Essentials

WHAT	Michigan vs Indiana
WHERE	Michigan Stadium Ann Arbor, MI
WHEN	4 Eastern
THE LINE	Michigan –28.5
TELEVISION	FS1
TICKETS	exist
WEATHER	cloudy, mid to low 30s, immediate aftermath of a fair amount of snow

Overview

This is year two post-Kevin Wilson, and the Wile E Coyote year has passed into the plummet stage. The Hoosiers are in the same range they usually are, battling for a bowl bid after surprisingly competitive games against Penn State and Ohio State that turned into inevitable Ls.

But also they've escaped Rutgers by a touchdown, gotten blasted by Iowa, and currently sit 82nd on offense in S&P+. They're 81st overall. The record doesn't show the step back from the old #chaosteam ways, but this is not the super-feisty Indiana of years past. They're almost dead average in tempo now. Which, like, what? How you gonna roll up on a big boy with a non-incoherent defense and win? Not that they won those games before. But they were more interesting about it!

Bah. 

[Hit THE JUMP for Just Some Guys]

Run Offense vs Indiana

YoU'Re A (marcelino) BaLLEr

This is the better half of Indiana's defense but that only gets it up to slightly below average nationally, and in the context of the Power 5 that means "poor." Indiana's wonky DL struggles to hold up at the line of scrimmage and the rest of the defense tries to mitigate the damage, with middling success. The result is a lot of decent runs, very few stuffs, and the hope that IU will live to fight another down. The personnel is Just A Guy from top to bottom:

The official depth chart has NT Mike Barwick starting over NT Ja'Merez Bowen but both rotate equally, with Syracuse transfer NT Kayton Samuels occasionally spelling them. DT Jerome Johnson split time last year with DT Jacob Robinson who is expected back for this game. None of these guys is liable to do more than push back and maybe knock a lineman upfield. Ditto SDE Gavin Everett, but his pass-rushing freshman backups are a huge liability on standard downs.

This shows up in the stats, which are metronomically mediocre. The last four weeks IU's given up between 4.5 and 6 YPC to Iowa, Penn State, Minnesota, and Maryland; before that they had decent performances against MSU (obvious), Rutgers (almost as obvious), and, bizarrely, Ohio State.

Michigan's handed out dull, slow-motion poundings to teams in Indiana's weight class the whole year: 4.8 YPC against Rutgers, 5.0 against Penn State, 4.3 against Maryland, etc. This preview projects that Shea Patterson will be wrapped in foam and once again removed from the ground game, so something like last week is probably in the offing, depending on how aggressive Indiana wants to be about exploiting that fact. Going by results so far this season they may not be quite as eager to take advantage as Rutgers was.

The one dude to keep an eye out for is spacebacker Marcelino Ball. Ball is one of just three remaining starters and would not be out of place at viper if he was magically transposed onto Michigan's roster. He's an excellent blitzer and if Michigan lets him get nosy in the ground game that's likely to pay off with some TFLs. Ball's been somewhat neutered in the new, conservative defense Tom Allen is forced to roll out given his overall lack of talent; a Michigan playing for next week could open up some opportunities.

Otherwise this should be a lot of down G that grinds out yards, relatively few big plays as Michigan keeps its cards hidden, and a performance that looks a wee bit disappointing if you're not factoring the aforementioned in.

KEY MATCHUP: TIGHT ENDS vs BALL. He'll be more of a challenge than Rutgers's OLB was and by God Michigan is running their whole rush offense through the TEs.

Pass Offense vs Indiana

This but less O'Korn [Marc-Gregor Campredon]

The brief window when Indiana and "competent pass defense" could be uttered in the same sentence has come and gone, like a butterfly on the mountain. (Except in sentences like the prior.) Iowa, Ohio State, and uhhh… Minnesota have all torched the Indiana secondary for at least 9.7 yards an attempt. You may remember Indiana's heroic comeback to tie the Gophers getting flushed on this play:

Michigan State hit 8.4 YPA, albeit in a portion of their season when there were rationales for putting Brian Lewerke on the field other than "I hate him and want him to suffer." Rutgers did not throw more picks than touchdowns. Indiana's only marginally acceptable Big Ten performance relative to competition level was against Penn State.

Let's survey the available talent, via Seth:

CB Andre Brown is better at Fant's boundary role than he was playing in all that space. The two guys who used to start ahead of him, CB A'Shon Riggins and CB Raheem Layne have to be driving Allen mad: Riggins gives up a ton of cushion while Layne tries to pick off everything. Both strategies are justifiable in this defense because they're often covering for SS Khalil Bryant, a lost puppy who was finally replaced last week with redshirt freshman SS Bryant Fitzgerald, who is a younger lost puppy. Classmate Juwan Burgess was supposed to win that job, but has been grooming instead to replace FS Jonathan Crawford, who has been starting so long he features on Jehu Chesson's highlight reel, and is back to his photobombing pictures of other peoples' touchdowns ways.

