Michigan won on Saturday night. Barely. And in doing so, the Wolverines might have already used up the goodwill their preseason ranking bought them.
A team that was picked as a top ten preseason program is not supposed to trail Western Michigan in the fourth quarter. A playoff contender is not supposed to need a tipped-ball Hail Mary to escape a Group of Five opponent at home. Yet here we are.
Head coach Kyle Whittingham, in his first game as a Michigan sideline replacement for Sherrone Moore, has to be seeing the same tape everyone else is. His offensive line got beat up. His quarterback looked jumpy. His play-calling was risk-averse to the point of feeling scared.
The College Football Playoff selection committee does not forgive close calls the way it used to. In the 12-team era, resume matters more than ever, and Michigan’s opener is not going to look great when the committee sits down in December.
The good news for Michigan is that the schedule gets you-know-what real fast. Oklahoma on the road in Week 3, USC at the Big House in October, and then the annual death march through Wisconsin, Iowa, Penn State, and Ohio State. There will be plenty of opportunities to build a real playoff resume, or bury themselves entirely.
The bad news is that this team does not look ready for any of those games right now. The offensive skill positions are talented but young. The defense lost a ton of talent to the NFL Draft, and while there are pieces, the cohesion just is not there yet.
Bryce Underwood is the story that will define this season. The five-star freshman quarterback was electric at times against Western Michigan, and he made a handful of throws that no other Michigan quarterback in recent memory could make. He also made his share of freshman decisions.
How fast Underwood grows up will determine everything for this program. If he is playing at a first-round-pick level by the halfway mark, Michigan can beat anyone. If he is still learning on the job in November, this team tops out at a Citrus Bowl.
Whittingham’s coaching debut was ugly. His actual coaching career, built at Utah over almost two decades, is a resume of consistency and slow, steady progress. Michigan fans need to buy in on the process now, because the Hail Mary that saved his opener was not going to save every game this fall.
Playoff hopes are still alive. They are just on much thinner ice than anyone in Ann Arbor wants to admit.
A longtime sports reporter, Carlos Garcia has written about some of the biggest and most notable athletic events of the last 5 years. He has been credentialed to cover MLS, NBA and MLB games all over the United States. His work has been published on Fox Sports, Bleacher Report, AOL and the Washington Post.
