlight tape.

How good the offense looks early will be very important for the stat line of the RB's, If the offense struggles early, how long until Denard starts to see more and more designed runs? The offensive line in my opinion, should still be very solid and create many of  those running lanes for the backs. I will make my ridiculous prediction now and say that by the end of the season whomever our starting tailback is will amass over 1,000 yds by the end of the season. If I had to boldly predict who that'll be, I'd say Toussaint. That's my story and I am sticking to it. Next up, the wide receivers. As always, Go Blue!