Michigan up to 7th in both Coaches Poll and AP Poll

Submitted by pfholland on
Coaches Poll: http://sportspolls.usatoday.com/ncaa/football/polls/coaches-poll/

Clemson is 2nd over Oklahoma by exactly one point. Also of interest is Penn State falling to 5th, Ohio State falling to 9th, and Wisconsin falling to 12th. Based on the "Others Receiving Votes" Maryland is 31st, one spot ahead of Notre Dame.

AP Poll: http://collegefootball.ap.org/poll

The AP has Oklahoma solidly in 2nd over Clemson. Penn State is 5th, while Ohio State only fell to 8th, and Wisconsin only fell to 10th.
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TrueBlue2003

September 11th, 2017 at 1:30 AM ^

representative of the fanbase, and the posters who think we're number 1 one week are totally the same as the ones who think we're 128th the next.  Riiiiiggghhhht.

No, it's just that the irrationally exuberant we're-going-undefeated crowd is very vocal after a game like Florida and the skeptical, Speight-hating, Drevno-can't-call-games, we're-too-young 8-4 predictors get very vocal after a game like Cinci.

The fanbase is fairly consistent in its distribution of each fan type and everything in between. But as though we're doing the wave, some sections stand up at certain times while others sit.

Joined: 01/05/2010

MGoPoints: 38075

MUUM79

September 10th, 2017 at 2:35 PM ^

Agreed, each game is unique. I was thinking MSU was going to get upset judging by how well Western played against USC. I still don't think we played horribly, had 400-200 yard advantage, key fumbles on a punt return and handoff exchanges, which are fixable mistakes.

Joined: 03/15/2010

MGoPoints: 1132

aiglick

September 10th, 2017 at 4:25 PM ^

There were two long potential completions where the receivers beat our secondary. One I think their QB overthrew the guy and the other the ball went through receivers hands. Obviously the plays played out the way they did but if those plays are made which a better team probably does then the game may have played out differently. Now, Michigan shot itself in the foot a lot and had the team not made so many mistakes, the Bearcats would never have even been in it. At the end of that day I think we have a pretty good team but the youngsters have got to work on cleaning up mistakes. May bite us at some point this year (though I still think with some luck this can be a special year) but regardless of what happens, the experience will prove invaluable for next year.

Joined: 11/27/2010

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XiX

September 10th, 2017 at 1:50 PM ^

Cincinnati wasn't as bad as most thought because they played down to Austin Peay? It happens.

Still, in spite of his stats, I didn't care for the overall sloppiness of Speight's play nor his continued struggle with mid-range accuracy. Gotta get that cleaned up, and I hope Harbaugh and Pep can, but he seems to have regressed some in his execution while growing in his decision making.

Plenty of time before PSU...

Joined: 11/04/2015

MGoPoints: 1508

myislanduniverse

September 10th, 2017 at 9:40 PM ^

I gave this notion some thought too; it's possible that the Cincinnati players (and coaches) were looking past Austin Peay because they had a much bigger game to plan for the following week, and APU didn't warrant taking much time away from that. All the same, I agree with you that what concerned me about yesterday was less seat Cincinnati did, and more with what we didn't. I'm happy to have a W over a team we were supposed to get a W over, but I see things that worry me about the future W's I want as well.

Joined: 09/06/2016

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Logan88

September 10th, 2017 at 7:32 PM ^

I can't help but wonder if Cincinnati spent the time they would normally prep for their first week opponenet focusing on UM instead. Austin Peay is the worst team in the FCS; perhaps, UC coaches felt that they could devote some/most of their prep time for UM instead of AP. This could also explain why UC played so poorly against AP the previous week. Meanwhile, UM had to focus extensively on Florida for the first week and experience the not unusual emotional "crash" after playing such a hyped game.

Just a thought that occured to me after the UM/UC game.

Joined: 01/05/2009

MGoPoints: 8078

reshp1

September 10th, 2017 at 9:20 PM ^

Frankly, FFFF and the preview here set unrealistic expectations. Cincinnati isn't good, but they aren't nearly as bad as the analysis here assumed. Their OL might not be good, but their quick passing style mitigates that and is hard to stop if they execute, especially if your DBs aren't 100% dialed in. We went to zone coverage a bit this game and it looked like our backfield had some confusion and didn't play as fast as if they were playing man-press. Their defense I actually thought was decent. They're undersized, but pretty fast. Their issues with Austin Peay were due to passive play calling. When they were aggressive, they were successful and they were against us as well. I predicted they would hit negative plays often enough to keep us frustratingly off schedule, but also bust and get big RPS plays on them as well to ofset that. That's basically what happened, with Michigan chipping in a ton of self inflicted mistakes as well.