So it's back to the pre-Fant salt mines. The lack of talent in the secondary has nowhere to hide since Indiana is 108th in sack rate; the Hoosiers are in triple digits in that, explosiveness allowed, efficiency allowed, and passing down S&P+.

This should be a bloodbath, weather permitting. Shea Patterson's accurate and against Rutgers he displayed an ability to stay in the pocket for his guys to get open. Indiana has no real hope of getting to him consistently and the talent in their secondary hasn't been able to keep up with receivers far worse than Michigan's group.

The one question mark for Michigan is Indiana's approach. In marked contrast to last year, this year's Indiana outfit is a passive two-high shell:

…more zone, again a huge departure from last year. Their corners are not good at press and can't be left alone on an island, so Indiana was leaving two high most of the time and living with what happened underneath. What happened underneath was usually a 7-yard pass.

They rarely send more than four and almost never send more than five, so it's going to be a lot of the seven-and-eight-man zones Patterson had some issues with earlier in the year. A more comfortable version of Patterson should shred it. Is that the version of Patterson that Michigan has?

 

KEY MATCHUP: SHEA PATTERSON vs THE FAINT OUTLINE OF A RUDOCKENING. Keeping last week's momentum going would be most excellent headed into the Game.

Run Defense vs Indiana

Frey recruits, without Frey [Campredon]

Freshman Stevie Scott decommitted from Rutgers and imbibed the super powers associated from that, but the DeBordening has held him to 5 yards a carry instead of the sumptuous bounties Saquon Barkley and Jonathan Taylor accumulate. But, hey, that's not too bad: Scott has 894 yards thus far and periodically looks like a real heir to the Rutgers Decommit throne. He's a burly straight-ahead gent, for the most part:

That's a hoss of a freshman. Scott's not fancy. He's going to make one shallow cut and try to run over anyone who gets in his way. If no one gets in his way his long speed is surprisingly good.

Unfortunately for Scott and Indiana's ground game their season to date has been up and down and Michigan looks like it'll be another down. IU clobbered their nonconference schedule (which did include Virginia). Since it's been tougher:

• MSU, #2 S&P+ run defense: 32 rushes, 29 yards, 0.9 YPC.
• Rutgers, #107: 42 rushes, 163 yards, 3.9 YPC.
• Ohio State, #42: 21 rushes, 84 yards, 4 YPC.
• Iowa, #30: 25 rushes, 67 yards, 2.7 YPC
• Penn State, #43: 45 rushes, 224 yards, 5 YPC.
• Minnesota, #107: 30 rushes, 153 yards, 5.1 YPC.
• Maryland, #55: 30 rushes, 131 yards, 4.4 YPC.

This is a generally competent ground attack that founders when presented with competent DL. Michigan has competency at DT and excellency at DE. Michigan is sixth in S&P+ rush D and likely to come closer to the Iowa/MSU games than Penn State or Ohio State.

Indiana does use Ramsey as a runner frequently. He's got 74 rushes on the year and 398 rushing yards; he's in the genre of mobile-ish but unthreatening QB that a lot of lower level teams have. Michigan hasn't had any trouble with mobile quarterbacks this year—2.8 YPC for the Wimbush version of ND, 1.3 for Nebraska, 2.3 for Penn State—and Ramsey isn't the kind of athlete that is likely to overturn that. Pick up a couple first downs? Sure.

If IU can move Michigan's DTs a bit and keep Rashan Gary from filling those gaps, Scott should be able to pound out some YAC and get Indiana in the medium-yardage situations their passing game is built for. Given their results to date that doesn't look super likely.

KEY MATCHUP: MICHIGAN DTs vs RESETTING THE LINE OF SCRIMMAGE. Scott is no the kind of back who's going to salvage much when he's got to make a hard cut in the backfield; he's very much a downhill guy. Michigan will seek to keep him from getting downhill.

Pass Defense vs Indiana

If you like short passes this is the unit for you. Peyton Ramsey's somewhat limited arm and a veritable army of little fast guys have resulted in a passing offense that completes 67% of its attempts (16th nationally) but is 124th in explosiveness. Ramsey's depth of target is the lowest in the Big Ten; he averages under ten yards a completion on a crap-ton of attempts. Between Ramsey and injured freshman Michael Penix, Indiana has 395 passing attempts, almost double that of Michigan.

So there's wealth to spread around and lo, it is spread. Seven(!) different players have more than twenty catches, and three more are in the 13-18 range. These multitudinous and varied targets can be split into two major groups. The first consists of middlingly athletic tall guys. Nick Westbrook and Donovan Hale have both returned from injury to post decent numbers; spectacularly named Ty Fryfogle is also in this genre. Michigan spent last year's game pressing Simmie Cobbs's face off, holding him to 4 catches for 39 yards. This generation of guys projects to meet the same fate. They're not going to get off the line that much. Westbrook and Hale lead the team in targets but Westbrook's 57% catch rate is pretty bad; Hale's 62% isn't much better.

