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Essentials

WHAT	#2 Michigan (11-0) vs #3 Ohio State(11-0)	fff
WHERE	Michigan Stadium Ann Arbor, MI
WHEN	Noon Eastern
THE LINE	M –3.5 (Vegas) M –6 (Bill C)
TELEVISION	FOX PBP: Gus Johnson Color: Joel Klatt
TICKETS	good luck
WEATHER	mid 30s mostly cloudy 0% chance of rain minimal wind

Overview

Ohio State University is a satellite campus of Oberlin located in Columbus mostly notable for the unusual architecture of their bell tower, which was built in 1926 but somehow bears an uncanny resemblance to the hollowed-out husk that used to be Kid Rock. Every September 29th, the student body assembles in their hooting masses around the tower and practices their guttural mating cries. The scene is quite disturbing.

[AFTER THE JUMP: oh god oh god oh god]

Run Offense vs Ohio State

[Barron]

A chart about the trenches:

This is a chart of adjusted line yards. The X-axis is offense; the Y-axis is defense. The upshot is that the Michigan offense is a B+ outfit behind a small subset of teams that fall into four bins, by in large: triple option, teams heavily dependent on QB runs, Oregon, and Wisconsin for some goddamn reason. This feels about right. Michigan has been good but a step back from the last couple years.

Meanwhile the Ohio State defense is a C+ outfit. (Note that we're talking about Michigan's spot on the X-axis vs OSU's spot on the Y-axis.) They're in a wide band of teams that are above average but not particularly impressive. And when you delve into even the raw OSU stats that seems to bear out. OSU's P5 opponents are #43, #47, #51, #57, #63, #91, #98, and #120 in EPA/play. (Unfortunately, these numbers from Game On Paper are unadjusted.)

The five decent teams:

• Maryland (#43): Maryland RBs combined for 23 carries and 85 yards. Tagovailoa had one called run for 7 yards and four scrambles for 32 yards.
• Wisconsin (#47): Braelon Allen had 10 carries for 50 yards before getting knocked out at halftime. Jackson Acker averaged 3.8 YPC after. Braedyn Locke ran for 25 yards on 3 carries.
• PSU (#51): Nic Singleton and Kaytron Allen combined for 74 yards on 18 carries, 4.1 per.
• Rutgers (#57): Drop out the 45-yard trick play fake sneak and Kyle Monangai and Sam Brown combined for 29 attempts at 4.8 YPC. Gavin Wimsatt added 56 yards on ten designed runs.
• Notre Dame (#63): Five different running backs combined for 174 yards on 33 carries, 5.3 an attempt.

That looks fairly encouraging from Michigan's point of view. Michigan probably doesn't win if they have Maryland/PSU output but does if they get Rutgers/ND/Braelon Allen production, and it's worth noting that Ohio State has not played a team in possession of a quarterback who is… uh… good. For the purposes of this section that means "is a run threat but is not a passer so limited you can flood the box."

The downside for Michigan is that they're not better than the broad middle listed above in EPA/play. They're actually just 68th. That's because they haven't hit home runs at anywhere near the rate they did last year; their success rate is still high. The upside is that Michigan has another gear to go to by involving McCarthy on the ground, which they have not done much all season, and that they've probably got a spectacular July Drive package involving Edwards and Mullings, or Edwards and Corum.

OSU is relatively thin on their defensive front. Tyleik Williams, who is excellent, barely leaves the field. The other DT spot rotates between reasonably good, but one dimensional players. Ty Hamilton is a run defender with a minimal impact as a rusher. Michael Hall Jr. is a fantastic interior pass rusher who's upfield explosion is often counterproductive when he's defending a run. Hall has been injured but says he'll play this weekend. The two starting ends and linebackers barely come off the field.

If Michigan is able to sustain some drives, whether by run or pass early, things could snowball as the body blows get home. Notre Dame got back into their game against OSU after facing a 10-0 deficit with a series of between-the tackles runs. ND's tackles are very good but their interior line isn't anywhere near Michigan's, and there's a version of this game where a less insanely aggressive Jim Knowles ends up bending and then breaking late in the game.

KEY MATCHUP: MICHIGAN vs EXPLOSIVE RUNS. Michigan has a much better shot at getting explosives in this game because they'll make OSU account for McCarthy, and they'll have some playbook stuff to dump out. I think Michigan will have some success grinding out first downs but not enough to just plow down the field.