Joined: 10/31/2011

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Woodstock Wolverine

September 10th, 2017 at 4:50 PM ^

I didn't get to watch the game yesterday because I was at a kids birthday party. I was following the game thread and the comments made it sound like Speight was the worst QB in the history of the forward pass. Watched the game today expecting to see a clown show at QB. Dude didn't play great, but my god people! Other than the fluke fumbles and a couple passes he played decent. I'm sure he'll get better. He's not going to be Baker Mayfeild, but I have no doubt that he can lead this team to a championship.

Joined: 07/16/2015

MGoPoints: 15496

ST3

September 10th, 2017 at 5:35 PM ^

I thought Speight played fine. My guess is some people read how bad Cincy supposedly is and bet on Michigan. When the offense sputtered, they were quick to blame Speight because he is the QB. However, there was plenty of blame to go around. Isaac ran for 6.7 Ypc, but Evans and Higdon were both under 4. Schoenle had a bad holding call wipe out a big run, but that guy is a beast on ST coverage. Harbaugh said that Onwenu missed a key block, and Bredeson, our 2nd best lineman is only 2 games removed from a poor bowl game performance. But that's the nuanced take, it's far easier to panic and blame Speight.

Joined: 09/11/2010

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PapabearBlue

September 10th, 2017 at 2:32 PM ^

And how long had Rudock been playing at Michigan, under Harbaugh, and with those wide receivers? 6-8 weeks?

This is 2.5 years under Harbaugh and it doesn't matter if you've got megatron or john q freshman out there when you are throwing 10 feet over your recievers on wide open passes.

Joined: 07/19/2011

MGoPoints: 2561

DrMantisToboggan

September 10th, 2017 at 2:53 PM ^

The comparison between them/their development/their time under Harbaugh isn't the point. The point is good QBs can have bad games at any time against any quality of opponent - and Speight wasn't even bad yesterday.

Speight finished 3rd in the conference in rating last year. He is beyond good enough to win a conference championship and make the playoff with, the numbers objectively bare that out.

I've accepted that a large chunk of our fans will always hate Speight and find a way to complain no matter what he does. That's fine - it's illogical and wrong - but their mind is made up. When this team wins in Indy in December I hope they congratulate him.

Joined: 11/26/2014

MGoPoints: 74183

lilpenny1316

September 10th, 2017 at 5:27 PM ^

That was Speight's stat line from the Iowa game.  That is not going to win you any games on the road.  Go back over the missed throws of open receivers in that Iowa game.  We lost because we weren't picking up 6 points on those throws, not because we gave up 2 points on a safety to make the score 10-2.  That was a bad game for the entire offense, but was really bad game by our QB.

 

Joined: 11/19/2009

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DrMantisToboggan

September 10th, 2017 at 7:38 PM ^

1) We lost that game by 1 pt, so yes, giving up 2 points did cost us that game.

2) That was THE game Speight broke his collarbone in.

3) Yes, he missed 4 wide open bombs for TDs, that's not debatable. Chesson also dropped 2 perfect balls, 1 in the endzone ("costing us 6") and the other in the redzone that bounced off him and was picked off, potentially costing us 6. Darboh couldn't catch the ball on the drive to seal the game, Butt also had a drop on a 3rd down.

 

So yes, Speight was not perfect in the game where he broke a major bone in chest. BUT, if the OL, or Chesson, or Darboh make one routine play, we win that game. Again I say, Speight was good enough to win that game, despite not being great. He is good enough.

Joined: 11/26/2014

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CalifExile

September 10th, 2017 at 3:53 PM ^

He was named the starter last year and this year because he is the best QB on the roster and gave/gives us the best chance to win. It's wrong to blame him alone for the final standings last year. Darboh and Chesson both had worse years than they did in 2015, the Ol was inadequate and none of the RBs established himself as a consistent gamebreaker, the way Isaac seems to be doing this year.

That said, you are right that he didn't play at his best in the big games last year and he isn't showing the improvement I expected in his second year as a starter.

Joined: 03/02/2010

MGoPoints: 12625

Double-D

September 10th, 2017 at 6:58 PM ^

He knows he needs to improve and tighten it up. I think his upside is better than some think. He understands the offense and reads defenses really well. He knows where to go with the ball. There is a ton of value in that. If the line can give him time and he can clean up the Tourette's shit he can be lethal. This is a young line and a young team. Growth is going to happen.

Joined: 12/21/2013

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