Category #2 had better luck last year and might have better luck this year. This category contains a cornucopia of little slot guys. J-Shun Harris, Luke Timian, and WHOP PHILYOR are all slots. Philyor's probably out, but that's no reason to omit this delightful nugget from the preview:

When Philyor was young, his father, Daniel, would take him to Burger King. Even when he was a child, Philyor wanted the same thing, every time.

“He’d always asked me, ‘What do you want? You gonna get something different?’” Philyor said, smiling. “I said, ‘I want a Whopper.’”

If you keep eating that, his father warned him, you’ll turn into a Whopper someday, which in fairness might have solved the size issue.

Anyway: Timian had almost 100 yards receiving last year; collectively these guys will be running underneath, hoping to pop open for some YAC. It'll have to be that or jump balls. RBs get a bunch of targets but these are all checkdowns when IU is out of ideas on a particular play.

Indiana's had decent success keeping Ramsey upright at 48th in sack rate allowed, but the nature of the offense plays into that. The line isn't asked to hold the fort for very long. If Indiana gets stuck in passing downs, well… they'll continue doing what they do and hope to break a tackle. It's a Mike DeBord joint.

One thing to look out for is some WACKY BUSINESS. DeBord has no doubt heard the mockery from the Michigan fanbase since he returned from non-revenue sports administration and will seek revenge with a couple of plays that defy Indiana tendencies to date.

KEY MATCHUP: SAFETIES vs SLOTS. Same as it ever was. Indiana will be a good prep for Ohio State, which is superior in almost every way but also an offense that throws a lot of short stuff and eats up tons of YAC. Michigan's ability to game that stuff with short LB zones has steadily improved over the course of the season.

SPECIAL TEAMS

Kicker LOGAN JUSTUS has taken time out from his busy schedule of righting wrongs and making the word ZAP appear out of nowhere to boot field goals for Indiana, and he's done a good job: he's 13/15 and 23rd in overall efficiency. Jared Smolar, the kickoff guy, has only gotten his kicks to the endzone about a third of the time and opponents have averaged 26 yards a return—this is a rare situation in which Michigan shouldn't be offering fair catches.

Punter Haydon Whitehead is in the short-n-boring genre. His net yards per punt is a guh 35.6; his gross is barely over 40 yards; he offers up few returns and few touchbacks. Expect fair catches.

IU return units have a large number of short and fast guys at their disposal; J-Shun Harris does have a TD this year and an average of 11 yards a pop. Kick return units have done little.

KEY MATCHUP:  AHHHH YOU PUT IT THROUGH THE UPRIGHTS

INTANGIBLES

CHEAP THRILLS

Worry if…

• DeBord pulls the 2008 Citrus Bowl gameplan out of mothballs.
• Indiana's able to dig Michigan's DTs out.
• A blizzard of short passes are inadequately defensed.

Cackle with knowing glee if…

• Patterson maintains last week's level of swashbuckling accuracy.
• Nobody gets hurt.
• Someone from two weeks in the future drops in and gives you subtle thumbs-up.

Fear/Paranoia Level: 2 (Baseline: 5; +1 for Last Vestiges Of Chaosteam Are In There Somewhere, –1 for You Don't Even Tempo, Bro?, –1 for A Defensive Program Without A Defense, –1 for Four TD Spread, –1 for Lol DeBord, +1 for It Would Be Just Like The Damn Universe To Smite Us With Our Own Derpy, Exiled Hand, –1 for You Beat Rutgers By How Many Points Again?)

Desperate need to win level: 10 (Baseline: 5; +1 for League Game, Smoke, +1 for Losing To DeBord Would Be A Disintegration Level Event, +1 for Last Hurdle Before the Big One, +1 for Playoff Dreams, +1 for Four Score Spread Ls are Unfun)

Loss will cause me to… look down in horror at my chest as a bulbous, leering Mike DeBord emerges from it.

Win will cause me to… aaaaaaaargh it's here

The strictures and conventions of sportswriting compel me to predict: 

This might be surprisingly low scoring, with Indiana creaking its way to a couple first down on many drives before the math of running a bunch of short passes against Don Brown catches up with them. Meanwhile, Michigan has been content to grind down the clock against overmatched opponents; the rush offense meets a pliable bend-but-don't break outfit.

If Michigan has the same sort of hiccups they've had most of the year this will end up being another one of those games where the scoreboard and the yardage totals don't look like they're from the same game, and then the dam will break in the second half.

Bunch of 8-12 play drives from Michigan ending in scores or dorfs offset by a little bit of Indiana moving the ball—they'll crack 200—and you've got a recipe for a slow-motion blowout.

Finally, three opportunities for me to look stupid Sunday:

• Patterson has one carry.
• DPJ has a 100-yard game.
• Michigan, 39-11