More help coming for Bryce Underwood? U-M coaches ‘working diligently’ on adding one thing

Michigan threw only five times in the first half of a 27-9 loss to Ohio State, and there have been narratives created that it’s because they didn’t trust quarterback Bryce Underwood after he missed a few open receivers. Head coach Sherrone Moore insisted again Monday that early success in the run game had more to do with it, adding they were looking at bringing in more help for Underwood next year. 

“[It was] try to be balanced,” Moore said. “Obviously, credit to them. I’m not going to make excuses. They played well. They played better than us in that game, and we didn’t do a good job executing that game. I thought we had a good start and had good momentum. As the game plan went and changed, you got in the red zone, trying to get the ball in the end zone and … first play of the game, you have a successful 20- or 30-yard run, you think that’s going to work, and then it doesn’t.

“For us, we’ve just got to move past that. We’ve got to push through — we’ve got to learn from it. We have … usually it’s 24 hours. It was almost 48 hours to really get over that one. So, I’ll learn from it and keep rolling.”

One area they’ll look to improve — getting more coaching help for Underwood. We asked if he might consider bringing in another dedicated quarterbacks coach … he noted staffers Josh Sinagaga and Travis Russell had also been working with him. 

“[Michigan O.C.] Chip [Lindsey], he spends a lot of time with [Underwood], and yeah, that’s something we’re definitely looking at is bringing in other people to help, bringing in another quarterback coach,” Moore continued. “It’s something we’re working diligently on, to get worked on …

“We just have to continue as a whole offense, in the building, to make sure it’s the best for the players that we have, continue to work for it that way. I think we hit a lot of [Lindsey’s offense] and a lot of stuff that he’s done in the past we’ve done, whether it be tempos, whether it be the press tests, whether it be the pass game, whatever it was … but as you have a younger team, there’s less you can do with them, right?

“You can’t do everything. You could try to do everything, but then you’ll really be doing nothing. So, we’ll progress, and as our team gets more veteran and even in these bowl practices, there will be things that we’ll introduce that we haven’t done because we’ll have more time.”

All with the intent of making Underwood and the offense much better in 2026.