Offense notes: Michigan peaking 'at the perfect time,' Bryson Kuzdzal steps up in win over Maryland

COLLEGE PARK, Md. — No. 18-ranked Michigan Wolverines football emptied the bench on both sides of the ball in a smashing 45-20 victory over Maryland Saturday evening. But one who didn’t get much use was senior punter Hudson Hollenbeck, other than his job as a holder on 6 touchdowns and 2 field goal attempts.

The Wolverines had 10 drives, and scored on 7 of them. The three others were a missed 38-yard field goal by kicker Dominic Zvada, his seventh failed kick of the season.

Michigan has put up 496 and 443 yards of total offense the last two weeks, in wins over Northwestern (24-22) and Maryland. That average of 469.5 yards per contest is much higher than the number in the rest of its tilts against Power Four opponents — 373.6.

“This whole season we’ve been preaching a peak at the perfect time, and I feel like it’s coming along,” freshman quarterback Bryce Underwood said.

“The cool thing about what’s happening is you have a bunch of guys that are playing at a high level at the right time,” head coach Sherrone Moore said. “But when you rush for 200 yards for 4 straight games, it’s really hard to do that in the Big Ten. To do that and throw the ball as consistent as we did … Bryce was 16 of 23, and so to do that with the balance is huge and to do that in this environment, in this game, getting ready for the next one, was a great time for us.”

Underwood hadn’t thrown a touchdown pass since the Oct. 18 game against Washington (W, 24-7), but tossed 2 Saturday — 1 to freshman wideout Andrew Marsh on a free play fade route and the other to graduate receiver Donaven McCulley on a third-down screen.

Underwood completed 16 of his 23 passes, with that 69.6-percent completion rate standing as his second-highest in a game this season, for 215 yards. The 6-foot-4, 228-pounder tied his career best with 2 touchdown passes, and added 20 yards on 8 carries on the ground.

“I feel like preparation has just been everything for me for these past few weeks. Coming off of a bye-week, we had two weeks to prepare, so I feel like that just led me on my path I’m on right now,” the Michigan signal-caller said.

“I just think he’s comfortable doing what he’s doing, and just every single day he gets better and better and better,” Moore said. “He still had [one bad throw] … it was close to one thrown across his body. We had to get him on that one. We got lucky on that one. I think we scored on that drive, so I still got mad at him. It never stops.

“You never stop coaching these kids, but the best thing about it, he wants it. He wants to be coached. He wants to be pushed and just keeps getting better and better. He makes plays that you’re just like, man … it’s phenomenal. He just does some things from a football standpoint, and I’m just proud of him and his progression and the offense in general, not turning the ball over and then defensively getting turnovers.”

Bryson Kuzdzal steps up

Michigan was down both junior Justice Haynes (likely out for regular season) and sophomore Jordan Marshall at running back, stressing the depth of the group. Marshall, who went down with an upper-body injury in last week’s game against Northwestern, was available Saturday, but only in an emergency situation.

The Wolverines had no need for the 5-foot-11, 216-pound Cincinnati native, because junior Bryson Kuzdzal — a former walk-on from Grand Rapids, Mich., who had 25 carer carries entering the day — put up a productive 100 yards and 3 touchdowns on 20 attempts. He also caught a screen pass for an 8-yard gain.

The 5-foot-11, 210-pound Forest Hills Eastern product showed his burst that Moore has said is close to Haynes’, including on his touchdown runs from 18 and 19 yards out.

“I don’t know,” Kuzdzal said when asked how fast he is. “Junior year of high school, I ran a 4.4, but I haven’t run it since then.”

Kuzdzal was asked if he’s faster than Haynes.

“I’m not going to say,” Kuzdzal said with a laugh.

He’s settling in for the Michigan offense, and the Wolverines will need him moving forward.

“You can practice it. Once you get out in the game, it’s a completely different ball game, so it’s just a lot of experience, learning to settle myself down and do what I’ve been coached to do,” said the Michigan back. “I was able to do that today.”

The offensive line continues to pave the way for an elite rushing attack that hasn’t slowed down despite injuries to the ball-carriers.

“The O-line is amazing, and it’s going to be amazing at Michigan every year,” Kuzdzal said. “That’s just something that I think we built this program on — O-line, D-line, winning in the trenches — and you see it.”

The Wolverines have quickly turned the page to Ohio State, next week’s regular-season finale at The Big House. A win means the Wolverines are likely in the catbird stat for a College Football Playoff bid.

“I think we have everything in our hands right now, and we’re going to attack it as hard as we can,” Kuzdzal said. “We’ll get to it Monday. But we have everything in front of us right now, so we just have to keep working.”

The work has gotten them this far — 9-2 and one of the top 20 teams in the nation — but it’s not done.

Miscellaneous Michigan football offense notes

• Michigan’s 27 first downs were the most it’s had in a game since a 49-0 win over Michigan State Oct. 21, 2023 (28).

• U-M is 6-0 in trips to College Park. Michigan’s 45-point outing today represented the program’s second-most points scored at Maryland in series history (59 in 2021). It was also the second-most points scored by U-M in a game this season (63 vs. CMU).

• The 45-point outburst is the most Michigan has put up against a Power Four opponent since last year’s 50-6 win over Northwestern Nov. 23, 2024.

• The Wolverines ran for 228 yards, their fifth-highest total in a game this season, behind the wins over Central Michigan (381), Nebraska (286), Michigan State (276) and Purdue (253).

• This is the fourth-consecutive game with 200-plus rushing yards, after going over the 200-yard mark only three times in the previous seven contests. This is the first time Michigan has had four-consecutive games with 200 rushing yards since 2022 (Penn State, 418; Michigan State, 276; Rutgers, 282; Nebraska, 264).

• This marks U-M’s sixth game this year with 400-plus yards of total offense (443 today). U-M has also recorded 390-plus yards twice.

• The Wolverines have produced 55 plays of 20-plus yards this season, adding six more in today’s game.

• The U-M offense was 12-of-14 on third down, including an 8-of-9 mark in the first half.

• The offensive line has helped produce 28 rushing touchdowns, tied for 10th nationally entering today’s game. The Wolverines added four more rushing touchdowns in today’s contest.

• Kuzdzal recorded his first career start.

• Kuzdzal is the third different U-M running back to record a three-touchdown game this season (Justice Haynes vs. New Mexico, Jordan Marshall vs. Purdue).

• Kuzdzal produced U-M’s 12th 100-yard rushing performance of the season by the fourth different player (Haynes, six; Marshall, four; Bryce Underwood, one).

• The last time U-M had four different players each record at least one 100-plus-yard rushing game was in 1998 (Thomas, three; Williams, two; Cross, one; Fargas, one). Michigan now has 12 total 100-yard performances this season, the program’s most since 2007 (Hart, nine; Brown, two; Minor, one).

• Sophomore running back Micah Ka’apana set career highs in carries (six) and yards (14) in his first game back from injury.

• Sophomore running back Tomas O’Meara also posted career bests with eight rushes for 71 yards, including a 36-yard gain on a fourth-quarter carry in his second appearance of the season.

Underwood recorded his seventh 200-plus-yard passing game this season, matching Chad Henne for the most by a first-year starting quarterback at U-M, though Henne had three 300-yard performances during his 2004 campaign.