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Coaching takes a big step back

Posted on by Kennedy
Coaching takes a big step back

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Michigan football has reached the halfway point of the 2024 season and is now in the first of its two bye weeks. Michigan writer Tony Garcia looks back at UM's first half phase by phase and evaluates the team. Finally, the special teams and head coaching.

PART 1: Midseason review of Michigan football's offense: Mullings and Loveland are the only bright spots

PART 2: Midseason review of the Michigan football defense: The stars remain, the chemistry takes a back seat

Kicking: A

The ONLY reason this isn't an A-plus is because Dominic Zvada blocked an extra point against USC in UM's 27-24 win over the Trojans in Week 4. Aside from that one attempt, it's no exaggeration to say that Zvada was perfect.

The Arkansas State transfer has made his other 15 PATs with ease and is perhaps most impressive when he goes a perfect 8-for-8 on field goal attempts this season. Those weren't chip shots either. Of those field goals, only two came within 40 yards, making him a flawless 6-for-6 from 40 yards or more and an even more impressive 4-for-4 on attempts from 50+ yards. That's a level of consistency that NFL kickers strive for. Because of his calm demeanor and ability to hit from deep without compromising accuracy, he has been compared to Jake Moody, widely considered the best kicker in program history.

Moody was the last UM kicker to win the Lou Groza Award (2021), and at this rate Zvada, a semifinalist for the award in 2022, could well add some hardware to his own trophy case. Zvada, along with Mullings, Loveland, Josaiah Stewart and Mason Graham, were UM's top five players this season, with Will Johnson earning honorable mention.

Poke: C

After earning third-team All-Big Ten honors a season ago, Tommy Doman has been exceedingly average at punter, which would go unnoticed for many teams, but this year it's just not possible for the Wolverines. In his best game of the year against USC, he was named Big Ten Special Teams Player of the Week after his eight punts averaged nearly 48 yards per attempt, five of them went for 50 yards or more, and he kept the Trojans within their 20-yard line. Line held times and within their 10 twice.

Outside of this game, he leaves something to be desired. Doman is No. 39 (out of 72 qualified players) in average punt distance (42.81 yards), well behind his mark from last year (44.3), which currently ranks 26th. Doman didn't pin teams inside the 20 line and didn't turn the field over, which made things that much more difficult for an already struggling pass defense.

Head coach: D-plus

What's the best thing Sherrone Moore did in his first year? While the answer to this question is unclear and concerning, let's make a few things clear: Even though Moore took over as the reigning national champion, his predecessor Jim Harbaugh did him absolutely no favors with the situation he left him with.

First, Harbaugh gutted the staff, taking every defensive coach with him. When Moore was finished reshuffling and rehiring, the only The coach at Schembechler Hall, who had the same job this year as last year, was wide receivers coach Ron Bellamy, who was arguably the worst unit on the team.

Additionally, Harbaugh left Moore with a series of scandals still unfolding. UM is still responding to the NCAA's notice of UM's alleged sign-stealing actions and is actively serving a multi-year probation sentence after the athletic department reached a negotiated settlement with the governing body's law enforcement agency, which affected a variety of recruiting confirms irregularities under Harbaugh's supervision.

Moore was implicated and since he was serving a one-game suspension, he could be considered a “repeat offender” on this second charge, which is currently pending. Due to a number of these things, it is safe to assume that assembling the ideal recruiting class or securing ideal transfers was quite difficult with many unanswered questions.

MORE MICHIGAN FOOTBALL: At 25, Michigan football quarterback Jack Tuttle is getting his long-awaited shot

Despite all of this, Moore has come up short in almost every way. Not having the foresight to pluck a quarterback from the portal (chasing the national championship is not a valid excuse; programs like Alabama, Ohio State and Georgia often do both at the same time) is completely inexcusable, either before or after leaving by JJ McCarthy.

Equally baffling is the lack of additions elsewhere on offense. The Wolverines added an offensive lineman (Josh Priebe) and an average receiver from the Missouri Valley Conference (CJ Charleston) and assumed that would be enough to replace an entire starting offensive unit? Coaches were either disingenuous in their answers when asked about expectations or they completely overestimated their squad's abilities.

Whatever the case, Michigan is fortunate to have a winning record at this point, and while Moore wasn't prepared for success, nothing he did seemed like he had steadied the ship.

Overall grade for the first half: C

It's been a while since we've said this about UM, but for one half of the season this is an exceedingly average football team. It may run, but it may not happen. It can stop the run, but it can't stop the pass. It can kick, but not push.

It commits too many penalties, misses too many tackles, and generally lacks explosiveness on offense other than Kalel Mullings and occasionally Donovan Edwards (Colston Loveland was good too, but even his longest catch of the year is only 24 yards).

There are several ways this can happen in the second half. The best case scenario for Michigan is that Jack Tuttle was missing the entire time and he was simply unavailable due to injury. Ideally, he doesn't turn the ball over like Warren and has already shown he can lead the passing offense better than Orji. So if he simply eliminates mistakes and is an average, serviceable passer, UM's offense will improve.

This will, in turn, ease the pressure on defenses who will continue to have to defend 11 or 12 possessions per game, often on shorter pitches than desired. The biggest concerning aspect of Michigan's first half was the lack of complementary football, but if there was one man in the room who could change that, it was always Tuttle.

Michigan has four games left to play against teams currently ranked, including two against heavyweights Oregon and Ohio State. The Wolverines will likely be favored in just three of the final six games, and should all of those results hold, UM is looking at a 7-5 or 8-4 season (there's an outside chance at either 6-6 if everything goes wrong goes, or 9 -3 if all goes well), which is pretty disappointing.

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