Michigan has a defense again

I love to see superpowers in sports crumble, and don't care who they are.

Texas' football team went 5-7 last year after winning 10 or more games for nine straight seasons. That was good for everybody. Well, except the Longhorns.

Florida won the BCS title in the 2006 and 2008 seasons. The Gators have lost their last four games. They need that. It will remind them that this stuff is difficult.

Michigan had 40 consecutive winning seasons before 2008 and had gone to bowls in 33 straight years. Those were NCAA records. But then Lloyd Carr retired as the Wolverines' coach, and Michigan hired Rich Rodriguez. In Rodriguez's first season, Michigan was a breathtakingly bad 3-9. It lost at home to Utah and Toledo.

In '09, the Wolverines won their first four games. Then they won just once in their last seven games, and that was against FCS Delaware State.

Last year Michigan had a 7-5 record in the regular-season, but were viciously beaten in the Gator Bowl by Mississippi State, 52-14.

The superpower with all its traditions and resources and history was still foundering.

However, Michigan hired Brady Hoke from San Diego State to replace the deposed Rodriguez. Hoke knows what all smart head coaches know, which is you need to surround yourself with good coaches. So he hired Greg Mattison, the Baltimore Ravens' defensive coordinator, to guide the Wolverines' defense. At the price of ... yes ... $750,000 a year.

As you surely know, college assistant coaches don't make that kind of bread. Correction, they didn't used to make that kind of money.

LSU's offensive and defensive coordinators pull down $700,000 annually. Florida pays offensive coordinator Charlie Weis $765,000. Alabama defensive coordinator Kirby Smart is making $850,000. And Auburn offensive coordinator Gus Malzahn? He has a $1.3 million salary.

Back to Mattison. He is 61 and has been in coaching for 35 years. He was the defensive coordinator at Florida from 2005 to 2007. Good years. Then he spent three years at Baltimore, his only three in the NFL. Hoke, as aware of anyone that Michigan's defense was a mess, saw a way to start shoring things up in Mattison, who was defensive coordinator at Michigan in 1995 and 1996. Hoke was Mattison's defensive line coach.

Michigan was 110th in total defense last season, allowing 450.8 yards per game. It gave up 38 points to Iowa, 41 to Penn State, 65 to Illinois (albeit in a three-overtime win), 48 to Wisconsin and 37 to Ohio State before getting shredded by Mississippi State.

Through seven games this season, the Wolverines are 35th in total defense with an average of 340.6 yards allowed per game. That's what you would call improvement, though the Wolverines have yet to play Iowa, Illinois, Nebraska and Ohio State.

It was stunning to see how un-Michigan the Michigan defense was in its losses to Iowa in 2009 and 2010. The Wolverines didn't force a single Hawkeye turnover last year in Iowa's 38-28 win in Ann Arbor. The year before in Iowa City, the Hawkeyes scored four times in the first-half on the way to a 30-28 victory.

Iowa has played Michigan 57 times, but has never won three in a row from the Wolverines. Michigan didn't have Mattison in charge of its defense for the last two.

Here's a good story on Mattison by Sports Illustrated's Andy Staples.