FORMATION NOTES: More tackle over stuff. This is the aforementioned play in Picture Pages that's just an I-Form with Lewan and Schofield flipped, mostly notable for PSU's super heavy package on the DL. Penn State brought this out three or four times.

They had one snap in an offset pro-form with Hayes in the backfield.

And, of course… this.

SUBSTITUTION NOTES: Gardner all the way at QB save one Morris snap after Gardner's helmet popped off. Toussaint almost all the way at RB; some scattered Green, and one Justice Hayes snap in a two-back look. Norfleet got one snap, a fake jet sweep that led to a middle screen.

At TE, Butt and Williams played a ton; Funchess put his hand down every once in a while but was mostly part of the WR rotation. That rotation has almost entirely come down to Gallon, Chesson, Funchess, and Dileo; Jackson got one snap IIRC and Reynolds none.

The OL was a revolving door. Magnuson first came in to replace Williams in tackle over sets after Williams gave up a sack, then replaced Lewan, with Schofield moving to left tackle and Magnuson generally existing on the right. Burzynski first replaced Kalis after his personal foul and then played most of the second half and overtime in place of Bryant.

[After THE JUMP: probably a rainbow of kittens]

COMPLAINTS FOR THE COMPLAINTS GOD

Well… yeah. For the same reasons that the defense's 390 yards allowed and 43 points allowed were actually okay, Michigan's 390 yards gained and 40 points acquired are actually bad. Michigan had 18 drives, setting the compressed one at the end of regulation aside. They got two bombs to Funchess, had one legit touchdown drive, had two FG drives of about 20 yards set up by the defense and for a variety of reasons did nothing on their other possessions. Even setting aside the two OT drives on which they weren't trying too hard, that's 21 plus maybe a point or two for the FGs over 16 drives. The hits over the top were not enough to rescue this.

Blame for that obviously gets spread around, what with Gardner throwing two quick interceptions and the WRs dropping a couple of important passes and … oh right 30 Michigan tailback carries averaging under a yard each.

Let us dispense with the frippery. Overtime.

They coached scared, and dumb. The first overtime has been hashed and re-hashed. Neither running play had a prayer and the chance of a turnover/sack if Michigan runs a simple high-low read on a corner with no one anywhere near him to help is negligible. Or you know what. The play that has no name.

The third OT was hardly better. I've seen a lot of "but they threw that one time" in the comments from the guys dying on Borges Hill. Yeah, they threw that one time. When they finally tried it, it was so, so easy.

It was the one-play equivalent of the 2008 Citrus Bowl. You had these corners trying to check Gallon one on one all day. What took you so long? Now I have conflicted feelings of happiness at this small success and larger-picture rage/depression.

Gallon gets a bad spot and Michigan is short of the line. On third and one they go tackle over and pull Joey Burzynski into 320-pound Da'Quan Jones while Erik Magnuson tries to fend off 300-pound Anthony Johnson. They end up short. Why do they end up short?

Because they set first down on fire and lost a third of a yard flinging an iso into a stacked line.

As a consequence of setting first down on fire and running a play at PSU's best defenders—after telling them where they should line up—with a walk-on and a freshman who give up 30-40 pounds to those guys, Michigan ends up with a 33 yard field goal attempt that misses.

Most of the time this grumbling ends up a side note about how that's going to bite us someday. This is the time it bit us. The problem's the same: fear caused Michigan to make bad decisions. They overrated the chance of a turnover or sack and reverted to tight, weak behavior.

They did this on their four-minute drill at the end of regulation as well. They got lucky on one particular zone stretch that cut all the way back to the unblocked end, who played it badly and let Toussaint squeeze through, and they got Actual Run Of Four Yards. Then it was third and twelve and Penn State was picking up an extremely tenuous pass interference call*; then it was third and seven and Penn State stunts their way out of the middle on the world's most obvious QB draw. In that situation, the free yards on the edge are so worth taking a shot at, but nope. Let's set up third and 12 and see what happens.

*[If the ball was in the air, it's PI. If not, it's legit. Looked like the ball was still in Gardner's hands when the contact came to me.]

For the love of god shut up about bubble screens?