Pass Offense vs Ohio State

[Barron]

OSU has been dominant here but the Ain't Played Nobody that has plagued Michigan stats is also relevant here. Since OSU played Wisconsin's backup, the only two semi-functional QBs OSU has played are ND's Sam Hartman and Maryland's Taulia Tagovailoa.

Tagovailoa was not the Tagovailoa Michigan saw, as he completed just 21 of 41 attempts despite remaining relatively clean and throwing two hideous interceptions, the first a five-yard throw well behind his WR, the second a classic Tagovailoa bad decision on a rollout. He was relatively clean in that game (32% pressure rate); he didn't throw the dimes he did against Michigan. Hartman was fine, completing 17/25 passes for 7 yards an attempt. He went off a cliff when pressured.

That said, OSU's pass defense is off-the-charts good in adjusted EPA allowed:

They've done all they can against Nobody.

Michigan number one concern here is Karsen Barnhart. Barnhart has never excelled in any phase in either my charting or PFF's but he's been steady. That went out the window a month ago. Barnhart's last four PFF pass pro grades: 57, 42, 0, 49. The 0 was against Penn State, where he got McCarthy crushed three times on Michigan's first two drives. This led to a hilarious-at-the-time second half where Michigan did not record an official pass attempt.

Entering the Ohio State game this feels less hilarious, especially after Barnhart had three different –2 pass pro events against Maryland last week. I had asserted after PSU that the road environment and meep-meep PSU DEs were outliers and Barnhart would be fine against OSU; now I am far less sanguine.

OSU returns the same defensive ends they had a year ago, when Barnhart was bad on the ground but fine (2 pass pro minuses) in this phase. Both OSU defensive ends have taken a step forward, though, and Barnhart appeared to be treading water until the past two weeks when he went backwards in a hurry. Jack Sawyer is the better rusher, with a 19% win rate; JTT is improved but still at 15%. That's still a major step forward from his 9% last year. Both guys are more in the mold of huge five star guys who are beefy but aren't superior edge rushers. They're more likely to bull a guy back into the QB. This has been something Barnhart's handled okay. But if you're not nervous you're not paying attention.

The good news, such as it is, is that Michigan can bench Barnhart if the need arises. Michigan is saying that Myles Hinton is available after a scary moment and gimpy walk to the locker room last week; I think it's unlikely that's, you know, true. But Michigan does have Trente Jones, another fifth-year senior with starting experience. Jones is powerful and seems like a good bet to be able to slow down a JTT.

If Michigan's able to get McCarthy clean looks he'll  be staring down an improved secondary. Denzel Burke is pushing for first round status after being pretty mid over the course of his career. Davison Igbinosun, an Ole Miss transfer, is just okay. He's grabby, having had six PI/holding calls on him this year, and Roman Wilson could easily distance himself if they get that matchup. S Lathan Ransom is almost certainly out for this game, and while the obvious joke is to hur hur about how that's a big miss for Michigan there's a reason he was starting and playing well in all games not against Michigan the past couple years.

Michigan's place to attack is likely the linebackers. Teams are completing 76% of their passes when Steele Chambers and Tommy Eichenberg are targeted, for about nine yards a catch. Most of these teams are absolutely horrible at doing offense and do not have linebacker-murdering guys like Donovan Edwards and Colston Loveland available. If Michigan is able to pay off the line yards advantage described in the previous section, a heavy dose—ATTENTION SHERRONE MOORE: HEAVY DOSE—of play action should provide open chunk plays over the middle.

JJ McCarthy? Well, he's been great in 8 games, gets an incomplete for the PSU game, and was bad last week largely because he was making decisions not to throw at open post routes with no deep safety. You could not predict that occurrence prior to the game; it probably won't recur. But, I mean, it's football. Unexpected stuff happens.

KEY MATCHUP: KARSEN BARNHART vs EITHER OHIO STATE OR THE INEXPLICABLE AVERSION TO PLAYING TRENTE JONES. If Barnhart's falling apart again you have to make the move.

Run Defense vs Ohio State

[Barron]

Ohio State has been either inexplicably awful here, if you look through the lens of OSU's talent level, or predictably awful here, if you look through the lens of who their head coach is. Entering the game they're 93rd in EPA/play, and that's a surge from 104th a couple weeks ago. That surge is based on beating in the heads of Michigan State and Minnesota, two hideous run defenses. The week before OSU ripped Minnesota, Purdue—PURDUE—put up 358 rushing yards on them. Michigan State went out the next week and gave up 241 yards to Indiana.

