Michigan Wolverines Football 31, Washington 10-Notes, Quotes & Observations

Former Michigan coach Bo Schembechler would have loved Michigan’s 31-10 win over Washington Saturday night. It was so run heavy that even the late coach's linemen from the '70s might have been jealous, and fans looking for a track meet were disappointed — perhaps even bored.

But there was no questioning the beauty of the dominance up front by the U-M offensive line, which had its way with Washington’s bigger (than Western Michigan) defensive front, carving lanes for a pair of 100-yard backs on the way to 335 for the game.

An eight-play, 73-yard scoring drive all on the ground to open the second half epitomized the workmanlike effort of the men up front. There was variation in the play calls, head coach Jim Harbaugh insisted — they weren’t just running the three yards and a cloud of dust dives from the 70s — and it was more than enough Saturday night.

U-M’s offensive line, frankly, looked Wisconsin-esque in bludgeoning the Huskies, and while it could have been worse (and naysayers would say probably should have been), the Wolverines met their objective.

“When you’re generating that kind of production on first down, and the first-down running game production was good … when we were second-and-six, that was rare,” Harbaugh said. “Most of the time it was second and five, second and four, and it was just keep seeing it. They were having a hard time tackling those running backs, Hassan [Haskins] and Blake [Corum]. They’re tough to tackle. You just want to keep going back to the well when that’s the case. You’ve got to make your opponent stop what you’re doing.

"I thought Josh did a great job staying with that, and even then attacking the ‘C’ gap … really became good at the ‘C’ gap. There were adjustments made. It wasn’t just that we were running the same play, but as they adjusted, we adjusted.”

They blew the Huskies’ big front off the ball even when they stacked the box, Corum (172 yards, three touchdowns, including a 67-yarder in the second) noted. They continued to grind out yardage in the second half with Haskins (155 yards and a score), playing comfortably ahead and never really in danger of losing.