On the offensive performance against Northwestern

Yeah, thanks for having me, John. And yeah, it was great. You know, you score on your last whatever drives, only three drives we didn't put in the end zone. Executing at a high level and finishing the end zone, which was important. You know, all those drives that we got in the red zone all but one didn't finish in the end zone. And just happy for the guy's success.

On Davis Warren's performance against Northwestern

Yeah, he, you know, we talked about going in the game. He didn't have to do too much. Just facilitate the football with what the play asks. You know, sometimes I felt like he was pressing a little bit much, you know, in Indiana and other games. And, you know, he's getting into his own. You know, he hasn't played relevant football since 2019. Obviously, we're late in the season now. But, you know, this is his sixth game really playing. But, you know, he was comfortable. He facilitated the football. Completed the ball at 74%. There's really, you know, four plays. You look back at it, you really want. Two of them were the last two. One was the interception. One was just, you know, in the course of the game. But I'm just happy with his development, his demeanor. He's getting calmer. He's protecting the football better. And he does a good job, you know, keeping the play alive in the pocket.

On the interception

Yeah, so that was, you know, Northwestern did a good job on that play. They brought a pressure that they haven't brought all year. But Davis saw it. He was trying to get rid of the football. It was an anticipation throw. Like we practiced, and the ball just sailed on him. It just sailed over Colson. You know, you go back and look at the tape. He has him open. He's trying to anticipate it. He missed it, right? That's when you come to the sideline. He's gonna make mistakes. And you just let him know, like, hey, listen, you made the correct decision. However, the footwork can be improved. He was drifting a little bit on the throw. Like I wanted him to anchor his back foot and then make the throw. He drifted, and that's probably why the ball sailed. And they made him pay.

On relying on technique and what you've learned in practice after turnovers

Yeah, so you rely back on your fundamentals and you talk about the preparation. Hey Dave, you knew what you were doing. You just didn't execute it. We're gonna go back out there. We're gonna put the ball back in your hands. You're gonna help us go win the football game. And the course of the game, you know, you can't beat the kid. You can't beat him down. You can't, you know, yell at him. You gotta let him know what he did wrong, help him correct it, especially with the new technology of the iPad. And then you go out there and play. And I think the best thing for Davis was we went right into a two-minute drive and he was able to get comfortable and he was facilitating the ball. And then after that, at halftime, that interception was long gone because of the success he had in the two-minute drive.

On the two-minute drive at the half

Yeah, so going into the game, we talked as a staff and as a unit with the players that it was gonna be hard to score on Northwestern if we had one timeout a minute, 20 seconds. They played really far off. They wanted you to keep the ball in front of them. They didn't want any chunk plays in two-minute. When we had three timeouts in two minutes, we were like, okay, it's go time. So they went out there, they executed the plan precisely like they did on Friday in our two-minute drive. I was happy to see that. There's a couple of plays that broke down. Davis extended them, Fred Moore made a play. And then in crunch time, whenever we're third and goal at the three-yard line, or I think it was third and two at the three-yard line, they executed, which was our top two-point play for the game. It was a perfect time to call it. They executed it precisely. So just knowing the game plan, right, the players fully understood it was gonna be a lot of underneath throws, check down in the backs, just how they played defense in two-minute. And they went out there and did a great job. And I thought Coach Moore was exceptional as well in that using the timeouts appropriate for me so we can get the best play calls in.

On the importance of getting momentum out of the half

So we talk about the middle eight a lot. That was something I brought last year to the team, and I actually did a presentation on it with the entire team in front of everybody. But you wanna win the last four minutes of the first half, and you can double up possession. So we knew we had the ball coming out of half. When the defense did a good job of getting this ball back, we knew as an offense, we needed to make sure that we could go get points, whether it was three or seven at the end of the first half, and then we were gonna get the ball coming back out. So when we did that at halftime, the message to the guys was, we gotta find the best runs. We need to establish the run. We only had 10 yards rushing in the first half. The pass game kinda carried us in the first half, especially in the two minutes. So we had to find what the best runs were, how we were gonna format those runs to let the players go out there and execute. Fortunate enough for us, Kalel had a great run on first down, and then second down, boom, it was untouched. He popped it, and we were able to get the ball in the end zone where we were on the ball.

