J.D. PicKell: Offensive balance is key to Michigan winning national championship

Michigan fans are no longer celebrating wins over Ohio State or Big Ten titles, because this year, they have their eye on the national championship.

The Wolverines knocked on the door of the title game each of the last two years but ultimately fell short. Now, the time for simply making the College Football Playoff has passed. The folks in Ann Arbor want to get in and win.

In order to make that dream a reality for Jim Harbaugh’s program, or progrum, On3’s J.D. PicKell points to one specific area of the ball club where the Wolverines need to take the next step, especially to topple to the current back-to-back champs.

Take a look right here (20:05-mark) at his breakdown of what Michigan needs to do in order to win it all, or you can read his full comments a little further down.

“Michigan, also another team that people are picking to win the national title. They have made it very clear: ‘National title or bust. We’ve beat Ohio state two years in a row, got the Big Ten hardware two years in a row, we want the big boy, we want to beat the final boss, we want to win the national championship.’

“So they win a national championship, in my mind, if they can be ambidextrous on offense. I’m talking about: can they run the ball and throw the ball equally effectively? Because that’s kind of the talking point all season long, all off-season long, rather, is JJ McCarthy taking the next step. And all that, I think that’s fair.

“I think the next level of that, the thing that people maybe need to talk about a little bit more, is… can his past catchers take that next step as well? Can Colston Loveland step into a bigger role playing tight end? Can Cornelius Johnson step into a bigger role?

“Going down the line here, his pass catchers have to be able to separate and be the guys that ultimately win for them when you get one-on-one. When they load the box — because Blake Corum and Donovan Edwards are eating their lunch — can we go on the outside, can we create explosive plays and throw the knockout punch with the pass game?”

PicKell then went on to note that Georgia is the team you’re going to have to beat to win it all. And in order to do that, per On3’s own Georgia insider, you have to be able to win on the outside in the pass game.

“Now, the other part of this is… if you’re going to win a national title, at some point in time you probably got to go through Georgia and they know that. That’s why the ‘Beat Georgia’ appeared at practice. What is the formula to beating Georgia? It’s been a while since someone’s done it.

“But the the team that got closest last year, Ohio State, they were winning on the outside. We had Rusty Mansell of DawgsHQ on this very show and we asked him straight up: ‘Rusty, how do you beat Georgia? It looks nearly impossible the way they’re operating right now. How do you beat Georgia? And he said with a straight face: you gotta win on the outside.

“We talk about it here a fair amount when we break down these games and preview them. You don’t have to have every matchup and I think Michigan will have a pretty solid standing when it comes to playing that line of scrimmage. I don’t think they’ll get overpowered there at all based on what they have on the offense of a defensive line.

“But you got to be able to win the matchups when the ball is in the air, one-on-one. You got to have one or two to be able to exploit them in the pass game. So that is the key for Michigan if they want to win a national title.”