Unfortunately, the bubble screen thing has taken on a life of its own. It's just a play. I brought it up in the first place to point to a larger issue with the way Michigan's offense seems to work. Michigan is setting itself up for failure by willingly running into fronts designed to stop their running game without forcing the opponent to make any hard decisions about whether they really want to isolate their corners. We saw Penn State play a bunch of guys in the box and then have a corner eight yards off and the final safety 10 yards off. The bubble is the dumbest, most basic way to make them do something else.

There are others. Michigan actually tried to exploit Penn State's formation with a curl/out combo on the last drive. Dileo's out seemed unnecessarily upfield and close to the linebacker, and Gardner missed him.

That's unfortunate. Unlike running the ball into eight and nine man fronts with an iffy offensive line it is the right call regardless of outcome, because your expectation of success executing that easy route is high and the payoff is potentially large. Trying that once in the fourth overtime is more taunting than coordinating.

It is depressing that Michigan is in a situation where they can't run at all and a cornerback lines up eight yards off a wide receiver and you don't have a hot check to a long handoff when you're just trying to run clock. Except they do. They got seven yards throwing one to Jeremy Jackson against ND—and that corner was closer to the LOS. None of this stuff is a fix for the larger problems of the offense but it would have won this game.

Borges put his players in positions to succeed.

We wondered about the Big Tactical Innovation after it was moderately successful against Minnesota. It turned into an enormous bust.

Including goal line plays since none of them actually happened on the goal line (but excluding the "let's center the ball" play and a fumbled snap), Michigan had 13 plays on which a tackle lined up next to another tackle. These plays were 11 runs that gained 8 yards (more than all of them on Toussaint's long run of the day, a 12-yarder), a seven-yard sack given up by Williams, and a scramble that gained eight yards. That is the product of three weeks of practice time and the futility there was only stopped by Lewan's injury.

Many of these plays could not be blocked by anybody, because Penn State was so aggressively overplaying run that they were in the gaps before Michigan could do anything about it.

Three guys for two blockers with the WLB meeting Bryant a yard in the backfield. If Kalis tries to pursue #40, the MLB, he blocks no one instead of an irrelevant guy. On second and one, a great PA down that a lot of DCs will just give you.

Or:

Meanwhile, when Michigan tried counters they were not able to get them to work because of PSU's extra guy and their defensive alignments. This play has been the source of much discussion because I think it's doomed and some people think it's on Glasgow:

It's pretty much doomed. Glasgow can't release vertically because he has a nose tackle lined up directly over him; even if he can straighten out more than he does he will probably only delay, not seal.

Even if you believe that these plays can be blocked you have to admit that it's very hard to do so with defenses putting eight in the box and ripping towards the line hell for leather. Watch the differences in the MLB and WLB on this Gardner counter play. Beginning of second half, first and ten:

After five straight passes to Gallon, second and ten:

Most of Michigan's runs in this game featured the former reaction. After this drive ended in a TD and Michigan started the next one with a throwback screen, Penn State actually played two deep; Gardner checked into an iso and Toussaint was able to cut back for five. (Apparently he can only check into runs.)

Meanwhile, Michigan's big bomb counter to the tackle over stuff was lining Devin Funchess up where AJ Williams normally goes and hoping Penn State didn't notice. We've secretly replaced the offensive-line-looking guy with a lanky bringer of doom every single one of you was told all week to identify as a pass tip. Let's see if you notice. Michigan got lucky that a linebacker backed out into a short zone instead of ripping up into a delayed blitz that would likely have been another sack.

Putting your players in positions to succeed should also mean playing your best guys, and Michigan clearly isn't doing that. AJ Williams is struggling immensely. Examples abound but here's a crystal clear view of his inability to get a simple down block on one of those 250 pound defensive ends Indiana was blowing to the sideline:

Despite most plays ending up like the above, Michigan is so set on keeping him on the field that they've installed a package no team in the recent history of college football has tried to use regularly. They benched Chris Bryant for similar failures so they could insert a 6'1" walk-on, but the idea they might spread the field with an actually good player (and a senior) is beyond the pale. That is truly magnificent stubbornness.

