The Michigan football defense has been dominant in the first half of the regular season. Defensive coordinator Jesse Minter's unit hasn't allowed a third-quarter point all season, which is arguably one of the most impressive stats in all of college football through six weeks.

Michigan football even recognized the spectacular stat on social media this week.

The Wolverines have outscored their six opponents 76-0 in the third quarter this year. Not many of Michigan's opponents are still in the game at halftime, but if they are, any hopes of an upset are squashed in the third quarter.

U-M was up 21-0 over UNLV at halftime in Week 2, but the Wolverines scored two touchdowns in the third quarter to take a five-touchdown lead into the final 15 minutes.

The following week, Michigan held just a 14-6 lead over Bowling Green at the break, but the Wolverines tacked on 17 third-quarter points to take a 31-6 lead, which ended up being the game's final score.

Rutgers was within a touchdown of Michigan at halftime in Week 4, but 10 third-quarter points gave the Wolverines a 17-point advantage heading into the fourth quarter.

Minter's defense's third-quarter dominance doesn't just come in close games, though.

Nebraska fell behind by four touchdowns in its late-September matchup with the Wolverines, but the Cornhuskers still couldn't find any rhythm in the second half. Michigan brought its backups in before Nebraska finally scored a touchdown.

Similarly, Minnesota connected on a miraculous 35-yard touchdown pass with six seconds left in the first half last week, but the Golden Gophers couldn't add to their momentum coming out of the locker room.

Simply put, Michigan's opponents better do as much scoring as possible in the first half, because the Wolverines — at least the first-stringers, that is — won't allow much, if anything, in the second half.

Sophomore defensive tackle Mason Graham and defensive line coach Mike Elston met with the media this week to discuss the second-half dominance.

Elston talked at length about what allows Michigan to be so successful after halftime.

"Number one, I'd say our conditioning — the things that coach [Ben Herbert] does with the guys in the weight room," Elston said. "We come out of halftime; we still have focus; we're still locked in."

Even since last season, fans have raved about Minter's halftime adjustments, but Elston said the volume of adjustments during halftime isn't really that high.

"We make some adjustments, but it's not a crazy amount of adjustments," he said. "The guys just know the mistakes they made in the first half, and they clean it up. We have really smart players."

Instead, Michigan does what it can to make adjustments during the game.

"We have a very good offense that insulates the defense in the third quarter with drives. Sometimes those drives go for six, seven minutes on the offensive side of the ball. We're sitting over there; we're still able to make adjustments and catch our breath."

Interestingly, Elston said Michigan even makes small adjustments during the opponent's offensive drive.

"Offenses, if they find a play that works, they're not gonna wait for the next drive to do it. They're going to keep running it because once you get them on the sideline, you can make the adjustment, but until then, that's the great thing about rotating guys in, is you can make that adjustment before the drive is over."

Graham also gave his thoughts on the dominance in the second half.

"A good thing for our coaching staff is they keep everything calm," Graham said. "No one's really freaking out at halftime. Even after this game, they were gashing us on the run a few times. We just know that we have to be more gap sound. We just started doing that."

The sophomore said he sees opposing players get more tired, exhausted and frustrated as the game goes on.

"I just see, like, we wear and tear on them, and as the game goes on, we know they can't hang with us for four quarters. We know at some point they're gonna break."

Michigan will take its dominant defense into a Big Ten bout with Indiana at the Big House on Saturday at noon on FOX.

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