A lot of interesting notes from a game I am still replaying in my head.

Denard

Another ground game worth 12 PAN, just like last week. My database goes back to the 2003 season and during that time there have been a total of 107 games where a player has recorded a PAN of 12 or higher. Of those 107 times, there are 10 players who have done it at least twice (4 have done it three times). The only players to have put up a dozen on the ground twice in one season versus BCS teams, Denard and two others, Jerome Harrison at Washington State vs Stanford and UCLA in 2005 and Chris Barclay at Wake Forest vs Clemson and Maryland in 2003.

The passing was obviously hit or miss for Denard on Saturday. The opening quarter started very strong with a +5 PAN to start things off. From the start of the second quarter until the final drive, the rating plummeted to a –8 during that stretch only to be brought back with a +4 through the air on the final drive.

The Special Teams

Will Hagerup did not have a beautiful looking day as many of his punts looked like shanks or line drives but his day not as ineffective as it appeared. He had five punts under 40 yards on the day, but only one of them was truly damaging. Two were fair caught inside the 15. Two of the others went out at the 20 and 24 which, although painful to watch, were about the effect as his 49 yard kick through the end zone. On top of that, he only allowed 9 yards of return on the day, all on his first kick which still netted 40 yards. All told, his punting performance had a PAN of –0.2, which came back to zero when adding in Denard’s quick kick. That said, his PAZ (Points Above Zoltan) was about –100.

Kicker: the sample size is small but the start could not be much worse for Michigan. So far this year Gibbons is –5 PAN, the second worst of college football team. Only Toledo’s –7 is worse.

Running Backs

Who knows what’s up with this group. It’s hard to say right now. Smith and Shaw saw their qualifying carries cut from 29 against UConn to 12 against Notre Dame. Against UConn both went +2 PAN while against ND Smith went –1 and Shaw –3. This weekend saw only four carries go for positive value (not positive yards) and one of those was the sole Hopkins carry.

Defense

This game is a very difficult game judge the defense on. There were a lot of really great moments (3 interceptions!) and a lot of really bad moments. Based on Notre Dame’s starting field position, they would be expected to score 25 points on the game, 27 if you count the two end of half drives. In that regard Michigan’s defense was slightly above average and if you add in the three interceptions there were some things to hang their hat on.

The two big pass plays were obviously killers, costing Michigan 12 points, as did the QB switch. ND was –9 PAN without Crist in the game and +16 when he was in, with most of the value coming from the two big pass plays.

The three interceptions helped Michigan dominate the starting field position. Michigan’s starting position put them in line for 32 points on the game, 7 more than ND. This was the 11th largest spread of field position for the weekend (OSU was first with +15 against Miami (YTM)).

Penalties

There are two main reasons Denard and the offense were able to put up such large PAN numbers but not outscore their expected points based on field position. The first is the two missed field goals which deflated the total points scored despite the offense getting them into position. The second is penalties, offensively Michigan’s five penalties cost the team a full touchdown and in each of the five occurrences helped prevent any further first downs on the drive.

On defense Michigan’s penalties helped make things a little too dangerous at the end of the half, but Michigan still managed to break even on the day on the defensive side of the ball.