Michigan DBs know matchup with Washington passing attack is 'gonna come down to us'

HOUSTON — Once the opening handshakes concluded Saturday morning at the George R. Brown Convention Center, Steve Clinkscale didn’t break another smile. He was too locked in.

Michigan's defensive backs coach and passing game coordinator is in the middle of the biggest assignment of his life this week, designing a game plan to stop the nation’s most prolific aerial attack.

While there are many factors which will decide if Michigan football or Washington wins the national championship at NRG Stadium on Monday night, the matchup that seems to be at the top of the list is U-M's elite secondary against Washington's star-studded wide receiver group.

"It's why we do this," Clinkscale told the Free Press. "I think this is the most talented receiver group we’ve faced. Yes they have a star, but I think they have three stars. ... We gotta do a great job of keeping them in front of us, challenging them when we need contested plays, leveraging the perimeter and making plays so we can win this game."

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Washington quarterback Michael Penix Jr. is among the most talented in the nation. U-M is familiar with the sixth-year senior who once starred at Indiana and was the Heisman Trophy runner-up this season after completing 66.7% (336 of 504) of his passes for 4,648 yards, 35 touchdowns and nine interceptions.

Most of those touchdowns were caught by the aforementioned three stars — Rome Odunze, Ja'Lynn Polk and Jalen McMillan — each of whom possesses different skills and has numbers that look like they came out of a video game.

Odunze, 6 feet 3 and 215 pounds, is the team's top target. The physical Las Vegas native is No. 2 in the nation in receiving yards (1,553), sixth in touchdowns (13) and 13th in catches (87), as he was named an All-American and finished as the runner-up for the Biletnikoff Award given to the nation's top receiver.

The Wolverines faced the man that beat out Odunze for the Biletnikoff. Ohio State's Marvin Harrison Jr. five catches for 118 yards and a TD in Michigan's win in late November.

Few Wolverines drew him as an assignment that afternoon as often as Michigan's All-Big Ten cornerback Will Johnson, who said he's ready to embrace another tough matchup.

"They’re probably the top two receivers stat-wise this year," he said Saturday. "I mean there’s a reason they’re getting those stats, getting those touchdowns. They’re both very talented receivers and are going to be drafted high in the draft class. They’re good athletes."

While Johnson is the team's top corner, the Wolverines pride themselves on their depth in the back end.

Clinkscale pointed out Johnson wasn't the only one to guard Harrison; Mike Sainristil is an All-American more than capable of holding his own, while Josh Wallace got a crack at him, too. That's not to mention, Rod Moore was "in position to make the play" with the game-sealing interception on a play Harrison was the target.

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Expect a similar strategy against Washington.

"We’re going to go with what’s hot," Clinkscale said. "Whether that’s matching (Will Johnson and Odunze) up, or Josh Wallace covering him or Mikey out there; if we’re executing and getting off the field three-and-out, that’s what we’ll do.

"If we have to shadow, we will, but that’s not what we’re doing right now. We’re going to line up, do our job, execute our assignments and play the type of football we’ve been playing all year."

That's likely the great neutralizer, or so Michigan hopes. The Wolverines are the No. 1 total defense (243.1 yards per game) and scoring defense (10.21 points per game), second in passing yards allowed (150.0 per game) and third pass efficiency defense (101.51).

Harrison said he hadn't seen anything like what the Wolverines threw at him and Odunze can see what he's talking about when he watches film.

"They're able to disguise a lot of coverages and get there guys to confuse the quarterback, confuse the wide receivers," Odunze said. "Make them do different things and different coverages, that allows them to create chaos in offenses and get them out of their rhythm.

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"They can play any coverage out there, so it's going to be a great challenge for us."

If the challenges for U-M ended with Odunze, that would still be problem enough. But the 6-4 sophomore Polk is second on the team in catches (65), yards (1,122) and touchdowns (nine), despite missing two games.

Perhaps scarier? Many believe the Huskies' second-best receiver is McMillan, the 6-1 junior slot receiver who had 39 catches for 526 yards and four touchdowns playing in only six games this year.

Sainristil may draw any or all of them throughout the evening, and while he did applaud their skillset, there's a matchup from earlier this season he sees as a similarity.

"Their ability to track the ball down field, they make a lot of contested catches, they run routes very well," Sainristil said. "They’re fast guys. But we’ve seen great talent from receiver core before and we’re able to be prepared through this game through playing Maryland.

"Tagovailoa is a good quarterback, left-handed quarterback … now we have Penix."

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Of course, the Huskies team goes well beyond its wide receiving corps that, according to defensive coordinator Jesse Minter, have "draft choices all over the field."

Washington supplanted the Wolverines as boasting the nation's top offensive line this season, while they also have a first-team All-Pac-12 running back in Dillon Johnson and a potential NFL tight end in Jake Westover.

Washington's No. 4 receiver, Germie Bernard, played at Michigan State last season and caught a touchdown pass on the first snap of his career. Now, he's a gadget guy for the Huskies, who has more than 450 yards of total offense as well as two touchdowns a piece through the air and on the ground.

The Huskies are is No. 1 in the nation in passing yards per game (350.0) and top 10 in scoring (37.6 points per game). It's not much of a secret what they want to do.

Can Michigan stop it?

"We know they’re a team that likes to score a lot of points and they like to do it through the air," Johnson said. "So it's gonna come down to us, no matter what."

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan football's DBs embrace matchup with Washington passing game