On the game plan coming out of the bye week

Yeah, so it made them play more on their heels, and it really opened up the run game later in the game. But that was something that was a point of emphasis for me. You know, you try to self-evaluate yourself every single day and every single game. There's things you always want to get back and you want to get better at. But knowing to be more aggressive on first down, and that doesn't mean just hucking the ball down the field, but having completion plays or extension of the run game with RPOs. There was more RPOs in that game than you've probably ever seen in the past three years with guys running those. So those were things that we evaluated in the bye week. And we felt that we were comfortable enough in that time that the guys could implement it, and they did a good job with that. So when you pass the ball on first down, you gain efficient yards, you're in second four, now you have the ammunition to go out there and execute.

On gaining confidence with the offensive line and the quick pass

Yeah, it allows them to know that like, listen, like you said, it's extension of the run play. It's not a taxing long block in the pass game. When you start getting these long lines in the pass game, that's difficult for any offensive lineman, no matter at what level you're at or how good you are. So for us, getting the ball out of our hands fast, getting it to your playmakers, five yards, and then if you get eight, nine, it's great. So we talk about when we get the ball, whether it's on the key screen that we threw the, I think it was the Teemo on the second play of the game or third play of the game on the first down, you get four, guarantee me four, then go get the rest. So that's huge for those guys, but also the offensive linemen just to, they're not long, sustainable blocks. And obviously they did a good job and only went up to one sack, which was on third down, and the pressures were way limited in that game.

On the importance of getting more people involved in the passing game to help Colston Loveland

Yeah, it's really important, not just for the offensive success, but Colston's as well. You know, if you can take eyes off of him and bodies off of him from covering him, you can open up with other guys. And I thought the best thing you saw is the receivers caught the ball with confidence, right? There was no drops out there. They were catching the football and they were making plays after the catch. It's huge for the offensive production going into a big game here against Ohio State. And you know, we got to continue that up.

On whether the run game sets up the pass or vice cersa

I think that's a game-by-game situation. Obviously, this year, we went into the season thinking it was gonna be the run set up the pass. The past two weeks, you can see against Indiana and against Northwestern, I came out and threw it a little bit more early, trying to open up the run. So I think it's gonna be a game-by-game and we'll see how that plays out this week.

On three seniors scoring rushing touchdowns

Yeah, that was really special, especially on their senior night, just to see them get in the end zone and how hard they ran. Obviously, Dono, we were trying to get him in there. When he got that one after Kalel, I think had three at the time. That was huge. That was a nice little trap play that we got in in the bye week. And then when we put Tavi in, I thought Jordan Marshall was gonna score on that kick return, because I was gonna put Jaden Davis, our quarterback, and Tavi in at running back. And when we got that done and then Tavi made the defender miss and score, that was really special for him. I believe it's his first career touchdown. Yes. I'm not gonna be wrong there, but his first career touchdown. A guy that, Tavi or Dunlap, I don't want to go too long, but he brings a smile to everybody's face, enthusiastic energy all the time, and he's just a great guy to have around the program. For him to get that on senior day was really, really cool.

On Marlin Klein's development

So Marlin needs to continue to develop in the throw game, but in the run game, he's been very, very good for us. You know, he's one of the best blockers in the entire country at tight end. You know, on Donovan's first long run, he pulled around the tight end from on the ball, which is not easy to do, and trapped the linebacker for us. He's done a great job with half placement, hand placement, and continue to get better every day in the run game. I'm excited for his future, but we got to continue to develop him in the throw game.

