Michigan Football: 3 takeaways from bounce-back win over Rutgers

Michigan football was able to strike early and often against a mediocre Rutgers team to bounce back from a Week 4 debacle. What’d we learn?

It was what everyone expected from the Wolverines against a team like Rutgers, but coming off a demoralizing blowout the week before against Wisconsin, a shutout was also what the doctor ordered.

Michigan smacked the Scarlet Knights around for 60 minutes as the outcome was never in doubt. The Wolverines didn’t give up any chunk plays because, well, Rutgers isn’t running anyone like Jonathan Taylor out onto the field.

Jim Harbaugh should hold off the “fire Harbaugh” crowd for another week as Iowa comes to town in Week 6 for a huge Big Ten battle.

What’d we learn from Michigan’s blowout win over the Scarlet Knights?

3. Offensive line isn’t consistently opening lanes

For a second straight game, the run game for the Wolverines was non-existent. The most effective runs all day long were by Shea Patterson as he scored three touchdowns on the ground.

Christian Turner, Hassan Haskins and Zach Charbonnet had a couple of nice runs and didn’t have terrible yards per carry numbers, but they weren’t finding lanes that they likely would of last year. This line isn’t playing up to its potential and it may be due to injuries and shuffling players around, but there’s too much talent to not rush for 200-plus yards against Rutgers.

The Scarlet Knights did a solid job of slowing down the Michigan run game, for the most part, but it was the passing attack they couldn’t stop.

Michigan found a ton of success through the air, so maybe running the ball wasn’t a priority until garbage time.