Michigan Wolverines football second-year offensive line coach Ed Warinner deserves plenty of credit for the way the Maize and Blue's rushing attack has taken off in recent weeks, culminating in last Saturday's 303-yard effort against Notre Dame.
Warinner spoke about that performance this week, along with the mentality the team had against the Irish and why the Sept. 21 blowout loss at Wisconsin served as a wakeup call.
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NEWS: Redshirt freshman running back Hassan Haskins has emerged as a key cog in Michigan's offensive attack this season, rushing for a career-best 149 yards last week against Notre Dame and averaging 100.6 yards over U-M's last three outings.
Almost nobody would have predicted this coming into the season, seeing as how freshman Zach Charbonnet, redshirt freshman Christian Turner and senior Tru Wilson were viewed as the Wolverines' top trio at the position, while Haskins was expected to be fourth-string at best.
WARINNER: “He had shown a lot of good things in practice, with his talents, vision and cutting abilities to break tackles.
"Hassan also showed signs all throughout training camp of his explosiveness and his great vision.
"I’m happy for him and for us, because now he’s gotten to manifest that onto the playing field in games.
"Zach had also been playing consistent, so now we have a one/two punch there. Tru was a valuable guy for us last year and is now starting to come into his own again.”
VIEWS: Running back was viewed as arguably the biggest concern on the whole team heading into the season (along with defensive tackle), and for good reason.
Outside of Wilson, nothing but youth and inexperience resided at the spot, and those worries came to fruition in a lot of ways through the first month of the season when Charbonnet looked to be the only impactful contributor at the position (though he was banged up and limited for several games).
A flip was seemingly switched for both the running backs and the offensive line in the Oct. 12 win at Illinois, when both Charbonnet and Haskins eclipsed the 100-yard mark and the team rushed for 295 yards as a whole.
Michigan racked up 141 yards on the ground against an elite Penn State front seven the following week, before it all culminated with a 303-yard rushing effort last Saturday against Notre Dame.
Warinner and head coach Jim Harbaugh have supposedly played a bigger role in the offensive game planning in recent weeks, reverting back to more of a power running style.
Whatever they have done is clearly working, and Charbonnet and Haskins were the main beneficiaries against the Irish (along with Wilson to a lesser degree, who ripped off a 27-yard touchdown run as part of his 45-yard showing).
