Our take on Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh’s press conference comments from Monday:
NEWS: Fifth-year senior John O’Korn completed 16 of 28 passes in a loss at Penn State and had a number of drops. Harbaugh said he was going to put redshirt freshman backup Brandon Peters in late.
HARBAUGH: “Brandon’s getting backup snaps. He’s readying himself to play. He’s one play away right now, and every day readying himself to be out there playing.”
VIEWS: O’Korn wasn’t great Saturday night, but he was solid.
“I won’t go into everything, but he managed the game very well, got us into everything, communicated, ran the offense very well," Harbaugh said. "There was some duress and plays we could have made, etc. … Some good, and as has been the theme for our offense, we missed on some opportunities, as well.
“We’re just going along the process of readying him to play. The backup quarterback always needs to be ready to play.”
He might get more snaps against Rutgers, but O’Korn is the starter right now, and they feel he gives them the best chance to win. We don’t expect that to change.
NEWS: Penn State mauled Michigan’s defense for 42 points.
HARBAUGH: “They got a couple of big running plays early. We’ve done a great job of taking away the run … then the quarterback made some really good throws down the field. They were able to get some big plays … We’ll go back and attack it and do better.
“We understand the issues. Plays weren’t defensed and defended well. For whatever reason, we weren’t in the proper gap, or were out of the gap and the ball hit right into that gap. We’ll keep coaching. That’s what we do as coaches.”
VIEWS: It was an anomaly, a lot of poor play from young linebackers, great plays by a really good offensive team. And it happens.
Defensive coordinator Don Brown is one of the best in the business. Even the best have their rough days. Tip your cap and move on.
NEWS: The offensive line struggled, giving up seven sacks in a loss.
HARBAUGH: “The line, after watching the tape, played very physical. They did some really good things, some things we’d like to have done better … I thought we matched up physically and really fought hard, played … not going to use the word well, because we lost the game. Some good things there.”
VIEWS: Redshirt junior Juwann Bushell-Beatty struggled, and right tackle remains a problem. He’s done some solid things in the running game, but this offense is struggling because of his position.
There’s nobody better at this point. The guys Harbaugh recruited are young, and the holdovers from the Brady Hoke era need to step up. They’re all part of one team.
NEWS: Harbaugh said the team still controls a lot of how the season can go.
HARBAUGH: “Teams that go through this can have a great opportunity in understanding where it nees to be, the response that comes as coaches, as players.
“We’ve got to keep coaching. As players they’ve got to find out what they’re made of from a competitive standpoint. When the going gets tough, the tough get going.
“It’s cliché … but we control a lot. That’s the other thing we want to find out, understand, control what you can control, and we control a lot as a bal lclub.”
VIEWS: There’s a standard they’re not meeting, Harbaugh said, but now they have the opportunity to learn it, he added.
“I believe we will, and that our team will respond,” Harbaugh said.
As for the anemic offense, which ranks near the bottom of most statistical categories …
“Every week we look at what we’re doing and really study that,” he said. “Who’s doing it, how they’re doing it. There are three things you look at: What you’re doing, what we're doing well … we’ll continue to build on that. Things we’re not doing well, we’ll do less of that.”
That included individual player evaluation. We saw freshman receiver Nico Collins last week … expect more young guys to get opportunities going forward.
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