67 days until Michigan football: Michigan defense brings the heat on third down
There’s much anticipation heading into the Michigan Wolverines football season, and TheWolverine.com is counting down the days until the Sept. 2 opener against East Carolina. We’ll discuss current Michigan events, the upcoming season and/or take a look at a significant number that correlates with how many days remain until kickoff, whether it be a player’s jersey number, a year, a date, a score, etc.
The Michigan defense allowed just 67 third-down conversions last season, with opponents moving the chains on only 33.8 percent of their attempts. That mark ranked 27th in the country.
Michigan defensive coordinator Jesse Minter has made it clear this offseason that he wants his group to be more “disruptive on early downs. According to Sports Info Solutions, Michigan only had 19 tackles for loss against first- and second-down runs in 2022, ranking 125th in the country, and just 47 “stuffs” (zero or negative yards), slotting 130th.
“Finding ways to create more negative plays on non-traditional downs,” Minter said this spring. “When we dial up a pressure or dial up something on third down, we were pretty good. But we had very, very few disruptive plays on normal downs.
“We certainly want to get sacks and get pressures, and do it at times without committing extra guys,” Minter said. “That’s been a huge emphasis for us [in spring ball]. While we ended up with a good number last year, there were times where we probably had to send more [rushers] than we wanted to.”
Third down was a different story. Michigan had 20 sacks on third down (third-most nationally) but only 14 on early downs (85th). Minter was stellar at dialing up blitzes at the right time — seven of their third-down sacks came when Minter brought a blitz — and Michigan’s edge rushers also turned up the heat on other occasions. The Wolverines got pressure on 46.1 percent of third-down passing plays, ranking 22nd in the nation.
The goal for Michigan this fall is to not have to bring as much blitz. In today’s college football, which is much more pass-happy, especially from most of the elite teams, getting pressure and sacks with the front four is paramount.
No play is a better example of this than TCU quarterback Max Duggan‘s 76-yard touchdown pass to star wide receiver Quentin Johnston on 3rd and 7. The Wolverines brought six pass rushers on the play, got in Duggan’s face, but the quarterback dumped it off to Johnston behind the line of scrimmage. Since most of Michigan’s defense was in the backfield, Johnston only had one man to beat, and that’s exactly what he did. That made it 48-38 early in the fourth quarter and killed the Wolverines’ momentum, which was building before the play.
As heartbreaking as the Fiesta Bowl loss was, it exposed some flaws that have been worked on throughout the offseason. This is one of them.
Michigan football countdown to kickoff
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