Asking players to do things they cannot do is not putting them in a position to succeed.

All this business about Borges, but doesn't Hoke bear responsibility, too?

Yes. It's impossible to tease out how much of this comes from above and how much is Borges's doing. I tend to focus on Borges because Hoke is relatively hands off with him, and that's from the man himself. The tackle over business, the constant deployment of tight ends: likely nothing to do with Hoke.

Specific tactical stuff in this game is on Hoke. Obviously, the mind-bending delay penalties. I'm guessing he directed the nature of the four-minute drive and the FG-to-win OT periods. This was a blow to the constantly repeated theme here that Hoke is one of few CFB coaches I wouldn't leap into a game of poker with.

I still think people are overreacting a little bit. This was bad, but Hoke's correct level of aggression has already paid off (the OSU win in 2011 was significantly aided by a go-for-it decision) and one blunder does not mean this is going to be Carr-era frustration all over again.

GET OUT OF THE HUDDLE.

Yes. In addition to all the things previously discussed, Michigan's offensive line is looking at Gardner with two  seconds on the playclock. Michigan snaps it with zero already showing—probably not actually a penalty because there is a natural delay before the ump looks at the ball to see if it's still there—and slides their line against a four man rush with no tailback to pick up the DE:

That turnover is a tangible cost of Michigan's inability to get to the line with 20 seconds on the clock consistently.

I think we do something here.

Numbers.

A chart.

Yes. For similar reasons to last week we lead with the run blocking.

So… yeah. I probably don't have to tell you that's a massive record for the negative from the line in the brief tenure of the run charting. I don't think it's ever dipped under 50%, let alone 30%. The pass blocking was a pleasant surprise. They should do more of that, I  think.

I thought bringing in Burzynski seemed almost petulant, but apparently it was justified that he replace either guard. Bryant was doing poorly, to be sure. Kalis was possibly worse. Unfortunately, Burzynski was not an upgrade and was just physically incapable of doing anything to the players Penn State presented him with. He kicked things off by forcing Gardner to make an awesome play lest Jones sack him; later on a stretch a PSU DT fended him off with one arm, like he was Taylor Lewan and Burzynski was some guy who plays for CMU.

Quarterback.

A weird game.

Devin Gardner 2012

Devin Gardner 2013

Shane Morris

Well… it could have been better. Penn State did a good job messing with Gardner's reads on two passing downs early; the first interception kind of seemed like a brilliant improvisation by the underneath PSU corner, who left Dileo wide open to undercut Gallon's hitch after seemingly dropping with the slot. The second interception was Zettel dropping off on a zone blitz to cover another Gallon hitch. PSU clearly entered with a gameplan to undercut Gardner's favorite receiver in confusing ways and executed that; Michigan obliged with the hitches and reacted like a scalded dog. Point PSU DC. That and the 4 DT look were clever ways to exploit Michigan tendencies.

On the other hand, Gardner had three opportunities to sting PSU deep and connected perfectly on two while narrowly missing the other. He flung some darts after avoiding pressure and kept drives alive with his feet. He was the offense.

Receivers.

[Passes are rated by how tough they are to catch. 0 == impossible. 1 == wow he caught that, 2 == moderate difficulty, 3 == routine. The 0/X in all passes marked zero is implied.]

Gallon derangement syndrome was costly early, but a couple of those zeros were penalties on PSU so the ratio of good things at Gallon versus bad ones was 9 to 5, which is still pretty good. Funchess had one drop on the back shoulder throw he really should have had; the longer incompletion I didn't think was actually catchable.

Heroes?

Uh. I guess Gardner despite the turnovers. Obviously Funchess and Gallon.

Not so heroic maybe?

Literally every offensive lineman and tight end.

What does it mean for Indiana and the future?

The offensive line is worse than last year. Joey Burzynski couldn't crack the lineup last year.

Michigan should be a 3-4 wide pass-oriented outfit the rest of the year. Ride or die with Gardner interceptions.

Devin Funchess is a monster. Second straight game he's flat run by a cornerback on a fly route. He's going to have some crazy numbers by the end of the year.

I need a drink.