The Morning After: Enough of the Nonsense Kyle Whittingham Needs to Have the Courage of his Convictions

Michigan was struggling and getting booed off its home field for the second time in as many games.

Their offense was stuck in reverse, with a complete inability to find any semblance of a rhythm. You’d be forgiven if you thought Michigan was still on its bye week because nothing was going well when they had the ball.

Kyle Whittingham told everyone what was coming before going into the locker room at halftime.

"First of all, we have to get something going on offense,” Whittingham said at halftime to CBS’ Jenny Dell. “We got absolutely nothing going. Not running the ball well. Only team not running the ball as well as us is then. So, neither team can run the football. But we have 2 turnovers. I don't have an answer for you right now, but we're going to talk about it, and we have to get something going."

The line about the two turnovers at the end was the money line from Whittingham. Whittingham had talked all week about the need to take care of the football. Bryce Underwood simply had not done that through 11 halves of football this season.

Underwood had five interceptions and four lost fumbles through the first five and a half games this season. Whittingham could not wait any longer to give Underwood a seat next to him, and he gave way to Tommy Carr with the hope of providing a spark to the team.

"Well, that's the exact term that we're looking for is a spark for the offense," said Whittingham. "And he provided it. He came in and players rallied around him. And that's not to be disparaging against Bryce, because that's pretty typical when you have a changing quarterback. Everyone rallies and ups their level of play. And that was a big difference in our production, obviously, in the second half as opposed to the first half.”

Seismic Change

Moving off of Bryce Underwood is a move that has a significant impact. Underwood is a former top recruit. He was the unquestioned starter coming into training camp. He was voted a captain as a sophomore. He’s being paid a lot of money, which Whittingham denied was a factor in him remaining in the starting lineup. He’s got plenty of talent, and someone like Underwood failing is a black eye on the program even if the coaching staff currently in place did not recruit him.

Putting him on the bench in favor of Tommy Carr, or anyone, is not something that should ever be done lightly.

Whittingham and his staff reaped the rewards of the quarterback change as Michigan outscored Penn State 21-8 in the second half.

With the spark that was provided by Carr, starting him in the next game is a no-brainer, right?

Whittingham would not tip his hand.

"He did a nice job," Whittingham said of Carr. "He's always prepared. I'd walk by that quarterback room 12 times, 15 times a day. He's in there pretty much every second. He doesn't have class. He's in there watching film. So he's very prepared when his number was called.

"And going forward, we'll take a good hard look at the tape and see why things balked down in the first half and why we were better in the second half because there really wasn't a lot of scheme change. And make a decision. Not prepared to say right now at this desk or this table what we're going to do going forward.”

Whittingham Needs to Commit

I understand the idea of gamesmanship and not wanting to tip the Wolverines’ hand to Indiana. I understand the idea that perhaps Tommy Carr could have a softer landing than having his first start come against the defending national champions, who are still one of the top teams in the country this year.

In a perfect world, Carr could start against someone like UTEP, or Rutgers.

This isn’t a perfect world, and Whittingham made that decision the moment he pulled Bryce Underwood off the field. If Underwood is not good enough to beat Penn State at home with a three point deficit to overcome, he’s not good enough to beat Indiana.

Soft landings might be preferable, but they’re not realistic.

Whittingham can say all he wants that a decision has not been made, but he’s smart. He knows that Carr gave his team a spark. He knows his team won the game after Carr entered.

The decision to start Carr against Indiana was made at halftime against Penn State. It’s time to see if the true freshman can sink or swim.