Michigan (sucks!) currently has the 4th ranked rushing defense in the country. And it’s arguable that without that exemplary facet of their game, they’d be 0-2 or at least 1-and-very-very-1. Given ND’s struggles (I don’t care what Charlie says) with the rushing offense in the SDSU game, a lot of ND fans are gnashing their teeth and a lot of Michigan (sucks!) fans are licking their chops. Neither group may have much of a case for either outlook. Given that Michigan’s linebacker corps is, to be polite, a hodgepodge unit, a sudden leap from 53rd against the run in 2007 to 4th in 2008 seems a bit, eh, premature. So how’d they do it?
Michigan (sucks!)’s defense currently boasts a 1.11 yards-per-carry average against them on 75 rushing attempts for 83 yards. Scary. But remember, in the NCAA, sacks count as rush attempts. And Michigan has recorded 9 sacks for 69 yards of loss for their opponents. So if we remove the 9 sacks from the rushing attempts and add the lost 69 yards back in to the net, we get 66 rushing attempts gaining 152 yards for 2.3 yards per carry.
See? Far less scary. Right? I mean, at that rate, they’d only be 12th against the run!
What should really concern the Irish is that 2nd in the Nation in sacks thing.
I’m not sure this post went in the direction I intended.
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- HLS Tweets for the Week of 2009-11-01 - November 1, 2009
