Michigan’s defense is designed to stop Ohio State, and the Wolverines are already thinking about next year
Michigan football’s defense has allowed just 74 points to Ohio State over the past three seasons.
ANN ARBOR, Mich. — Michigan football’s defense has allowed just 74 points to Ohio State over the past three seasons, holding elite offenses and pro-ready players below their traditional scoring outputs en route to three rivalry wins.
On Wednesday afternoon, defensive coordinator Jesse Minter discussed how the Wolverines have designed their program to win The Game:
Anytime you go somewhere, you assess. It started with Mike [Macdonald] and then I try to carry it on. But anytime you go somewhere, you assess: What’s the thing that’s kept this place from reaching the highest goals that you might have? Particularly, it was that game. There was so many wins and a lot of success and a lot of really good defense. I mean, No. 1 defense in the country, top five — but is it set up to beat the team that you know you have to beat, that you’re going to play in the last game of the season every year?
When I interviewed here, it was: How are we going to beat Ohio State? And how are we going to beat Michigan State? Because we were coming off a loss to Michigan State as well.
It’s something you work on every day here. You work on it year-round. All the all the drills that we do, all the physicality, all the things — I even think our offense has things built in to allow us to be ready for that game that you see in spring ball, you see in training camp. So yeah, it’s a year-round thing, and it’s really important. Even after The Game, you’re already thinking about what you’re going to do the next time you play them and the answers you need to have for maybe some things you showed. It’s a year-round process and the guys here have really bought into that, and it’s allowed us to be successful the last couple of times we’ve played them.
On Saturday, Michigan held the Buckeyes to 24 points. And one of the ways it accomplished that was by generating a pair of interceptions and by showing Marvin Harrison Jr. coverages that he said he had never seen before.
“He’s probably the one of the best college receivers in the last 15, 20 years, one of the best NFL Draft prospects at that position in a long time. Great skill set, ability to move around,” Minters aid. “So I think there’s a lot of answers you’ve got to have because they can line him up in so many different spots. And then we certainly trust our guys as well. So there’s times where Will was on him one-on-one; there was times where Mike was on him one-on-one. But we certainly wanted to really try to limit his ability to wreck the game.
“When I go back and watch, them and Penn State was kind of an evenly matched game, and he was the difference in the game for their offense. And while he still did some damage on us — there’s a couple plays we’d like to have back — to be able to somewhat keep a roof on him and keep him from really being able to wreck the game was certainly a big part of the game plan.”
The Wolverines and that defense are on to the Big Ten Championship Game, where they will face Iowa on Saturday at Lucas Oil Stadium.
