Michigan football: Wolverines deserve top 4 spot in College Football Playoff rankings

Now is when it starts to count.

As the evening light fades on Tuesday, the College Football Playoff rankings will be unveiled for the 1st time in 2022. The AP Poll won’t matter in the eyes of the committee. Neither will the coaches poll.  And to the public? The top 4 spots as deemed by a committee will count.

Tennessee earned a spot following its 5th top-25 win, a rout of No. 19 Kentucky. Georgia is the defending national champion and likely will nab a spot based on merit. You could argue that TCU — with 4 consecutive top-25 wins — has a case for the most impressive set of matchups among undefeated teams. Ohio State has yet to drop a game despite occasional stalled play from its offense. And Alabama is Alabama, though it has a loss (52-49 to Tennessee).

But the only team with as strong of a case as the Vols entering November is Michigan.

While a 29-7 win over Michigan State that featured 5 FGs by Jake Moody didn’t produce any wow factor, it did make the case that Michigan can grind with the best of them.

Second-half adjustments were the difference after the Wolverines led just 13-7 at intermission. Don’t think for a second that Jim Harbaugh is content with settling for FGs on 2 of 4 red zone trips after the break, but a 16-0 point differential is all that matters.

Blake Corum ate. JJ McCarthy improvised. Donovan Edwards, Luke Schoonmaker, Roman Wilson and Ronnie Bell all played their parts as the Paul Bunyan Trophy returned to Ann Arbor for the first time since 2019. And when the defense was needed, it answered, holding the Spartans to 61 yards after halftime.

Rivalries often test the level of talent and grit a program possesses. Michigan has plenty of both. And while it shouldn’t be satisfied with the number of points left off the board, Michigan proved to the nation it can win in crunch time.

One-dimensional? Perhaps. Unstoppable? A possibility.

Trust the run, trust the process

Corum surpassed the 1,000-yard mark with his 5th game of 100+ rushing yards. McCarthy utilized his athleticism and kept drives alive with his feet, averaging 7.1 yards per carry in the process. Edwards averaged 6.2 yards per touch a snap and showed off his hands with a 28-yard reception.

The Wolverines averaged 5.4 yards per rush. They picked up 27 first downs, 18 of which came on the ground. And the slow march to victory only proved that while perhaps boring, Michigan’s offensive game plan is effective regardless of the opponent.

Outside noise should benefit Michigan’s case, especially when mentioning the ground game.

Hundreds of miles east of Ann Arbor, Penn State’s run defense stymied Ohio State most of way and the Lions led 21-16 before the Buckeyes delivered a 4th-quarter flurry.

Let’s take a look inside OSU’s rushing stats from Saturday.

TreVeyon Henderson scored on a 41-yard run with just under 9 minutes on the clock, then followed that up with a 7-yard TD scamper after CJ Stroud found Emeka Egbuka for a gain of 42. Outside of those 2 plays, the Buckeyes totaled 49 yards off their other 24 carries.

Divide that, and carry the remainder … that’s a hair over 2 yards a carry. That’s been Penn State’s M.O. all season. Take a look at its run defense in games outside of facing the Wolverines:

• Week 1 vs. Purdue – 61 yards
• Week 2 vs. Ohio – 100 yards
• Week 3 vs. Auburn – 119 yards
• Week 4 vs. Central Michigan – 88 yards
• Week 5 vs. Northwestern – 31 yards
• Week 7 vs. Minnesota. – 165 yards
• Week 9 vs. Ohio State – 98 yards

Crunching the numbers, Penn State has held opponents not named Michigan to roughly 90 yards per game. That would rank 8th among FBS teams.

In reality, Penn State is 57th defending the run. The reason? Michigan went rampant for 418 yards and 4 TDs before the final whistle blew.

A qualified resume?

The Wolverines rank top 10 in nearly every major offensive category. They’re 5th in rushing (246 yards per game), 8th in scoring (41 points per game), and 10th in 3rd-down conversions (50.6%). Michigan is 12th (93.2%) in getting points from within the red zone, because Moody all but guarantees 3 points. Producing TDs from inside the 20 is the offense’s weak point so far (63.6%, 58th).

Defensively, the Wolverines have slouched their way through the 1st half of the games, only to rebound by the start of 3rd quarter. Outside of its game against Maryland, Michigan has outscored B1G opponents in the 2nd half 78-3.

Can Ohio State make that argument? Can TCU? Can Alabama?

Michigan isn’t flashy. It doesn’t have the pizzazz or theatrics of Tennessee with Hendon Hooker or Alabama with Bryce Young. It’s a “what you see is what you get” offense, and the defense does its job to close out games.

And who cares? It works. So long as the formula is selling, why stop production?

Four games stand in Michigan’s way before Indianapolis. Barring an implosion, the Wolverines should be 10-0 when they host No. 14 Illinois (7-1) on Nov. 19. The Illini have a potent defense and a Michigan-style offense led the RB Chase Brown.

All eyes might be looking ahead to Ohio State, but attention must turn to Rutgers, which is up next on the schedule, Saturday night in New Jersey.

Attention also turns to Tuesday night, when the first 4 “in” will be revealed.

Michigan shouldn’t be granted a spot based on last season.

But it’s earned the right to make to the cut in the first 4. If Ohio State gets a pass, why not Michigan?

Cole Thompson

Cole Thompson is a freelance writer for Saturday Tradition who has covered college football and the NFL for multiple websites. Thompson is currently based in Houston, Texas, and also can be heard daily on SportsMap National Radio's 'Just Sayin It' from 3am-6am.