Preview: Maryland

Essentials

Right: Devin Gardner and a friend, from his Instagram via this must-read feature by Nick Baumgardner.

Overview

Prepare yourselves. The weather report indicates the dreaded "wintry mix" will fall upon Ann Arbor tomorrow morning before turning into scattered showers as the game temperature hangs around 40 with a windchill of freezing. Fandom Endurance badges may be required.

It's also Senior Day. Michigan will bid farewell to 12 players. One is Devin Gardner, and if he doesn't receive a thunderous ovation...

The guy's played for three different offensive coordinators, two head coaches and he's been asked to line up at two separate positions. Yet, through it all, he's never stopped giving everything he has.

Not to his team, and not to his community.

"I'm becoming a man here, and I thank God for this adversity," Gardner said earlier this season. "I'm becoming a better man."

...I'll lose quite a bit of faith in humanity.

It's a great time to familiarize yourself with the remarkable stories off the guys who don't see their names in print all that often, too. For example, Alex Mitropolous-Rundus, who'll get the Senior Day treatment despite spending his high school years on the drumline, not the football team.

Also being honored tomorrow: Brennen Beyer, Joey Burzynski, Anthony Capatina, Will Hagerup, Delonte Hollowell, Jonathan Keizer, Jake Ryan, Alex Swieca, Raymon Taylor, and Matt Wile.

The opponent is Maryland, a mediocre squad that's played to form this season, beating the teams they should while dropping games against West Virginia, Ohio State, Wisconsin, and Michigan State. Michigan, of course, needs another win for bowl eligibility, and this is their best shot at it.

Run Offense vs Maryland

Andre Monroe is a disruptive 3-4 DE

Maryland's rush defense grades out as mediocre on the advanced metrics, and that passes the sanity test for a squad that's limited the lesser running games they've faced (WVU, Penn State, USF, Iowa) and given up big yardage to the good ones (Indiana, OSU, MSU, Wisconsin ... and, er, Syracuse).

The Terps are very experienced in the front seven of their 3-4 defense; every starter is a senior save OLB Yannick Ngakoue, a talented sophomore who splits time with senior Yannick Cudjoe-Virgil. (Yes, seriously, two Yannicks at one position.) Nose tackle Darius Kilgo is an NFL prospect because he can do more than just take on a double-team; he has seven TFLs this season. Andre Monroe doesn't fit the prototype of anything at 5'11", 282 pounds, but he manages to be very disruptive from his DE spot, albeit more against the pass than the run.

The inside linebackers, Cole Farrand and LA Goree, both play at a stout 245 pounds and are very active between the tackles. Maryland gets a boost with the return of OLB Matt Robinson, who was excellent against the run in 2013 but has missed most of this season with a shoulder injury; he got through last week's game against MSU and should be good to go tomorrow.

Injuries have removed the team's top tackler from his natural spot. Due to significant losses in the secondary (more on that later), strong safety Sean Davis has moved to cornerback, and while he'll be an excellent run support corner, Maryland won't have him flying into the box from the back line. This worked out fine a couple weeks ago against Penn State, a team with no offense to speak of, but MSU managed to tally 242 yards on 47 carries (5.2 YPC) last weekend.

On Michigan's end, Derrick Green has been ruled out this weekend, so De'Veon Smith should get the bulk of the carries after he had his best game of the year against Northwestern.

Key Matchup: The tackles vs. Maryland's attacking OLBs. Robinson has been very limited this season but had 10 TFLs—only 0.5 of which came on a sack—in 2013. On the other side, Ngakoue's had a breakout year with 12.5 TFLs. Ben Braden, especially, has had some trouble against quicker defenders, and these two are both quite disruptive off the edge.

[Hit THE JUMP for the REST of the PREVIEW]

Pass Offense vs Maryland

Will Likely's only serious limitation is his height, but it's a limitation (5'7").

Maryland has been quite good against the pass. The only offenses with major success against them aren't ones that resemble Michigan: West Virginia, Ohio State, and Wisconsin are the only teams to break 9 YPA against them, and only two others (Syracuse and MSU) even cracked 6 YPA. Take out the contests against the Buckeyes and Mountaineers (combined 8 TDs, 1 INT) and the Terps have allowed just five touchdown passes while picking off seven.

There are those injury problems, however, as one starting corner (Alvin Hill) is out for the year and his replacement (Jeremiah Johnson) has missed significant time with a hamstring injury. Davis has held up okay so far but there are very legitimate questions as to how long that'll last for a 6'1", 200-pound converted safety who's best known for his run support.

The other corner is 5'7" sophomore Will Likely, an immensely talented defender and return man who's obviously limited by his stature. When given the chance, he's a heck of a playmaker, with five interceptions—two of which he returned for touchdowns—on the season. Gardner has to be careful throwing at him underneath; if he's lined up on Funchess, though, it wouldn't be a bad idea to just lob one up there.

The safeties could be a question mark with Davis forced into duty at corner. While PSU averaged just 4.2 YPA, MSU connected on two 50+ yard throws to bolster their average to 7.7 despite completing fewer than half their passes.

Key matchup: Michigan vs. their own conservative tendency. If a 5'7" dude lines up across from Funchess and the Wolverines don't attempt any deep shots...

If a midseason-converted safety lines up across from Funchess and the Wolverines don't attempt any deep shots...

Well, I'll be unhappy, I'll say that much.

Run Defense vs Maryland

QB CJ Brown is Maryland's biggest running threat.

As Maryland's SBNation blog Testudo Times points out, the Terps haven't been able to get anything going on the ground against good defenses.

