A Look Ahead to the 2024 Michigan Wolverines

April 30, 2024 by CollegeFootballPoll.com Staff

Michigan and a new head coach are faced with plenty of issues to overcome in 2024. But don't count them out. After all, the 2023 season was about as strange as it gets and the Wolverines still managed to make an undefeated run and claim the national title.

Jim Harbaugh took his natuonal title and returned to the NFL as the hea coach of the LA Chargers. His trusted assistant, Sherrone Moore, is now getting paid to be the head coach after handling those duties for 4 of the 6 games in which Harbaugh was serving suspensions a year ago. Those included the final 3 regular season games and the school's 1,000th win (vs. Maryland).

2024 Michigan Schedule

We will get an early barometer game for the Maize and Blue when they host Texas on September 7, a week after opening at home against Fresno State. Right now, Michigan is a 3.5-point underdog versus the Longhorns as the over/under season wins total is 9.5. At least Moore will get an entire month of home games before trekking to Washington for a conference game in Week 6.

That Washington game is the second of three against former Pac-12 schools. Michigan will host USC on September 21 and Oregon on November 2. The Wolverines and UCLA Bruins will not play until 2026.

The nonconference slate concludes with Arkansas State on September 14. The league slate for every B1G Conference members consists of 9 games with each team getting 5 home and 4 away, or 4 games and 5 away, in alternating seasons. This year, Michigan gets 5 at home.

8/31 Fresno State
9/7 Texas
9/14 Arkansas State
9/21 USC
9/28 Minnesota
10/5 at Washington
10/19 at Illinois
10/26 Michigan State
11/2 Oregon
11/9 at Indiana
11/23 Northwestern
11/30 at Ohio State

The above schedule features three teams in the Top 9 of all-time wins - Ohio State, Texas, and USC. Over-all, five of the top 9 teams are B1G members - Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State Nebraska, and USC.

Draft

Michigan had 13 players taken in the NFL Draft, the most of any school this season. Texas was second 11, while only 15 schools had 2 or more players selected.

• 13 - Michigan
• 11 - Texas
• 10 - Alabama, Florida State, Washington
• 8 - Georgia, Oregon, Penn State
• 7 - Notre Dame, USC
• 6 - Clemson, LSU, Missouri
• 5 - Auburn, Utah

Michigan's 13 is the 4th-most ever drafted from a single school. Georgia holds the record with 15 in 2022 while Ohio State (2004) and LSU (2020) have each had 14 players taken one time.

Courtesy of The Athletic, here is the list of each Wolverine drafted this year

• No. 10 J.J. McCarthy, QB, Minnesota Vikings
• No. 49 Kris Jenkins, DL, Cincinnati Bengals
• No. 50 Mike Sainristil, DB, Washington Commanders
• No. 69 Junior Colson, LB, Los Angeles Chargers
• No. 83 Blake Corum, RB, Los Angeles Rams
• No. 84 Roman Wilson, WR, Pittsburgh Steelers
• No. 85 Zak Zinter, OL, Cleveland Browns
• No. 121 AJ Barner, TE, Seattle Seahawks
• No. 172 Trevor Keegan, OL, Philadelphia Eagles
• No. 240 Michael Barrett, LB, Carolina Panthers
• No. 249 LaDarius Henderson, OL, Houston Texans
• No. 252 Jaylen Harrell, Edge, Tennessee Titans
• No. 253 Cornelius Johnson, WR, Los Angeles Chargers

Virtually the entire offense is gone. The two biggest salvations for this year's team may be a defense that has almost everyone returning, and the fact that last year's squad was more of a collection of talent rather than 1 or 2 superstar players.

Probation

It was announced on April 16 that Michigan and the NCAA had finally come to a resolution on lingering alleged violations. The resulting penalties include three years of probation, a fine and recruiting restrictions. Harbaugh did not participate in the agreement,and that portion of the case will be considered separately by the Committee on Infractions, after which the committee will release its full decision. 

The agreed-upon violations involved impermissible in-person recruiting contacts during a COVID-19 dead period, impermissible tryouts, and the program exceeding the number of allowed countable coaches when noncoaching staff members engaged in on- and off-field coaching activities (including providing technical and tactical skills instruction to student-athletes).  The negotiated resolution also involved the school's agreement that the underlying violations demonstrated a head coach responsibility violation and the former football head coach failed to meet his responsibility to cooperate with the investigation. The school also agreed that it failed to deter and detect the impermissible recruiting contacts and did not ensure that the football program adhered to rules for noncoaching staff members.

Most Wins All-Time

Week Zero

The 2024 season kicks off with four games on August 24 with Florida State and Georgia Tech headlining the action with an ACC tilt in Dublin, Ireland.

The other three games see new ACC member SMU head further west to take on Mountain West member Nevada, while FCS power Montana State visits FBS weakling New Mexico, and FCS member Delaware State (a HBCU program) head to Hawaii.