Michigan 40, Middle Tennessee State 21
It was far from a flawless debut. Two Michigan fumbles, including a Shea Patterson miscue on the season's first play from scrimmage, led directly to Middle Tennessee State touchdowns. The receivers couldn't haul in a handful of catchable passes. The offensive coaches repeatedly tried a two-quarterback package that produced little but confusion. The O-line couldn't get the needed push on a fourth-and-goal. The second-string secondary yakety saxed a late deep ball into MTSU's third touchdown.
The natural progression of the season should work out many of those problems, however, and what was left was exciting indeed. Examine Michigan's opening drive of the second quarter, for instance, if you want to understand the optimism surrounding first-year offensive coordinator Josh Gattis. After a Patterson keeper for five yards, Gattis called consecutive run-pass options to free up Tarik Black for big gains, then a conventional play-action bomb to Nico Collins for a leaping 28-yard touchdown. Four plays, 67 yards, no huddles, 1:14 off the clock, seven points. This isn't last year's Michigan offense.
There were other signs of a contender. Blue chip freshman running back Zach Charbonnet got the start, ripped off a 14-yard gain on his first career carry, later added a 41-yard dash through contact, and made multiple blitz-killing pickups. Christian Turner made some nifty cuts and displayed surprising power, while Dylan McCaffrey hardly had to use his arm to move the offense downfield. Michigan finished with 252 rushing yards at 5.9 a pop.
Deep fly to right-center. [Fuller]
The aerial attack didn't quite produce as much, though that had more to do with gameflow than anything else. Before the quarterback shuffling began, Patterson looked comfortable and confident; he began the game 15-for-20 for 188 yards and three scores before scuffling to a 2-for-9 finish in a choppy, frippery-filled second half. Collins and Black looked dominant, combining for 129 yards and two scores on nine targets and seven catches. Sean McKeon bulled through a safety to finish off a 28-yard touchdown up the seam. True freshman Cornelius Johnson reeled in a difficult catch when he plucked a comeback route out of the air that he appeared to expect over the other shoulder.
The defense also had a somewhat uneven performance, letting MTSU QB Asher O'Hara rip off some annoying runs, though they were relatively dominant statistically until the backups ceded a 59-yard touchdown pass deep into garbage time. That allowed the Blue Raiders to edge over 300 yards; unless Michigan's secondary depth is tested against a stronger opponent it shouldn't be too relevant. It felt like the defense could do more—perhaps because Lavert Hill not only muffed a punt but also let an easy pick-six slip through his fingers—but in reality they did about as much as they could.
Ambry Thomas stood tall in the secondary. [Patrick Barron]
We may have even seen a couple questions answered. While injuries held Donovan Peoples-Jones, Donovan Jeter, and Jon Runyan Jr. out of the game, cornerback Ambry Thomas took his place in the lineup after fighting off colitis. He made an impact, too, cutting off a throw to the flat for a leaping interception, then later coming up with a fumble recovery.
His cornerback counterpart, redshirt freshman Vincent Gray, was the biggest unknown in the starting lineup, and he passed his first test with flying colors. Gray looked adept in coverage and fought through traffic for a few jarring, no-YAC-allowed tackles in the flat. With Thomas evidently healthy, Gray looks like the third corner everyone hoped would emerge.
Not everything clicked tonight. That's a season opener for you. Even with the errors, you didn't have to squint much to see a very dangerous football team on the Michigan Stadium turf.
[After THE JUMP: the box score]
September 1st, 2019 at 9:38 AM ^
My concern with this game and the entire Harbaugh tenure is the amount of unforced errors. These guys know how to catch a football but forget during the games. That cost us around 21 points. A 54-14 score would totally change the feel of this game. It's all correctable but they don't have much time. They are trending towards a meltdown on the road against Wisconsin given their poor history on the road and after bye weeks. I hope it all changes this year because this is getting old.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:53 AM ^
Did you watch any other games this weekend? These types of mistakes happen in every game for every team. These are 18-21 year old kids. They make mistakes.
It could be worse, you could be a FSU or Tenn fan.