With Miyan Williams out for the season, OSU is near-exclusively running TreVeyon Henderson and Chip Trayanum. Trayanum remains the limited bruiser he was a year ago. The oft-injured Henderson missed four games after doing exactly one thing against Notre Dame, then returned with a vengeance. Henderson is a home run hitter who's been put in position to hit home runs. Alex on the one thing:

Henderson had a bit of a dud of a sophomore year in 2022, battling injuries and never looking like his electric self from 2021, but this year he seems to be back. This play changed the Notre Dame game:

That's the TreVeyon Henderson that had me terrified going into the 2021 edition of The Game, the one that can turn one missed tackle into a touchdown from anywhere on the field. I still am not sure if Henderson is a great runner at breaking tackles or grinding out yardage, but he's looked quicker and more instinctual as a runner this season and should be generating considerable NFL interest as a result of his exploits this season.

That is first and foremost a hideous play for the ND linebacker who puts his head down and doesn't even see Henderson bounce outside, but when you get an error Henderson is the kind of guy who zips past safety angles and turns an eight yard run into 61. That's the danger for a Michigan team that seems likely to sit back and rely on the defensive line to win enough to offset the inevitable 5-yard runs when you're playing even in the box. What if playing it safe doesn't really buy you anything?

When you aren't getting a lightning bolt to the face, Henderson can be handled. ND bottled up Henderson aside from the above, holding him to 2.5 YPC. He's not a guy who grinds out YAC when he's met near the line of scrimmage—most of his yards after contact are after breaking tackles in the open field—and while he's a slasher who will jet through a gap if you give him one, when he's faced with a closed front he's going to bounce it, and if you have a Junior Colson you can probably track him down. OSU has only faced one half-decent run defense since Henderson came back, and that was against Wisconsin (#33 EPA/rush). Henderson had runs of 30 and 33 yards in the fourth quarter; before that he was workmanlike—99 yards on 22 carries.

Michigan is 7th in EPA/play against the run and have managed this despite playing with even boxes virtually the whole year. They will probably try to get away with that again, as they did last year when a series of early Chip Trayanum runs were ominously successful. The stretch game will be interesting; Michigan has looked vulnerable because a double of the frontside DT is possible when you run an even box and it's almost impossible for the DT to win that. But also OSU fans hate it because they suck at running it.

OSU's improved in part because they've moved away from a lot of boundary zone stretch, which the OSU ball-knowers universally hated, to a more diverse approach that mixes in a lot of gap runs, particularly pin and pull that suits Henderson's strengths. PFF run blocking grades are often goofy, but FWIW they like tackle Josh Fryar and G Matthew Jones (80 and 74); Josh Simmons and Donovan Jackson are decent, and C Carson Hinzman is not great.

You could argue that Michigan would be justified to move another guy in the box because the threat of Henderson is greater than the threat of McCord. I would expect Michigan to have a whole playbook of new stuff, in any case. Seth has been complaining about charting the same four defensive plays all year.

KEY MATCHUP: MICHIGAN TACKLING vs THREE OR FOUR OPEN FIELD HENDERSON RUNS. Michigan is better prepared than most for this, as their starting linebackers have missed a total of four tackles on the season. But eight vs 80 is kind of a big swing.

Pass Defense vs Ohio State

[Barron]

This boils down to two factors. Let's deal with them in order.

Factor number one is pressure. Kyle McCord goes full pumpkin when he gets heat:

Readers knew this stat already, but pass-rush will be key for Michigan this weekend

Kyle McCord is 5th nationally in passer rating in a clean pocket, but 110th under pressure.
-Comp. % drops from 72.7 to 38.0
-Yds/attempt drops from 10.3 to 4.0
-TD:INT drops from 20:2 to 2:2 https://t.co/ixN0vfmJ3b

— Zach Shaw (@_ZachShaw) November 22, 2023

That is worse—far worse—than the Drew Allar dropoff we talked about in the lead-up to the PSU game. Allar's completion percentage went off the same cliff but his YPA dropped less than a yard. In part that's because his clean YPA was 6.7 and going down to 6.0 isn't a big problem. But also: Allar's YPA when pressured is 50% higher than McCord's. Drew Allar. PFF's passing grade for McCord when pressured is 29. When he's not? 91. A huge part of The Game hinges on how well Michigan gets to McCord.

