Legendary Florida and Ohio State coach Urban Meyer knew he'd likely get in trouble for what he was about to say.
Still, he said it anyway. The man who went 7-0 with the Buckeyes against the Wolverines when he coached in Columbus heaped praise on Michigan football
after it bounced back from a lackluster effort in a fortunate 13-12 season-opening win over Western Michigan and followed it with a statement: a 17-10 victory over then-No. 10 Oklahoma.
The season, in many respects, was on the rails early. A loss would've likely led to loss of confidence and even more negativity from the outside. Instead, U-M put together a sound performance led by dominant defense and scintillating special teams to top the Sooners and move back into the top 20 of the national
rankings.
Meyer acknowledged his relationship with coach Kyle Whittingham, who was Utah's defensive coordinator when Meyer was the head coach in 2003-04, before saying that had nothing to do with his assessment of U-M's most recent effort.
“I got to be careful flying into Columbus, Ohio, I might get assaulted," Meyer began on the Triple-Option podcast. "I know the [Michigan] staff, and even if that was the previous staff, it is what it is. That was an A-plus. The negativity − because the reality is they should be 1-1, they should have lost [against Western]. But here’s the good thing:You won’t hear anybody talk about Western Michigan again now because they took care of business.”
Offensive lineman Blake Frazier wasn't pleased with the narratives floating around social media following Week 1, but he didn't take it to heart. He simply said after the game that "there’s a lot of people that don’t really understand football the way that we do that like to display their opinions, and to us, that doesn’t really matter."
Whittingham, meanwhile, doesn't have social media. Not only that, he said he doesn't read anything in media because he "doesn't have time for that" but acknowledged if U-M was treated unfairly, as the question he was asked suggested, "we probably deserved it because we didn't play very well."
Whittingham put the onus on himself for not having his team in the right head space ahead of the opener, so he doubled down in practice. Not only more physicality, but increased urgency from everybody at every turn.
“The mantra last week was ‘do more’ in every capacity,” Whittingham said Monday, Sept. 14 at his weekly press conference. “Do more with your nutrition. Do more with your hydration. Do more with the weight room, and they answered the bell. We took that to heart."
The result was one of the best wins any team across the country (outside of Oklahoma State beating Oregon and Texas beating Ohio State) has on their resume. This was far from a guarantee. Michigan, which a week prior was a heavy favorite, fell all the way to 4½-point underdogs by kickoff.
The turnaround all started the following morning after the disappointing Week 1 performance. Captain Trey Pierce suggested to his fellow captains Rod Moore, Jordan Marshall and Bryce Underwood they gather their teammates for a players-only meeting.
The specific message was kept in-house, but the essence was the opener was not a display of Michigan football, and that's unacceptable moving forward. Then, Whittingham said he honed in on those two words for his team moving into its first true test of the year: "Do more."
But as Meyer knows, it's one thing to say it and another thing entirely to achieve it.
Whittingham talked about a more physical practice on "bloody Tuesday," which included “more hitting, more finishing blocks [and] more contact drills.” Had Michigan fallen to OU, it's hard to say where the morale would've been.
But that hypothetical won't be discovered. Instead, Michigan is 2-0 moving into a game against UTEP as a five-touchdown favorite. In all likelihood, U-M will finish its nonconference slate undefeated for the first time since 2023, its national title season.
In other words, the message worked. Now it's up to the Wolverines to show they're still trending up.
“How do you get buy-in? A signature win,” Meyer said. “You can’t talk your way into a buy-in. Not a place like Alabama, the Wolverines, Ohio State. No, you’re gonna have to do it. He’s a different guy now. He’s different than what they had there. He’s not a Wolverine man or whatever they call that.“They had a signature win against a good Oklahoma team. Their defense is playing freaking lights out. Buy-in is complete. Now they've got to continue.”
Tony Garcia is the Michigan beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at apgarcia@freepress.com and follow him on X at @RealTonyGarcia.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan football gets complete 'buy in' after heeding coach's message