September 1st, 2019 at 9:44 AM ^
It was clear to any rational fan that the two QB package was stupid as fuck. But our coaches want to prove they are smarter than everyone else.
September 2nd, 2019 at 2:43 AM ^
Well Gattis is bringing it over from Moorhead and it was run by Bama last year when he was there too. Georgia also ran it with fields a bit too. And the saints run it in the NFL.
Not sure how doing something several other teams do is trying to prove you are smarter than everyone else.
September 1st, 2019 at 9:52 AM ^
W aside, it's so awesome to see Ace's name on top of the column again.
September 1st, 2019 at 10:14 AM ^
Good summary. We were sloppy but that's typical of an opener. The only thing that was really unsettling to me was the clock management at the end of the first half. If you've got a timeout in the last minute - let alone two - go ahead and call it. It's there to be used. Don't burn a down to save a timeout.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:52 AM ^
"We were sloppy but that's typical of an opener."
We had a number of completely unimpressive openers under Schembechler, including the 7-0 snoozer against Northwestern in 1972:
https://digital.bentley.umich.edu/midaily/mdp.39015071754480/177
Another one that comes to mind is 1980—we stumbled to a 17-10 win at home against Northwestern, and they went 0-11 that year.
Shit happens, and sometimes it's in openers.
September 1st, 2019 at 10:17 AM ^
Takes:
-The secondary is better than expected, Ambry and Gray look like legit guys. Gray plays run defense like a safety.
-The Dline is worse than expected. Only significant pass rush was coming from Glasgow.
-Charbonet is good right now.
-Cornelius Johnson is better than Ronnie Bell.
September 1st, 2019 at 10:18 AM ^
Thanks Ace!! Glad to have you back!!
September 1st, 2019 at 10:23 AM ^
Targets yesterday (out of 32 attempts by Patterson/McCaffrey/Milton):
Bell 7
Black, McKeon 5 each
Collins 4
Charbonnet, Eubanks 3 each
Johnson 2
McCaffrey, Sainristil, Turner 1 each
Bama's Jeudy had 13, FWIW.
This is much the same dynamic as last year, which suggests the ball distribution issues may be more about the QB than the OC.
September 1st, 2019 at 10:58 AM ^
So you just listed counts that show the ball getting sprayed all over the field, and then say there were "ball distribution issues". WTF? You want all passes thrown to Collins and Black because Bama only uses Jeudy?
Maybe, just maybe, Gattis wanted to work on some things in a blowout with a brand new offense?
September 1st, 2019 at 3:10 PM ^
See my comment below for success rate on throws to Collins/Black versus the rest of the receiving corps. If throwing the ball to your top receivers is a "successful" play 78% of the time, then you absolutely should be getting them the ball more than 9-10 times a game. And this has nothing to do with it being a "blowout". Fewer than 1/3 of the targets in the first half went to Collins or Black. Patterson threw 8 passes in their 2 minute drill at the end of the first half, and 0 of them went to Collins or Black. The vast majority of those he appeared to throw it to his first read, so that's a play call thing, not a QB thing.
September 2nd, 2019 at 8:36 AM ^
Neither Collins or Black were on the field for a single snap of the 2 minute drill. Harbaugh said Black got an IV at half time so that may have contributed but I don’t know why Nico didnt participate in the 2 min drill.
September 1st, 2019 at 10:41 AM ^
It was quite weird watching Michigan run shotgun all night, especially in goal line and short yardage situations. I don’t read too much into the score because we got stopped once on the one yard line, had a muffed pick six, and our turnovers lead directly to their points. Had we played a slightly cleaner game the score would’ve been 55-7. I do hope DPJ is back soon bc Nico and Tarik are studs, add in people’s Jones and we have the best WR corps in the NCAA
September 1st, 2019 at 1:13 PM ^
people’s Jones
That's a weird one.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:03 AM ^
I thought it might be interesting to look at some of the play-by-play stats from ESPN. I started by just looking at number of run/pass plays by down/distance but also incorporated Football Outsider's success rate metric. A play is considered successful if it gains 50 percent of necessary yards on first down, 70 percent on second down, and 100 percent on third and fourth down. There are a few interesting take-aways:
First, the offense ran a lot more plays than in past years (84 including garbage time) with a pretty balanced run/pass playcalling (40 passes and 43 runs, plus that stupid spike at the end of the first half).
