Wolverine247 Board

Overall, I thought Michigan played close to its best game this season, especially on offense. Borges appeared to really open up the playbook for Gardner, which allowed him to be successful.

Thoughts:

Devin Gardner is legit. He has a strong arm, good athleticism, makes good decisions, and trusts his instincts. If I didn't know anything about Michigan, I would have never thought that was his first start, he looked that comfortable and felt pressure in the pocket.

The wide receivers really stepped up yesterday. Gallon and Roundtree both had some great catches and rarely dropped anything. This may have just been a product of Gardner's accuracy, or they possibly just felt with Denard out they truly needed to step up to win this game.

Jake Ryan will be an All American before he graduates. He plays with amazing speed, yet he rarely makes a mistake. It seems every game he improves and makes some absolutely insane play. I'm really excited to see how he improves for this season, and beyond.

The linebackers overall are a really good group, and can go two deep with the freshmen and Cam Gordon stepping in. Desmond Morgan lacks the athleticism you want out of a linebacker, but he has a nose for the football and doesn't really make too many mistakes. His ability to read a QB and ability to trust his instincts allow him to make plays and he is a key component in this defense. Demens is inconsistent with his play, but overall he is very good in the run defense and solid in pass defense, IMO.

After watching some of the highlights, Kovacs may not be racking up the stats he did last year, but he is the unquestioned leader of this defense and is still great at getting to the QB on a blitz.

The corner backs are going to be nasty next season, especially with Countess returning. I'm not sure what others think of Taylor, but IMO, he and Countess are going to make a no-fly zone.

I'm truly disappointed in the offensive line play from this year. They just seem to lack that nasty streak we saw last year and miss assignments. Like yesterday on a couple run plays, there were three offensive linemen blocking one defender while another defender blasts through uncontested. Teams are going to continue to blitz because they are having great success with it, so hopefully Borges can adjust and find plays that can expose the blitz. Starting Gardner would be my choice because his poise in the pocket and ability to get the ball out fast and accurate so they can run quick slants against the blitz.

The defensive line isn't quite as bad as I expected it to be, and I'm really surprised on how much Quentin Washington has improved. Roh has his plays, but he is inconsistent. He has all the ability in the world to be in the backfield every play, but appears to take some plays off here and there. As I said before Q-Wash has been a revelation and has been that immovable object that we've been looking for, plus he has been getting to the running back and quarter back pretty consistently. He does need to work on his tackling though, jumping on the back of the player tends to be unsuccessful. Big Will Campbell hasn't been great, but he hasn't been bad this year, really a big piece in the run defense.

Running back play has been a part of the offensive line play, but Fitz Toussaint has been bad this year. He is almost too fast for the blockers and tends to get to the line before the holes develop and causes either no gain, or very little gain. Thomas Rawls deserves the starting spot after what he has shown and the way he runs. Not sure why the coaches refuse to take Ftiz out of the starting lineup.

Those are my thoughts on the game, feel free to disagree.