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There’s no question: Michigan football has underachieved in recent years.
The Wolverines have had some of the better recruiting classes in the country in the past decade-plus, yet, since the inception of the College Football Playoff in 2014 and the Big Ten Championship game in 2011, the maize and blue have made neither — although they’ve had two chances under head coach Jim Harbaugh, in 2016 and 2018.
Going back 30 years, ESPN ranked the teams that have underachieved the most in all of college football (link requires a subscription). While fans and many in the national media might suggest Michigan should be at or near the top, that designation goes to Georgia, the sole Tier 1 team listed. The Wolverines, however, are in Tier 4 with fellow struggling historical powerhouses Miami, USC, Nebraska and Tennessee.
Although Michigan didn’t contend nationally as often as Miami did in the 1980s and early 1990s, the Wolverines recorded eight AP top-eight finishes between 1983 and 1992, and they won or shared seven Big Ten titles between 1982 and 1992. Michigan won a national title in 1997 and had five top-10 finishes between 1997 and 2006. But the program has become increasingly less competitive nationally and even in the Big Ten, where it hasn’t won a championship since 2004. The Wolverines have dropped eight straight games to Ohio State and have beaten the Buckeyes just once since 2003. Michigan still prints money, carries a national brand and plays in the nation’s largest stadium. Although the past two decades have widened the gap between Michigan and national elites like Ohio State, the Wolverines should be performing at a higher level.
Of course, being close to contending for two recent years isn’t close enough for a team that’s expected to win the conference every 3-4 years. If Michigan wants to get out of the doghouse, it’ll have to start winning some big games, not just those it’s expected to win on a yearly basis.
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