Second, the playcalling still seemed a wee bit too predictable. They still ran the ball 70% of the time on 1st down (25 runs to 11 passes), ran the ball 90% of the time there were 4 or fewer yards to gain, and passed the ball 90% of the time there were 5 or more yards to gain.
Related to the predictability, they ran 70% of the time on first down, passed 65% of the time on second down, and passed 67% of the time on third/fourth down (mostly driven by getting stuck in 3rd and long scenarios). Passing on first down and running on second down were roughly 10% more likely to be successful.
Third, the top guys (Black/Collins/Charbonnet/Turner) need to get the ball in their hands as much as possible. Black and Collins had a 78% success rate (7 of 9 targets) catching the ball, and Charbonnet and Turner had a 50% success rate (10 of 20 carries) running the ball. All other receivers/TEs had a 29% success rate (5 of 17 targets, including 1 of 7 for Ronnie Bell), and all other RBs had a 20% success rate (1 of 5 carries) running the ball.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:18 AM ^
Solid look! Thanks for the information, hopefully the coaches will take note and loosen things up going forward!
September 1st, 2019 at 11:10 AM ^
As long as we can all agree that putting both starting and backup QBs on the field at same time is a horrible idea, then I'm good.
Otherwise I think it wasn't as bad as I thought last night.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:14 AM ^
Couldn't watch last night because of family gatherings, but watched it this morning. What I see:
- Charbonnet can pass block, and Turner is legit. I don't think Tru will see many carries as the season progresses - RB is in good shape
- Vincent Gray is legit, he and Thomas will solidify the secondary opposite Hill and give Hill a chance to get comfortable
- Mayfield and Hayes are going to be a very good tackle duo next year
- Cornelius Johnson is going to be the #1 WR before he's gone
- This offense can get big plays from anywhere on the field
- DT... Needs some work - hopefully, that's what we saw
Lots of jankiness from the offense in its first game as a spread outfit. But it already looks a helluva lot better than anything Rich Rod trotted out in Yr 1! I expected some rough around the edges stuff, but it also looks smooth enough that I'm not worried about it going forward. Kinks will sort themselves out, and the two QB thing will go the way of the Dodo (the sooner the better).
For me, I get an overall sense that Michigan went in thinking this was a throwaway game to try some things out and get everyone a feel for game action. The rotation players should (will) start seeing less plays next week, and the intensity will tick up a bit.
Snowflakes aside, I'm good with these guys going forward.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:31 AM ^
Certainly a lot of the issues were related to team health. The play was also first game, new system, inconsistent.
i was troubled by the offensive and defensive line play. The rest didn’t bother me. However in years where we’ve had ineffective line play, things haven’t gone according to plan.
It’s hard to prognosticate after one game. I hope they improve. Last night’s team would’ve lost to Indiana, let alone Notre Dame.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:39 AM ^
I am not worried at all about the offense. I am genuinely excited to watch this offense moving forward.
I liked the pre-snap motion in the back field. Lots of moving parts confuses opposing defenses. I hated having both Shea and DCaf on the field at the same time. Recipe for disaster...and it didn't work. This comment flies in the face of those wanting more passing but I would've like to have seen more Charbonnet. Seemed like we gashed them every time he ran it, except at the goal line. Disappointed with the sacks, Shea still needs to figure out when to throw the ball away. All in all I was fairly impressed with the new offense. The stupid mistakes and drops should disappear as the season goes on and everyone gets better timing and more comfortable.
September 1st, 2019 at 11:56 AM ^
If this offense truly never goes under center and never uses a fullback, it will handicap itself on short yardage downs. I don't get that mentality -- why not have that kind of package? Why give yourself fewer tools?
