Jesse Minter wants to stay in the moment at all times.

In his seven years of calling plays, the Michigan Co-Defensive Coordinator learned to avoid emotion and focus on the moment, whether it's in his playcalling, in-game coaching, or coaching practices.

"I called plays for six years before I went to Baltimore. So I have a lot of confidence in myself in regards to just staying in the moment," Minter said when asked about his comfort calling plays. "I remember, as a first-time play caller in 2011, I was young, and you ride the wave. You sort of ride the emotion of the game at times when you first start, and I think it's the ability to sort of take yourself out of the good and bad and focus on the next play."

Arguably the most anxiety-ridden person on Earth on a Saturday evening in the fall is a college football fan whose team is in a close game.

Maybe you take a drink of your beverage in disgust. Perhaps you love your team so much that you must stand up and pace in the game's most significant moments. Hell, maybe you're so displeased with the defense giving up five yards on a short third-down play that you need to walk outside and throw some things -- your phone, a chair, or that beverage you were once sipping for pleasure, you're now catapulting in anger.

Now, just for a moment, imagine a world where fans lived in the moment and saw the bigger picture on the third and shorts or when the opposing offense scores to open the game. For some, that's simply impossible.

On the field, the same emotions can take over. Oh, no, the top cornerback on the team was just Mossed on the boundary for a go-ahead touchdown in the third quarter—the team trails by four.

A player will naturally beat themselves up after failure and thus create a slippery slope that starts with giving up one touchdown and ends with several more blunders. Once you're mentally out, the other team knows and picks on you like you're the youngest of eight cousins in the annual family Turkey Bowl.

You're toast, and likely so is your team.

Minter wants his defense to understand emotion can help them, but it will hurt them if they don't manage it. He wants his unit to emulate the same mentality he uses in coaching and play-calling: staying in the moment.

"You want defensive players to have the next play mentality. As a play caller, the more you do it, the more you sort of understand that one play is not gonna make the difference," Minter said in a media availability on Thursday morning. "It's putting the guys in the best position, every play, not being emotional. I think sometimes play callers can be emotional in response. And sometimes that's not the best thing for that situation. So I'm confident in my ability to do that."

In his first year on staff, the former Vanderbilt coordinator and Ravens defensive assistant already sees that his personnel has an elevated mental understanding of the game.

"Great defenses are a 'next play' mentality. You know you can gain momentum as a defense, and that's good to use. Make a good play, everybody gets excited, you make another good play, and you keep that energy up. The really, really good defenses that I've been around, that I've watched, that I've studied, it's what happens when a bad play happens. How do they respond?"

"I've been pleased with how we've responded at times in practice. It's just a mentality of, it's always the next play is the most important play. The way I always have looked at it is, when you go back and watch games, everybody's always like, 'Hey, these five or six plays that made the difference, good or bad.' The thing is, you don't know what five or six plays those are as the game is occurring. So it's important to just play the next play, lock-in."

Minter emphasized that he doesn't want his team to be absent of emotion. He wants to see a maturation from his group surrounding the understanding of when to use emotion as an advantage without risking a backfire from an emotional shotgun.

How many times can you remember that same fan who was ready to risk it all after his team allowed a third-down conversion, then go on Twitter and declare a future national championship after his team forced a turnover two plays later?

Think about last season. When Michigan was up 13-0 on the road at Nebraska at halftime, it seemed like the Wolverines had no reason to sweat despite the two-possession lead. Nebraska couldn't move the ball if a bulldozer were carrying it.

Promptly, the Huskers scored 22 points in the third quarter.

Backs against the wall and adversity at a high, Michigan pulled it off and won the game by a field goal, thanks to a funky forced turnover and allowing only a touchdown in the game's final quarter.

Those are the moments Minter wants his team to have control of, and knowing what last year's team did when adversity struck; he's confident they will.

"As an old secondary coach, every guy will give up a catch. It's how do you respond? How do you come back and play? How do you stay locked in every play? So I think the guys have done a good job of sort of embracing that mentality. And hopefully, we can carry it over as we go — we will face adversity, and so it's how do you handle adversity? How do you handle it?" Minter said. "I look at last year and study what happened. On the first drive of the season, they go down and score a touchdown. Well, they responded really well, so at some point over the first month of the year, we'll be in some adverse situations, and I'll be anxious to see how we respond."

Lucky for Minter, he's coordinating at a program that believes it's at a different level mentally from its players to its nutritionist Abigail O'Connor and everybody in between.

In football, synergy is everything.

When it comes to a job involving many employees, synergy is everything.

A football staff is a hybrid of both, and how the staff interacts with one another typically reflects onto the personnel who actually play the games.

Minter's co-defensive coordinator, Steve Clinkscale, sees eye-to-eye with him on the mental aspect of the game.

Moreover, "Clink" sees this team's mental fortitude as a giant positive.

"Mentally advanced as far as understanding the game of football, I think this has been the best program I've been around. From teaching that to the entire team, the entire team knows how I teach block destruction, and how I teach man coverage. We know how the O-line teaches pulling or how we're gonna defend pullers," Clinkscale said. "I think our knowledge of the game is what makes us a hungry team to make us want to learn more about the defense. 'Well, why are we doing this? Where's my help, and who am I helping?' I think if we continue to do that as a defense and as a team, we'll continue to exceed expectations. I think that starts with Coach Harbaugh, and it's been an excellent experience."

Somewhere along the way, Michigan's defense will give up a big play, a go-ahead score, or multiple in a row.

How will they respond? We'll have to wait and see.

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