Unfortunately, the disaster that was the OSU spring game has not translated to the season. OSU's pass protection has been all right. Not great, not bad. Fine. PFF has them 60th amongst D1 teams in their grading, and I more or less believe PFF charters can accurately declare whether a QB was pressured, hit or sacked. I have a lot of problems with their run block grading; pass block grading seems pretty on point.

OSU has played one team in the vicinity of Michigan in PFF pass rush grading: Penn State. PSU gets a 90.7; M gets a 90.3. They've also played Notre Dame and Minnesota, who are about nine points back. Wisconsin (33) and Rutgers (50) are the other top 50 pass rushes they've faced. Pressure percentages faced:

• PSU: 24%
• ND: 41%
• Minnesota: 10%
• Wisconsin: 42%
• Rutgers: 19%

That is completely inconsistent. You can probably drop out the Minnesota number since that game was over at the opening kick since the Gopher offense wasn't going to do anything against the OSU defense; also it was last week so Don't Get The QB Hurt was foremost in OSU's mind. There is still a giant gap between 20% pressure, which you can live with as an offense, and 40%, which is the end of efficiency.

Meanwhile Michigan has faced a few teams in the general vicinity of OSU in pass blocking. OSU grades out with a 69; Penn State and Maryland are at 67, ranking 64th and 65th. Minnesota is 68th. Michigan pressure rates in those games:

• Penn State: 54%
• Maryland: 38%
• Minnesota: 48%

FWIW, Michigan's other games against P5 opponents are in a similar bin. Michigan had a 60% pressure rate against Purdue, 50% against MSU, 57% against Indiana, and 47% against Nebraska. The only Big Ten team to not get overrun? Rutgers, with a 26% pressure rate ceded. 

OSU center Carson Hinzman is the weak link, earning a cyan in Alex's charting and a metaphrical one in PFF's:

His 53.5 PFF grade is second-worst among OSU players to be regularly used on offense and that matches up with my charting. He got abused repeatedly by Penn State … Interior rush against Hinzmann in the passing game and weakness in the run game has been a recurring theme in the OSU games I charted. His PFF grades have been below average in nearly every P5 game OSU has played in.

G Donovan Jackson also drops off a cliff in "true pass sets," which PFF defines as straight dropbacks in the pocket with more than three rushers and a time to throw of 2-4 seconds. (IE, not dinking it.) Those weaknesses on the interior play into Michigan's pass rush strength. While they lack an Aidan Hutchinson edge murder dude (probably—Derrick Moore is actually grading out not too far away) they do not field a below average rusher other than Rayshaun Benny and DT Mason Graham is lethal.

This should—must be—a Michigan blowout where McCord is pressured on 40-50% of OSU dropbacks, whereupon he starts throwing dangerous passes and generally looking like a first time starter in a tough environment.

Factor number two is Marvin Harrison Jr. Also, to a lesser extent, Emeka Egbuka. There is a 97% chance that if Michigan loses this game it will be because MHJ ruthlessly dunks on the Michigan secondary, which did not look exceptional in their only outing against a functional passing offense last week against Maryland. I'm willing to write off Will Johnson getting hit on a fade route as an it-happens kind of event. Johnson has put in enough duty to expect that he will be excellent.

Josh Wallace getting crushed on a double move that Michigan was fortunate Tagovailoa missed, and then getting benched for a configuration with Mike Sainristil on the outside and Ja'Den McBurrows in the slot… this is our concern, dude. Sainristil has been an exceptional nickel for the past two years but his occasional forays on the outside have been less sanguine. On the outside, Sainristil's height is more of an issue and his excellent run defense is nerfed. (At least McBurrows suggested he might have some game in this department when he delivered a Maryland receiver into Tagovailoa's midsection.) I'm not sure how much to put on Purdue's last-second touchdown, but that was Sainristil playing on the outside and getting burned. If it was clearly better than having Wallace out there, it would have been more than an occasional deployment. It reads as a break-glass-in-case-of-emergency contingency plan. And the glass might break early.

Given the likelihood of pressure and weird zones that get McCord to freeze up—he's not great at reading them yet—Michigan is probably going to play it safe, preferring underneath completions to thunderbolts and expecting a long-yardage situation where they can throw an exotic blitz at McCord. Some efficiency interspersed with pressured incompletions and a couple of turnover-worthy balls is likely. Also Harrison's going to score a 45-yard touchdown nobody can do anything about.

