Another week, another Michigan football beatdown of a lesser opponent.
But this time, the Wolverines didn’t wait until the second half to get going.
Michigan (10-0) wasn’t perfect in the first half, punting twice and handling the clock in a strange fashion at the end of the second quarter, but went into the break up by two touchdowns — their largest halftime lead in Big Ten play — and never looked back, steamrolling Nebraska, 34-3.
It’s the first time the Wolverines started a season 10-0 since 2006.
“It’s a joyful, happy ride that we’re on,” said Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh. “It’s a mission, but it’s a happy mission, not one that has any anxiety or anger or any kind of fear to it. It’s a happy ride.”
For the seventh consecutive game, Blake Corum had more than 100 yards on the ground (he had 103 by halftime) and a score, this time he racked up 162 yards and a touchdown on 28 carries.
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J.J. McCarthy was far from his best, he connected on just two of his first seven attempts and finished the day 8-for-17 but did have a touchdown to Ronnie Bell midway through the second quarter, a rushing score late in the third and one final touchdown in the fourth — a 29-yard pass.
Michigan’s defense dominated once again, which was the expectation coming in. Nebraska came into play with its backup quarterback, Chubba Purdy, after transfer Casey Thompson was ruled out Thursday with a hand injury. But Purdy was knocked out midway through the second quarter after taking a hit when he slid awkwardly for a first down.
The drive, which was finished by Logan Smothers at quarterback, resulted in the Huskers’ only points of the game.
“We knew going into this game with the issues at the quarterback without position with (Thompson) being out, the play calling would be much more simple to help play to the strengths of (Purdy) and (Smothers),” said defensive back Mike Sainristil. “We just knew going out there, the play call style wouldn’t be anything crazy.
“We just need to do a better job of starting fast and staying that way the whole game.”
Offense goes ground and pound
Michigan’s attack wasn’t exciting, but it was effective, running 49 carries 264 yards. The Wolverines set the tone on their 12-play, 80-yard opening drive; they ran nine times (none of which gained more than 9 yards) and passed three times.
Corum had a 4-yard catch, then six rushes (Donovan Edwards had two touches as well) before he pounded in his 17th touchdown of the season, which put him into a tie with Anthony Thomas for fifth-most in a single season in program history.
“I always go into each game wanting the ball, I want it as many times as they’re going to give it to me,” Corum said. “It ended up where I got the ball a good amount of times, so I’m happy.”
The next two drives lasted just seven combined plays — McCarthy was 0-for-4 passing with a sack mixed in — and Michigan went back to the ground.
After Nebraska failed to set the edge on the fifth Corum run of Michigan’s fourth drive, the back bounced a rush outside right for a gain of 12 to make it first-and-goal. Michigan called a play-action, which led to Bell running wide open in the end zone for his first touchdown reception since Week 2 against Hawaii.
“That first one felt really good,” Bell said. “Really good.”
Curiously, the Wolverines took their time on the final drive of half and settled for a field goal, going into the break with two of their three timeouts remaining.
“Yeah, that was, I was beating myself up,” Harbaugh said. “They had 12 men on the field, I could’ve just taken the penalty and it would’ve been first-and-5, that would’ve been the way to do it, but Blake had six more hard yards of running and I declined it so he got those six yards.
“But yeah, it definitely did cost us one play because the clock kept running and I should’ve called a timeout there.”
On the second drive of the second half, the Wolverines marched on a 10-play, 65-yard drive, rushing the ball nine times. After Corum had consecutive rushes for 7 and 10 yards to get down to the Nebraska 3, McCarthy kept the designed run around the left side for the walk-in touchdown, thanks to a big block on the edge from Corum.
“I felt pretty big when I knocked him down,” Corum said. “Great run by J.J., great blocking by the offensive line, but yeah, I knocked that big boy on his butt.”
Four running backs touched the ball on the drive; Corum, C.J. Stokes, Isaiah Gash and Tavierre Dunlap, but Donovan Edwards did not play that possession. He touched the ball twice in the first quarter, rushing for 13 yards, and stood next to coaches on the sideline with a helmet on, but didn’t go into the game over the final three quarters.
Corum didn’t enter the game in the fourth quarter, but Stokes showed flashes with consecutive runs of 17, 15 and 14 to get into Nebraska territory. On second-and-6, McCarthy found Bell on a crossing route who broke a tackle, stayed in bounds and scampered up the right sideline but fumbled the ball just before he crossed the goal line.
Andrel Anthony recovered the ball in the end zone as it was headed out of bounds and was credited with the touchdown.
“That was crazy, don’t really know what happened, but shoutout Drel,” Bell said with a laugh. “It still being a touchdown made it all worth it. So yeah man, huge play by him.”
Stokes finished with eight carries for 68 yards, a career best.
Defense dominates from start to finish
Nebraska gained 34 yards on its first drive, 30 of which came on a third-and-6 deep ball to one of the Big Ten’s best receivers, Trey Palmer. The Huskers also put together a 12-play, 47-yard drive shortly before the half when Purdy got knocked out of the game.
Outside of those two efforts that netted 81 yards, the Huskers managed just 60 more yards total. Michigan’s rushing defense, which entered the game No. 1 in the nation allowing less than 73 rushing yards per game, maintained its status quo, allowing 75 yards on 29 carries (2.6 per attempt).
Anthony Grant, the Huskers leading rusher coming into play, was held to just 22 yards on 11 carries.
Junior Colson led the team with six tackles and one sack. Mason Graham, a true freshman, also had a sack to go with a quarterback hurry and three tackles. Harbaugh adimtted, Graham and Kenneth Grant were two freshmen he lauded in the summer.
“He showed up the first couple practices and t was like ‘okay, that’s in shorts let’s see it in pads’ and right away in pads he was really good,” said Harbaugh. “He’s a heck of a player at a position you really need, at defensive tackle.
“Those were the two guys I was referring to in the summer that were a gift from the football gods.”
Purdy completed his first three passes of the day, but he went 6-for-12 for 56 yards on the day while Smothers went 4-for-8 and just 15 yards as the Huskers had just eight first downs on the day.
Michigan completed its fourth second-half shutout in its last five games and has now outscored opponents in those quarters, 117-3.
“Coach Minter and the whole defensive staff do a great job when we come in at half getting the adjustments made,” said Sainristil. “We don’t give anybody anything in the second half, we just want to continue to have second half shutouts
“We know going into the second half it’s a 0-0 score and we want to win every half.”
Contact Tony Garcia at [email protected]. Follow him on Twitter at @realtonygarcia.