22 days until Michigan football: How last season could set up where program is headed

There’s much anticipation heading into the Michigan Wolverines football season, and TheWolverine.com is counting down the days until the Sept. 2 opener against East Carolina. We’ll discuss current Michigan events, the upcoming season and/or take a look at a significant number that correlates with how many days remain until kickoff, whether it be a player’s jersey number, a year, a date, a score, etc.

Michigan football is two weeks into its 2023 fall camp, meaning our time to reminisce on what came before this season is coming to a close. With 22 days to go until the season opener, today we look back on how the 2022 season set a foundation for this year’s expectations.

Coming off a 12-2 record, a Big Ten title and the team’s first trip to the College Football Playoff in 2021, some believed that it was lightning in a bottle for a Michigan program that had failed to reach expectations under Jim Harbaugh prior to that.

Entering the 2022 season, gone were figures that were so instrumental in the last season’s success. Running back Hassan Haskins, EDGE duo Aidan Hutchinson and David Ojabo and safety Daxton Hill were among those who took their game to the NFL level. Cade McNamara was a known commodity at quarterback, but most believed Michigan needed more to keep itself in the playoff conversation.

J.J. McCarthy was able to supplant McNamara as the team’s starter, Michigan rebooted with a “no-star defense,” and Blake Corum and Donovan Edwards became arguably the most talented running back duo in the country. The pieces were in place then to go on another run, and potentially climb the next rung on the ladder.

Michigan was able to retrofit McCarthy’s dual-threat skill set into its traditional smashmouth offense, but his playmaking ability gave them a different look and a higher ceiling. McNamara was like a good leadoff hitter in baseball. He could get himself on base and set the team up for success with occasional power, but needed someone to drive him home. McCarthy, on the other hand, has home run ability every time he steps up to the plate and could deliver a big play when the lights were the brightest.

Never was that more clear down the stretch after losing Corum to a knee injury. Michigan found a way to piece together its run game, but McCarthy had to shoulder more. In doing so, he had three of his most impressive performances of the season in wins at Ohio State, the Big Ten title game vs. Purdue and the comeback effort against TCU.

No matter the reason, or what people think happened against TCU, Michigan showed up in the Fiesta Bowl and had its most untimely performance of the season. Some argue they overlooked TCU and were focused on Georgia. Others will say they simply got outplayed and outcoached. Whatever it was, the result was the same.

Climbing the ladder is a process. One day it will be smooth sailing, the other you get knocked down a few rungs. For a program that in many ways is still re-learning how to be a national power, these scars can become strengths. Getting blown out by Georgia in the Orange Bowl in 2021 was a measuring stick and a learning experience. Last season’s Fiesta Bowl was a missed opportunity, and everyone in the building knows it.

Watching Ohio State take Georgia to the final moments of their playoff game was sobering, too. The national title was there and winnable last season for the Wolverines and they let it slip away.

So when people ask how it is possible for Michigan, who has gone 25-3 over the last two years and beaten OSU twice along the way, to find their edge for the 2023 season, look no further than how it ended. They did what any driven enterprise would do.

Michigan went back to work. It got bigger. It got stronger. With actual on-field work taking place and the 2023 season on the way, we will see what type of fruit this tree provides for a team expected to compete for every prize ahead of it.

Michigan football countdown to kickoff

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