What they're saying after Michigan football's loss at Indiana

The Michigan Wolverines fell to 5-5 on the season on Saturday in a 20-15 loss to the No. 8 Indiana Hoosiers, who were finally caught in a tough game this season. However, it was still a missed opportunity for a U-M in desperate need of a win that drew plenty of reactions.

Here is a sampling of what the local and national voices were saying about the Michigan program after its fourth loss in the last five games.

Ryan Van Bergen, The Wolverine postgame show

Michigan at Indiana postgame show: ‘No justification’ for positon U-M finds itself in

“It’s tough to have the game unfold the way that it did,” Van Bergen said. “And to me, to see these guys playing their hearts out, I thought a lot of the team effort was consistently good throughout the game, but you see us in positions and situations where there’s no justification outside of the coaches put us in those situations.

“In this game, bringing Alex Orji in and the Orji package, which I think found some moderate success throughout the last two weeks, but it found nothing this week and we still are beating our head against that door. Kalel Mullings, not sure if he has a health issue or what’s going on, but it kind of seemed like they took him out at least early on in this game and tried to kind of go pocket passer with Davis Warren and change it up a little bit.

“We saw a little bit of synergy in the second half, which was nice, but it’s just such a small flame and such a small spark and we have the same record on repeat, but I feel like coaching let us down in some big ways, both offensively, defensively, special teams, time management, penalties, not lined up. Were there some good glimpses? Yeah, but overall, I feel like we got outcoached and that’s why we came away six points short of being able to beat this good Indiana team.”

Chris Balas, The Wolverine

IU 20, Michigan 15: Notes, quotes, and observations – defense deserved better

The fan finger-pointing began in the first half of a 20-15 Michigan loss at Indiana, one closer than most predicted but still another for the ‘L’ column. U-M got off to a solid start before falling behind 17-3, managing less than 100 yards in a half (again), 11 rushing yards (11!) at the break, and giving up huge chunks of yardage on defense to limp into halftime down two scores. 

There was nothing to indicate the Wolverines would be in position to keep this game close. Zero. To their credit, however, they continued to fight — especially the defense. The offense took the second half kickoff near midfield before a Tommy Doman punt pinned IU deep. A gift from Indiana quarterback Kurtis Rourke, accepted by junior safety Zeke Berry (who played a great second half) when he jumped a route for a pick, set the offense up with first and goal from the IU 7, and Michigan was in position to get back in the game. 

But the red zone play calling, execution, and overall sloppiness resulted in a field goal, a win for the Hoosiers. Lack of execution up front was once again one of the biggest culprits — head coach Sherrone Moore acknowledged that early in his press conference, and he was right — as it was for most of the game. 

But he needs to accept now what he probably already knows, and what’s obvious on film — they’re not going to be. Not this year, with this group they said before the year they felt very good about but has since struggled all year with the basics. 

Clayton Sayfie, The Wolverine

Best and worst from Michigan’s loss to Indiana

There were multiple decisions by the Michigan staff that were questionable, including its choice to run on third down from the Indiana 46-yard line, pick up 4 yards and then punt in the third quarter. The run play call pretty much indicated that the Wolverines would go for it on fourth down, but they chose to pin Indiana instead.

Michigan wound up getting an interception by junior cornerback Zeke Berry on the first play of Indiana’s backed-up drive, so punting certainly wasn’t the wrong call, but keeping it on the ground seemed to be.

Michigan also let 31 seconds come off the clock before calling a timeout after Indiana gained 8 yards on first down, a play that ended at the 1:28 mark of the fourth quarter. Michigan had all three timeouts and had to stop the clock to potentially get the football back. The Hoosiers picked up the first down on the next play, after Moore eventually did call timeout with 57 seconds remaining, but it was still a head-scratcher.

Isaiah Hole, Wolverines Wire

Five takeaways: Michigan football better than expected, but loses still to IU

It used to be that, no matter how good Michigan football was any given year, heading to Bloomington, it was bound to be a near disaster. In 2015, what ended up being a good Michigan team was taken to double overtime by what was donned ‘chaos team.’ In 2017, it wasn’t a good Michigan team, but an even worse Indiana team took the Wolverines to OT. Even home games in those odd years in that period saw closer-than-expected outcomes.

