Joel Klatt: Beating Michigan is key to winning the Big Ten East

Michigan has gone on to win the Big Ten in each of the past two seasons. Now, in 2023, Joel Klatt believes that they could very well do it again considering how difficult their style of play is to handle.

Klatt recently determined that the road to the Big Ten’s East Division literally runs through Ann Arbor on his show. With how physical the Wolverines are at the line of scrimmage and in the run game, he says those areas, specifically against Ohio State and Penn State, are where the division and conference will be won or lost.

“In order to win this division, I think that you’re going to have to beat Michigan, right? That might go without being said. But they have the blueprint and that blueprint ain’t changing anytime soon,” said Klatt. “This is a team that clearly understands how to win football games and why they win football games.”

“I think these two numbers really put it in perspective what this division is all about. 250 and 242. What do those represent? Those represent last year’s rushing yards in the second half of the Ohio State-Penn State games. Michigan was thoroughly dominant at the line of scrimmage when they needed to be against their two biggest opponents within their conference. That’s where this conference, this division is going to come down to,” Klatt continued. “You’re not going to beat Michigan unless you can control their run game, okay? Neither of those teams were able to do that last year. And it looks like it’s going to be even more difficult to do that moving forward into this year.”

Why is it going to be more difficult? Well, Klatt starts with their stacked offensive line. Then, once you deploy one of the best backfields in the country, Jim Harbaugh has the weapons to attack in a style that’s going to ground and pound teams and make life miserable in the Big Ten.

“Michigan’s offensive line, at least on paper to me, looks like one of the two best offensive lines in the country along with, potentially, Georgia. The thing about Michigan’s offensive line is that it’s deep, okay? There’s six, seven guys that you could argue are draftable players. Like, NFL caliber offensive linemen,” explained Klatt. “It leads me to believe that with their two backs, Donovan Edwards and Blake Corum, that this is going to be a team that can just bludgeon people to death. I don’t think they’re going to come out and try to be fancy and score 50 points a game. If they’re going to get to 50? It’s going to be the old fashioned way. And they’re just going to hammer away with the run game at the entire Big Ten schedule.”

“Ohio State and Penn State? What’s your avenue to winning the division and representing the Big Ten East in the Big Ten Championship? You’ve got to stop the run,” Klatt said. “You’ve got to control the run game of Michigan if you’re going to win that side of the division. That seems like it’s going to be very difficult to do.”

That’s not all though. For Klatt, the real kicker is that even if the Buckeyes or Nittany Lions were to bring Michigan’s rushing attack to a standstill? That’s where JJ McCarthy, a great player in his own right, would step in to give the Wolverines a dual-threat offense that might just be too much to overcome.

“The other part that makes this tough for Ohio State and Penn State? Even if you do that? Now you’ve got to contend with a quarterback that has proven he can go out and win a game with his play,” said Klatt. “He can put the team on his back. They could win because of the quarterback and not just with the quarterback.”

“So even if Ohio State and Penn State can handle the run game, which is going to be very difficult? They’re going to have to deal with a quarterback that has confidence and the ability to go win the game himself,” Klatt said. “It’s going to be tough, it’s going to be very tough.”

Ohio State and Penn State are going to give Michigan everything that they’ve got in order to knock them off. However, neither of them may have enough when you consider all that Klatt laid out about the Wolverines offense and how it has already led them to wins over the previous two campaigns.