KEY MATCHUP: JESSE MINTER vs KYLE MCCORD'S BRAIN. The ideal here is that McCord has guys coming from everywhere and he's throwing at Braiden McGregor dropping into a slant. Disintegration is a possibility.

SPECIAL TEAMS

This has been an area of concern for Ohio State, leading to an amusing twitter subplot where deranged Ohio State fans call for the beheading of special teams coach Parker Fleming. Parker Fleming is also the guy behind the @statsowar account, and must scroll Twitter on certain Saturdays trying to remind himself that he is not the Parker Fleming that OSU fans want to defenestrate.

That said, this has been mostly fine except for… uh… five plays. An accounting:

Michigan State ran a successful fake punt to keep a drive alive even though the Buckeyes had a punt safe call on. Other [issues] this year include a botched punt snap that gave Maryland a short field, a punted ball hitting an Ohio State coverage man and being recovered by Penn State near midfield and an ill-fated fake punt that did not work and gave Rutgers a short field that led to a field goal.

Play number five? The fake that wasn't against Michigan last year.

When not making game-changing screwups, OSU's been fine. They rank 51st in FEI thanks largely to a rock-bottom punt return unit. In addition to the turnover mentioned above, 16 OSU return opportunities have gone for 4.6 yards an attempt. Xavier Johnson returns kicks and hasn't done anything aside from a 32-yarder against Notre Dame. Also he has not had a return opportunity in the last five games.

Kicker Jayden Fielding is 14/16 on the year on mostly short stuff. He's 3/5 outside of 40 yards and has not attempted a 50+ yard kick. He's also the kickoff guy; opponents have returned just 13 of his 70 kicks.

Punter Jesse Mirco is "mid," as the kids say. His net of 38.6 yards is 11th in the Big Ten, and when opponents get a return in it's usually a good one. Opponents are averaging 13.5 yards per opportunity without a touchdown, and two of those were Youngstown State returns that collectively went for –9 yards. Michigan's not well positioned to take advantage of this since they've settled on Jake Thaw as their returner after Tyler Morris didn't scream fire/poison at Quinten Johnson, resulting in a Michigan turnover of their own. Thaw's been surprisingly slippery for a walk-on nobody had heard of prior to this year but Donovan Edwards he is not.

KEY MATCHUP: AHHH YOU PUT IT THROUGH THE UPRIGHTS

INTANGIBLES

CHEAP THRILLS

Worry if...

• Barnhart's getting crushed and they won't replace him.
• Michigan's light box is giving Henderson lanes.
• McCarthy's putting up BRs again after a season with literally zero outside of BGSU until last week.

Cackle with glee if...

• Kyle McCord is under siege.
• OSU special teams does something inexplicable.
• Michigan's gameplan rips apart the OSU defense.

Fear/Paranoia Level: 10 (Baseline 5; +5 for The Game)

Desperate Need To Win Level: 16 (Baseline 5; +5 for The Game, +5 for Burn It All Down, +1 for And Then Piss On The Ashes)

Loss will cause me to... die.

Win will cause me to... reply to every single Ohio State person who @ed me out of nowhere over the past month.

The strictures and conventions of sportswriting compel me to predict: 

This is likely to be a defensive battle, with Michigan attempting to grind it out early to test an OSU run defense that has been good but not great against teams in the general vicinity of Michigan; it seems like Michigan might be able to get the OSU linebackers out of position some. But Barnhart rather looms as a potential issue that could blow up a lot of stuff via both land and air. If he's able to hang in I think Michigan will have an efficient offensive day; I don't think that's going to happen.

On the other side of the ball, Michigan will put Hinzman to the sword and probably whip up on the rest of the interior line. They have a ton of depth to play fresh the whole time and the best players on Michigan's defense are pointed straight at the OSU weaknesses. I expect a suite of unexpected blitzes and zones that get McCord thinking, a lot of pressure he handles badly, a couple of interceptable balls, and Marvin Harrison Jr bailing out OSU's ass repeatedly.

In the end, the steadier quarterback should win out.

Finally, three opportunities for me to look stupid tomorrow: 

• Donovan Edwards finally has a Donovan Edwards game, doing damage in both phases.
• Sainristil pick-six.
• Michigan, 26-17.