Indiana was supposed to run away with this one and in the early going, it appeared as if it would. The Hoosiers hadn’t scored less than 31 points in a game this season, and with 17 points at the half, it looked as if they were on their way there. But Michigan made some solid second-half adjustments, clamping down defensively while playing man defense, and IU found itself on the ropes.

But like Michigan used to do, Indiana held on to win.

Davis Hale, ESPN.com

College football Week 11 highlights: Top plays, games, takeaways

Perhaps no one has done the impossible better than Cignetti. From 2021 through 2023, Michigan was 26-1 in Big Ten play. In that same time frame, Indiana was 3-24 against Big Ten competition.

But because Cignetti cares not about precedent, the Hoosiers were a 14.5-point favorite Saturday, and while they didn’t cover, they did walk away with a 10-0 record, the first 10-win season in school history. Kurtis Rourke threw for 206 yards and two touchdowns and the defense held Michigan to just 206 yards in the game, the defense had eight pass breakups, and the Hoosiers made Michigan look utterly lost (which, to be fair, is not uncommon for Michigan this year).

Indiana is now in position to reach the Big Ten title game and, likely a playoff bid, despite finishing 3-9 last year, starting a QB who transferred from the MAC and a head coach that brought a handful of starters from a Sun Belt team, which begs the question of why Big Ten football looks so hard for Lincoln Riley.

Austin Meek, The Athletic

Indiana 10-0 for first time after holding off Michigan rally. Are Hoosiers a Playoff lock?

It wasn’t clear how much fight Michigan would have left after losing 38-17 to No. 1 Oregon a week ago. To their credit, the Wolverines didn’t fold when they fell behind and had the No. 8 team on the ropes for much of the second half.

The outcome was equal parts encouraging and frustrating, as Michigan had chances to win but wasn’t able to finish the job. Settling for a field goal after Zeke Berry’s interception gave Michigan the ball at the 7-yard line was costly. As well as Michigan’s defense played, the offense managed just 206 yards and struggled with many of the same issues that have shown up all season. Davis Warren averaged only 4.6 yards per pass attempt in completing 16 of 32 for just 137 yards, and Donovan Edwards and Kalel Mullings — who scored the team’s only touchdown on a fourth down in the fourth quarter — both averaged just three yards per carry.

The Wolverines made this game much more interesting than it could have been, but Michigan is still a 5-5 football team that missed a chance for its best win of the season.

Trevor Woods, Maize n Brew

Takeaways from Michigan’s loss to Indiana

The first thing Michigan has to do is pick up one more win to gain bowl eligibility. With games against 4-5 Northwestern and No. 2 Ohio State (8-1) the Wolverines tilt against Northwestern has to be treated as a must-win, otherwise there’s a strong likelihood they finish 5-7 with a loss to the Buckeyes.

Secondly, Michigan must also start to think about the 2025 season and start giving some true freshmen a longer look — why not give quarterback Jadyn Davis and running back Jordan Marshall some snaps? Even freshmen offensive linemen such as Andrew Sprague and Blake Frazier could use more playing time, as could edge rusher Dominic Nichols. Even if there are growing pains from some of the freshmen, they’ll be all the better for the experience once next season rolls around.

Tony Garcia, Detroit Free Press

Michigan football grades vs. Indiana: Sherrone Moore flunks again

For the fifth time in as many losses, Michigan failed to score more than 17 points. The passing game, as has been the case often this year, was not good. Davis Warren completed 16 of 32 passes for 137 yards and did not have a completion longer than 16 yards on the afternoon. He completed 11 of his final 26 attempts for 73 yards. Even more worrisome, the running game had perhaps its toughest day of the year.

As a team, U-M ran 34 times for 69 yards while none of Donovan Edwards (15 carries for 46 yards), Kalel Mullings (10 carries for 30 yards) or Benjamin Hall (four carries for 9 yards) had even a single run of more than 10 yards. To make matters worse, the offense started with first-and-goal from the 7-yard line in the third quarter and had to settle for a field goal and on the opening drive had a field goal after getting down to the 3-yard line. On the day, Michigan managed just 206 yards of offense, went 6-for-17 on third- and fourth-down conversions and had only two plays of more than 15 yards all afternoon — both of which went 16 yards.