On Max Bredeson getting a long pass pay

It's really cool. Max, we were joking at the end of the game, it was his career high, two receptions, right? Tied his career high. It wasn't his yardage total, because I think Hawaii had a really long one. It was like a 56-yard reception. Yeah, so, but that's a play we had in for a while, we were trying to get off the sheet, but we weren't in third and short very often, or third and everybody thinks you're running the ball with Max in there in the last three games. So we got in that situation, it was the perfect time. We knew they would cut Max loose. He did a good job with it. I'm glad, he caught the ball and stayed inbounds. That's a fullback mentality right there. He wasn't going to run out of bounds, he cut back up and got as many yards as he could. So, not only for him just to get that and get that gratification for all the hard work he does, especially on the goal line and short yardage, but just to touch the ball a couple times was great.

On impressions of Ohio State

Yeah, they're really good up front, especially on the edges. You know, 33 and 44 are guys we know very well. Really talented, big, long, athletic guys. They're stout in the middle, some guys that we played for a while. Their corners are aggressive. You know, as we know, number one has the most PIs in the country, and 10 we know very well. And then the safeties, you know, Caleb Downs coming from Alabama, really talented player. And the linebacker crew, as guys we played last year, some guys moved around. So, we know them well. They're big and athletic, but we're up for the task and we're gonna try to knock them off the ball.

On what has worked before and using what works now to gameplan

Yeah, so just talking about them a little bit. In 22, you know, they were really, really aggressive. Last year, they were really back. This year, they're back to the middle. They're not as aggressive, not as calm. So, they're trying to get, you know, kind of a little bit more aggressive dynamic, but not as much as they were in 22, where they could let up the huge play. You know, going to the game plan, you know, we've studied them 365 days a year. We watch them, the GAs, the analysts, always break them down. So, we have a good feel of what they're gonna do and how they wanna do it. So, we meticulously put plays in the game plan throughout the season to try to play off them for when we play them. So, it's gonna be part of what we do, part of what they don't think we can do and what we're gonna be able to execute really well that we've had in our back pocket for a while.

On the importance of having a good game with Ohio State looming

Super important. You know, just to be able to run the football, be efficient on third down. I think we were 11 of 16 on third down and 101 on fourth down, so that tells you, you know, you're really efficient in those situations. Scoring in the red zone, finishing drives the way we wanna finish drives, downhill run game. You know, that gives us a lot of confidence. We've done a good job of protecting the football lately. We gotta continue to do that. But, you know, the guys were fired up. They were excited. But, you know, they were ready to flip that switch. You know, we got the trophy, we sung the victors, we slapped high fives, and then we're ready for the Buckeyes.

On whether Alex Orji will be included in the gameplan

Yeah, so Alex is, you know, Alex, Davis, any of the guys I've played are selfless individuals. They just want the betterment of the team. You know, obviously he didn't get in the game against Northwestern. There was part of the plan to do that. It just never materialized. And then when we started running the ball, really won the second half, we really didn't feel like we needed that. It was, you know how we did against Michigan State. We came out and ran him, and he opened us up. We were thinking about getting him in there and do some different things. But when Kalel did so well, it didn't happen. He was great. Jaden Denegal was great. Whenever, you know, at the end of the game, I went to both of them and said, hey, I think I want to get Jadyn Davis in there to get his first, you know, taste of Michigan football in the big house. And they both were outstanding. And they said, hey, yeah, let's put him in there. That'd be a great opportunity. So just the camaraderie in the room and the support for each other has been outstanding.

On Jadyn Davis' development

Yeah, so the transition from high school to college is, you know, is very, very vast, right? Especially at the level that we're trying to achieve and success we're trying to achieve at the University of Michigan. His development has been really good. His knowledge of the system is outstanding. For him to go out there and be able to operate everything. Now it's the speed of the game. Continue to speed up his feet, anticipating throws, protecting the ball a little bit better. But he's doing a really good job. I'm excited for his future. And he has a bright one. And he's a great kid. Comes from a great family. I'm just excited to have him part of the room.

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