Since a 38-31 win against Iowa on Oct. 18, C.J. Brown and the offense have struggled to their three worst offensive outputs of the season. The Terps have scored 42 points in the three games since, against Wisconsin, Penn State and Michigan State – a 14-point average per game. They have managed just 207 yards per game in those contests, fueled by the three lowest per-play rates of their season. Last week, they ran for a total of 6 yards. That was only marginally worse than the 46 they accrued at Wisconsin or 33 at Penn State (via cfbstats).

Brown was quick to spot the common thread in the three most recent games.

"Yeah, they're all top-10 defenses," Brown said. "We've played some pretty good defenses. I think that's the biggest thing. We've got to step up our level of play and match that."

The Terps run a fair amount of the zone read with quarterback CJ Brown, who leads the team in rushing with just 375 yards on 3.2 YPC, but it hasn't been effective when they've faced solid defenses, and Michigan is currently third nationally in rushing defense by the S&P+ metric.

Maryland tried to give their running game a boost by replacing RB Brandon Ross with Wes Brown, who had a decent freshman year before missing all of 2013 due to injury, but neither have been able to move the ball. The offensive line appears to be the main issue, which is a little surprising since they returned all five starters; then again, they weren't a good rushing team last year, either.

Michigan should win this matchup decidedly.

Key Matchup: Michigan's DEs vs. contain. Frank Clark's dismissal shouldn't have a significant impact here unless his replacements—Mario Ojemudia and Taco Charlton—get undisciplined on the outside; Ojemudia has improved in this regard, while Charlton is still a little inconsistent. Maryland's ground game goes as CJ Brown goes, so maintaining the edge when he decides to pull should be enough to stop their running game cold.

Pass Defense vs Maryland

Deon Long is one of the last men standing from what was a deep receiving corps.

Given the above, you might wonder why Maryland runs the ball just about as much as they throw it. Well, Brown isn't exactly a pinpoint passer: he's completing 53% of his throws at just 6.6 YPA with 11 TDs and nine INTs. He's been lifted a few times for backup QB Caleb Rowe, but Rowe isn't at all a threat on the ground, and he hasn't taken care of the ball well enough to justify removing the threat of the QB run from the field.

Not helping matters is the decimation of what looked preseason to be the conference's most talented and deepest receiving corps. Starter Nigel King transferred to Kansas before the season started. Star Stefon Diggs will miss the rest of the regular season with a lacerated kidney suffered against PSU. The man who replaced Diggs when he broke his leg in 2013, Levern Jacobs, is suspended for the year due to a preseason assault charge; his younger brother, Taivon Jacobs, fell to a season-ending knee injury two drives into the season. This week, Maryland announced a two-game suspension for Juwann Winfree, who has ten catches in seven games this year.

This has allowed defenses to focus their efforts on former five-star Deon Long, who's averaging just over 11 yards per catch, a dropoff of four yards from his 2013 mark. The co-starters on the other side haven't been very productive: Marcus Leak has two catches over the last four weeks, while Amba Etta-Tawo has just six on the year. Sophomore Jacquille Veii, who's expected to start in the slot, has provided a boost in both the passing and running games, but other than getting eight carries against Syracuse he hasn't touched the ball more than five times in a game.

The O-line has struggled, too, as Maryland's posted the #86 adjusted sack rate in the country. Again, this looks like a matchup Michigan should be able to handle. Add in the weather factor and this could be a very ugly game.

Key Matchup: The corners vs. tackling after the catch. Deon Long, especially, can break plays big if he sheds his the initial tackle. In a game that looks like it'll come down to strong defense, one long run after the catch may be one more than Michigan can afford to allow.

Special Teams

A decided advantage for Maryland, which is fourth in Football Outsiders' special teams metric. Kicker Brad Craddock has drilled all 14 of his attempts this season. Punting is a weakness, as the Terps rank 99th in net yardage, but Michigan is worst at 107th.

The return game is where it gets scary, even without Diggs fielding kicks. Likely is averaging 33 yards on his seven kickoff returns, all of those coming last week. He's been the main punt returner since day one, however, and has two touchdowns off those this season while averaging over 12 yards. While he hasn't had much success at all since September, he also hasn't faced Michigan's punt team.

Key Matchup: YOU KICK THE BALL AS FAR AWAY FROM LIKELY AS FEASIBLY POSSIBLE AAAAHHHHHHHHH

Intangibles

it's cold and I'm scared

Cheap Thrills

Worry if...

• Maryland has any semblance of a running game.
• Michigan can't find a way to attack a 5'7" corner and a converted safety on the outside.
• Everyone freezes to death.

Cackle with knowing glee if..

• They throw it to the tall guy and he catches it and runs far, in something resembling that order.
• De'Veon Smith clobbers his way to a respectable day on the ground.
• With Gardner's ankle reportedly (relatively) healthy, M unleashes a real offense.

Fear/Paranoia Level: 1 (Baseline 5; –5 for What Is There To Fear Anymore, Really? +1 for Oh Right Bowl Practices Would Be Nice I Guess)

Desperate need to win level: 10 (Baseline 5; +1 for Win It For Devin, -1 for Let's Just Get This Over With, +1 for There Are 11 Other Seniors Too, +4 for Those Bowl Practices Really Would Be Nice And Winning Next Week Seems Rather Unlikely)

Loss will cause me to... feel really awful for Devin Gardner.

Win will cause me to... reschedule some Christmas Week plans, in all likelihood. Also feel pretty good for Devin Gardner.

The strictures and conventions of sportswriting compel me to predict:

I'm just gonna re-use my prediction for Northwestern:

This game will be hideous.

That turned out to be pretty spot-on.

Finally, three opportunities for me to look stupid Sunday:

• Devin Gardner has a big day on the ground, making everyone feel very conflicted about things.
• Will Likely busts a long punt return, but that's about it for production from Maryland.
• Michigan, 18-12