I hope it doesn't hurt much. If it hurts at all, I hope it becomes a meme on here on the level of Borges not running the bubble screen or Coach Rod running the 3-3-5 against Shafer's wishes.
September 1st, 2019 at 1:23 PM ^
All in all it was a fine first game. You can see that they're trying to install a new offense, and they largely shelved that new offense in the 2nd half. But the 2nd quarter was a great glimpse of what this offense will hopefully look like going forward. Getting Tarik Black wide open, McKeon up the seam, Nico Collins in single coverage where he's practically unguardable, Shea making accurate throws. This passing offense has the potential to be very dangerous, and as they get more familiar with the offense this will be a team that will score a lot of points. The RB group looked even better than advertised, especially Charbonnet who was as expected as a runner but actually looked functional as a pass blocker. Turner churned out some tough yards and Wilson had a tremendous blitz pickup on the Black touchdown. Overall this offense has the talent, and as they continue to get familiar with the new scheme this should become a very dangerous unit.
On defense, I thought things weren't as dire as a lot of people are making them out to be. This side came in with 2 major question marks, and it seems that one of those question marks was answered with Ambry coming back and looking great and Gray looking like a very serviceable 3rd CB. Our secondary suddenly looks like a strength. That just leaves DT, which is still very much a question mark. Need Dwumfour/Jeter to get healthy, and I anticipate that we'll see more of Hinton/Smith going forward because I don't think you can live with Ben Mason as a starting DT. But at the end of the day, MTSU scored 14 points in non-garbage time and those 14 points came as a result of turnovers and short fields, so overall it's hard to get too upset at the defensive performance.
A lot of this team's issues seemed self-inflicted. Fumbles, drops, missed tackles, etc. All things that are very fixable going forward. It looked like a first game, but at no point did I think that this team doesn't have the talent, athleticism, or coaching to win the Big Ten.
September 1st, 2019 at 1:43 PM ^
Sure, our victory yesterday might have had some warts on it, but it can be vastly worse in a variety of ways:
"Georgia State coach Shawn Elliott certainly knows about upsets.
He was an assistant coach at Appalachian State when the Mountaineers stunned a fifth-ranked Michigan squad in the first week of the 2007 season.
"Two totally different scenarios," Elliott said. "We had 63 scholarships [then], going to play the Michigan Wolverines with 85. We walked in here with 83 scholarships. They possibly had 85, I'm not sure. We were on an even scale, so to speak."
The hard times for Tennessee were evident from a look at the Neyland Stadium stands. Although the announced attendance was 85,503, thousands of fans apparently left at halftime and others headed for shaded areas, leaving plenty of sections of the 102,455-seat facility virtually empty as Georgia State celebrated its victory."
Aubrey Solomon, WTF.
September 1st, 2019 at 2:33 PM ^
Good to have you back writing recaps, Ace. We missed ya.
September 1st, 2019 at 2:33 PM ^
It's all been said. So I'll say we need to rep our RPOs more. No reason to go away from them in the second quarter to work on dumb plays that don't work and put multiple important players at risk. The RPOs are lethal, let's bang them out and get excellent at them.
I was pleasantly surprised about Gray and loved more emphasis on passing. Charbonnet looks like the real deal, but BPONE says something catastrophic will happen soon. I'm sad about all the injuries. I saw lots of things that have plagued Harbaugh's Michigan teams through the years. It's a 9-3/8-4 year.
September 1st, 2019 at 3:01 PM ^
I liked it, glad we have football,back. Wasn't great, wasn't bad.
September 1st, 2019 at 7:59 PM ^
I do not know how to feel about this game. We won. We did not dominate the "flow of the game". Stats sure, but situationally we seemed janky. Also reading around folks outside of M fandom ARE laughing at the debut of #speedinspace.
Sigh. If only those 3 bombs passing TDs were instead 5...
The best I can sum up is this: when OU or other perennial passing spread team plays they do so with authority. What M did was show is the potential while still learning it themselves. They are the apprentice still, my hope is they turn into masters by Wisconsin (fingers crossed)
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