Josh Priebe: Michigan offensive line 'mistakes' are 'easily fixable'
Michigan Wolverines football broke out five new starters on the offensive line in a 30-10 win over Fresno State to open the 2024 season. The offense had 4 negative plays, surrendered 1 sack and averaged 4.4 yards per rush — numbers that aren’t up to their standard against a Group of Five opponent.
The good news for the Maize and Blue: There is a sense of confidence that the line play can get cleaned up before taking on No. 3 Texas Saturday afternoon at The Big House.
Graduate left guard Josh Priebe is one that is a believer.
“A lot of the mistakes that were made are stuff that’s easily fixable, easy to correct,” Priebe said. “I think we played pretty physical, and as the season goes along, we’re only going to get closer as an offense, as an offensive line and just continue to improve each week and play better.”
Added Priebe, on the chemistry of the Michigan offensive line: “Overall, I thought it was pretty good. Our communication overall, there weren’t a whole lot of MAs, missed assignments, stuff like that. A lot of the stuff was one-man breakdowns and some technique stuff that, through practice, can be easily corrected. Certainly nothing that we’re super concerned about.”
Priebe said the mistakes are easier to clean up now that they have game film to go off of.
“For a lot of guys, and even myself playing my first game here, getting those first-game jitters out,” the Northwestern transfer said. “Certainly, once you get rolling into the season here, a lot of that stuff is going to be eliminated.”
Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore, who served as the team’s offensive line coach from 2021-23, said that he went back and watched the line play in weeks one and two of the last three years. Each time, there was a big jump in productivity from the first to second game.
“I hate to say that it’s expected,” Priebe said of first-game struggles. “Obviously, we want to be as perfect as possible. But nobody’s ever going to play a perfect game, and I think you strive for perfection, but you’re never going to be perfect.
“For us, it’s just about correcting those little things. Individually, eliminating those one-man breakdowns, eliminating everything that we can and just playing better together.”
Priebe spent the previous four seasons at Northwestern and said this weekend’s game against No. 3 Texas will be the biggest he’s played in. He noted that his Wildcats were in the Big Ten championship game his freshman season in 2020, but he didn’t see any action in that one.
“Certainly, everyone in the building understands the weight of this game and how seriously everyone’s taking it,” the Michigan guard said. “I think nobody takes that lightly. But at the same time, trying to eliminate all the outside distractions, all the buzz or extra pressure of the game. Investing that time and energy into prepping for Texas is everyone’s focus right now.”
When asked if the Wolverines have prepared for the Longhorns for some time, Priebe clearly didn’t want to say too much but indicated that Michigan has been working on Texas for weeks.
“We’ve definitely had the game circled for a while,” he said. “Even when that schedule came out early on, everyone knew this game was really important. Yeah, we’ve been preparing for a decent amount of time, yeah.”
