How 2 Michigan football signees dealt with Jim Harbaugh exit, Sherrone Moore promotion

So much has happened with Michigan football since Jordan Marshall and Andrew Sprague signed up to join the Wolverines in late December.

They beat Alabama in the Rose Bowl before demolishing Washington to claim their first national title since 1997. Then, just like that, the core of that championship team disintegrated. One by one, a procession of upperclassmen left for the NFL. Even star quarterback J.J. McCarthy announced his plans to forgo his last remaining year of eligibility and head to the pros. On the heels of that mass exodus, Jim Harbaugh – Michigan’s leader of the past nine years – also bolted. He accepted a job with the Los Angeles Chargers, leaving the program in the hands of a first-time head coach, Sherrone Moore.

Yeah, Sprague said, it was a lot to process in that 35-day period.

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“Definitely weird,” the four-star offensive tackle and crown jewel of Michigan’s incoming freshman class told the Free Press. “But I never really lost faith.”

Sprague instead remains hopeful because the 38-year-old Moore is now in charge. Last week, Moore, new offensive line coach Grant Newsome, and now-former defensive assistant Mike Elston paid Sprague a visit at his Kansas City home. There, they chatted for 2½ hours over lunch about the state of the Wolverines in this transition phase. The thrust of their message was that Michigan would continue to operate like it did under Harbaugh.

“From just talking to him, it feels like he’s not going to change much,” Marshall relayed to the Free Press. “He’s gonna do what we’ve always done, which is lean on the run game.”

That is exactly what Marshall wanted to hear. He fell in love with the Wolverines’ ground-and-pound style that Harbaugh cultivated and Moore helped nurture. It’s what led the Cincinnati native to spurn the Ohio State Buckeyes and cast his lot with their archrivals. As one of the nation’s most coveted prospects, Marshall imagined himself thriving in Michigan’s rugged offense and following in the footsteps of Blake Corum. He has the bona fides to suggest that is possible. The four-star running back gained 3,511 yards and scored 47 touchdowns during his last two seasons at Archbishop Moeller, one of the country’s most prominent high school football powerhouses. He was then named the top football player in his home state.

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Marshall had 23 Power Five scholarship offers and teams would be lining up to grab him if he took advantage of a new policy that allows for student-athletes to be released from their letters of intent due to a coaching change. But the thought has never crossed his mind. Marshall didn’t commit to Michigan because of Harbaugh. In fact, he had a sneaking suspicion Harbaugh wouldn’t even be there when he was due to arrive on campus in the late spring or summer.

“At the end of the day, I knew he was most likely to move on and go to the NFL,” Marshall said. “He wanted to do that. I always knew it was a possibility. But I knew Michigan would be in good hands no matter who the head coach was. …Because even if we took out all the coaches, Michigan would still be Michigan. It’s player-driven and not coach-driven. And your team’s better when it’s all about the players.”

Still, it’s undeniable that Harbaugh’s shadow looms large. Sprague called him “a great leader of men.”

“It definitely made it more attractive having a legendary coach like that,” Sprague said. “But it’s not the only reason I went there.”

Instead, Sprague became enamored with the program Harbaugh built and Moore hopes to preserve. At his introductory news conference, Moore promised that Michigan wouldn’t “rebuild” but would instead “reload.”

“We’re going to continue to set the standard similar to what we have done,” Moore said.

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He’ll have his work cut for him in Year 1 of his regime. As two NCAA active investigations hover over them, the Wolverines will try to navigate a more powerful Big Ten that includes four new teams. They’ll face a loaded schedule that features tests against Texas, USC, Oregon, rivals Michigan State and Ohio State, plus national runner-up Washington. They will enter that gantlet with a revamped roster that lost 17 starters, including 10 on offense. Michigan will confront all of these challenges as it carries the burden of expectations created by its own recent success.

“Our fan base is going to want us to bring home a national championship every year and that’s what our goal has got to be because we’re not just going to stop at one,” Marshall said. “It’s a new era. But that new era is going to put a lot of pressure on us.”

So be it, Marshall said. With or without Harbaugh, this is what he signed up for when he picked Michigan. Last month, surrounded by family at his home, he watched the Wolverines run over Washington and reach the summit of college football. As he saw some of his future teammates celebrate the championship under a cloud of confetti, Marshall thought to himself, “I’m gonna get mine someday. My class is going to get theirs someday.”

Marshall still feels that way even though the man who led Michigan to the top is no longer there.

Contact Rainer Sabin at rsabin@freepress.com. Follow him @RainerSabin.

This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: How 2 Michigan football signees reacted to a wild 35-day period