Jim Harbaugh Preparing Team For 'Three Game War' To Finish The Season
Jim Harbaugh joined his weekly Inside Michigan Football radio show with host Jon Jansen Monday night to talk about the 38-7 win over Maryland, and to look ahead at the bye week and the season's final stretch.
U-M will finish the season playing Michigan State, at Indiana and against Ohio State. First, however, it is a bye week. Harbaugh and his staff will hit the road recruiting and prepare for the matchup with the Spartans during the week off.
To Harbaugh, U-M's victory over Maryland was impressive in a lot of respects.
"The preparation was really good," Harbaugh said. "[We were] locked in. There was a real laser focus all week. They practice really hard, which is good because as any kind of football person or coach or spectator, you worry about coming off a big win, a dramatic win against Notre Dame. Is there going to be any kind of hangover the next week?
"Some people call it a trap game and there were some thoughts of that, but I just never observed our team falling into any kind of mental lapse that you hear about. That was the most impressive thing is the continued preparation and effort and concentration on the mission."
The strong start to the game would take any doubt away to whether or not the Wolverines came ready to play following the big rivalry win over ND. The opening kickoff return for a touchdown by freshman wide receiver Giles Jackson fired up the entire team going into the rest of the contest.
"It doesn’t get any better than that," Harbaugh said. "That’s as good as you can start a football game. You talk about starting fast, and that was that. It was great watching Giles. His confidence has gone up and up the entire season with every game.
"I think the thing that got the entire sideline fired up was a great block by [senior linebacker] Devin Gil, and a great block by [junior running back] Matt Brown ... I think that certainly ignites your team."
Harbaugh was pleased with aspects of the offense in the game, and noted some areas that needed improvement.
"I saw a lot of really good play," Harbaugh said. "There was tough yardage to come by. They have played two fronts, a three down front and a four down front and we didn’t know which we were going to get. We got the three down front most of the game. They made some plays and we had some plays that probably weren’t the way we called them. But, [sophomore running back] Hassan Haskins, even on plays that should’ve been tackles for losses, he was able to turn them into four-yard gains, eight-yard gains. The running back play was outstanding.
"[Fifth-year senior left tackle] Jon Runyan had probably his best game. The line was good.
"Offensively, we missed a couple plays in the passing game. A couple gives when it should’ve been throws. It could’ve led to a couple big plays. [Junior wide receiver] Nico Collins should’ve probably had another touchdown on the fade if the ball would have gotten out of the quarterback’s hand a little bit quicker. He made another big play. He’s really becoming a force. He’s just doing an outstanding job and people are recognizing it. They’re double teaming him at times. That helps the run game when you can pull another defender out of the box to overlap as a safety and give help to a corner."
Harbaugh elaborated on the offensive line play and how it has been improving each week.
"It needs to be [improving] because the defensive lines that we're going to be facing the next three opponents are very formidable," Harbaugh said. "Michigan State, Indiana and Ohio State have tremendous defensive fronts."
Possibly the stat that stands out the most for U-M coming out of the Maryland game is that it marks two straight games without turning the ball over, something that had been a problem earlier in the season.
"Overall, I thought it was really sound," Harbaugh said. "No turnovers. The streak of not having any turnovers [is] a great thing.
"There’s a lot of good to learn from. I thought we came out of it pretty healthy, as well, and that’s a good thing going into our off week.”
The Wolverines' defense did not allow any points against Maryland. The Terrapins' lone touchdown came on a kick return.
"I think they have the mindset, the identity of not letting the opponent into the end zone," Harbaugh said of his defense. "You can see it with the defensive coaches and the players. They take great pride in not letting them in the end zone. If they get in there, they’re going to have to really have earned it. You can tell, they’re not happy when the opponent gets in the end zone."
Senior safety Josh Metellus stood out in the game, notching one interception and nine total tackles, with two of them being tackles for loss.
"Josh Metellus really had the game of his career. Not just picking off a ball, but I don’t know how many tackles he had. The tackle that he made on their running back, that back hit the hole as fast as I’ve seen a running back hit it, with the intention of getting up on the second level and running through somebody and it worked out just the opposite. Metellus came up from his safety position and put a lick on him, which was a formidable hit. Josh Metellus came out on the good side of that one. There were a bunch of other tackles throughout the game … He really played a tremendous game."
The red zone defense was huge in not allowing Maryland's offense to score. Harbaugh cites the pressure on the quarterback and tight coverage downfield as the main reason why the defense came up big in the red zone.
"There’s no question that the pressure on the quarterback, the hurries, the sacks, the hits in there [were important]," Harbaugh said. "Our defensive backs know they have to cover not for long, just good tight coverage, guard against the ball coming out quick because if there’s any time or there’s any type of double move or development to the route, our front and our pass rush is going to get there. I think it has really been effective and was really effective in this game."
U-M has an opportunity to rest and prepare at the same time with not having a game this weekend.
"Physically, we’ve got to get them rested, got to get them prepared," Harbaugh said when asked of what he's asking from his players this week. "I’m going to take some of the physicality out of how we prepare in practice ... Mentally getting them ready for a three-game war coming up, none more important than the one we play against Michigan State. We’ll keep the blinders on that."
Notes
• Offensive coordinator Josh Gattis also joined Jansen on the show. He talked about senior quarterback Shea Patterson and what has allowed him to find more success in recent weeks.
"I think week one, he put a lot of pressure on himself. He was kind of down on himself with turning the ball over. The thing he had to realize is it wasn’t all his fault. He just had to eliminate that pressure he put on himself in the beginning of the year. He had to relax and get back to playing football, being confident with his decision making and that’s allowed him to play at his best.
• Gattis also talked about why the offense has been able to find more success as of late. Limiting turnovers is a big reason why.
"Really, I think the only thing I see differently is protecting the football," Gattis explained. "Over the past few weeks, we’ve done an extremely good job protecting the ball. We’re still not where we want to be or where we strive to be, but our kids are doing a really good job executing [lately] and it’s shown.
"The biggest thing is emphasizing the small little details and eliminating the small little wounds. You look at our first five games, we had a lot of good plays and points scored, but there was a heavy cloud of 13 or 14 turnovers."
• The health of his quarterbacks with redshirt sophomore Dylan McCaffrey recovering from his injury has allowed Gattis to run more of the offense.
"Unfortunately, Dylan got banged up quite a bit early in the year," he said. "And, there was a point in the year where we really only had two quarterbacks, so it really changed the way we approached game planning. Myself, I didn't want to get another quarterback hit or another quarterback hurt, so we eliminated things that we were doing in the quarterback read game to make sure we could stay as healthy as possible. Once we got our full staple of quarterbacks back, we feel comfortable in running the offense the way we want to run our offense."
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