{"id":559215,"date":"2026-04-02T00:31:09","date_gmt":"2026-04-02T00:31:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/559215\/"},"modified":"2026-04-02T00:31:09","modified_gmt":"2026-04-02T00:31:09","slug":"michigan-coach-kyle-whittingham-on-terrific-freshman-underwood","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/559215\/","title":{"rendered":"Michigan coach Kyle Whittingham on ‘terrific’ freshman, Underwood"},"content":{"rendered":"

Michigan Wolverines football<\/a> head coach Kyle Whittingham<\/a> helped make Utah a power out west, and is now tasked with getting the Maize and Blue back to \u2018Champions Of The West.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m here to help this football team get to where we believe we can be,\u201d Whittingham said on On3\u2019s Crain And Cone<\/a>. \u201cI\u2019m not here to change traditions or mess with that. The traditions here and the history is incredible, and it\u2019s just steeped in tradition, this program. So, it\u2019s not my place to meddle with that.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re going to put a physical, tough product on the field. That\u2019s the expectation at Michigan is to be physical and tough. That\u2019s what we\u2019re striving for.\u201d<\/p>\n

That process started in January, with Whittingham hiring his strength coach from Utah, Doug Elisaia.<\/p>\n

\u201cHigh-level athletes, like what we have here at Michigan and in Division-I football, seem to thrive on structure and discipline and a routine,\u201d Whittingham said. \u201cAnd you\u2019ve got to be consistent. You can\u2019t have highs and lows, you can\u2019t be a rollercoaster. Players need to come into the facility every day, know what\u2019s expected, know what\u2019s expected at practice, know what\u2019s expected in the weight room. They seem to thrive in a very structured environment. We certainly have that here.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe first thing we did was overhaul the strength program, because a lot of the toughness and grit in the football team is developed in the strength program \u2014\u00a0and we feel we\u2019ve got one of the best in the business in Doug Elisaia running our strength program.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bryce Underwood is a \u2018mega talent\u2019<\/p>\n

The first meeting Whittingham had with a player was with sophomore quarterback Bryce Underwood<\/a>, a 6-foot-4, 228-pound Detroit native who started all 13 games last season. Underwood completed 60.3 percent of his passes for 2,428 yards and 11 touchdowns with 9 interceptions last season, adding 88 carries for 392 yards and 6 scores, including sacks.<\/p>\n

Whittingham provided an update on how he\u2019s performed this spring.<\/p>\n

\u201cFirst of all, he is a mega talent \u2014\u00a0his arm strength, his athleticism,\u201d the Michigan coach said. \u201cHe\u2019s 6-4-plus, 230 pounds. The way he runs. It\u2019s incredible, the gifts that he\u2019s been blessed with.<\/p>\n

\u201cObviously, the first order of business is to learn the new scheme. We have a new scheme going in offensively. It\u2019s not a sharp learning curve. It\u2019s pretty user-friendly. But he\u2019s got to get mastery of that. Once he has mastery of that, which he\u2019s on the right track right now and doing a great job, now it\u2019s just refining a few things with his mechanics and making sure that he completely has a grasp of what we\u2019re doing and what we\u2019re expecting.\u201d<\/p>\n

Two Michigan position groups standing out<\/p>\n

Whittingham was asked which position groups are standing out most this spring, and first pointed to the running backs. There, junior Jordan Marshall<\/a> is coming off a 150-carry, 932-yard, 10-touchdown season, even while missing time at the end of the year. Freshman Savion Hiter<\/a> enrolled early and has turned heads, too, a five-star prospect.<\/p>\n

\u201cI really love our running back room,\u201d Whittingham said. \u201cWe have Jordan Marshall coming back, who\u2019s a proven commodity, and Savion Hiter, who was the top running back in the country in some polls. He\u2019s really lived up to that. He was a mid-year guy, and he has looked terrific through his first six practices. [Senior] Bryson Kuzdzal<\/a> is another guy in that room. So, we feel like we\u2019ve got a very strong running back situation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Michigan\u2019s defensive line is also strong, per Whittingham, despite returning just one starter, senior tackle Trey Pierce<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cDefensively, the front,\u201d Whittingham said. \u201cWe feel like we have a good front coming back, and that\u2019s something that is always critical. Your defense starts at the line of scrimmage, and we feel like we\u2019ve got some dudes up front.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Michigan Wolverines football head coach Kyle Whittingham helped make Utah a power out west, and is now tasked…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":559216,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[399,398,396,397,99],"class_list":{"0":"post-559215","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football","11":"tag-ncaafootball","12":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=559215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/559215\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/559216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=559215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=559215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=559215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}