Football
When Sherrone Moore hired Chip Lindsey to become his new offensive coordinator ahead of the 2025 football season, the Wolverines were hoping for a more prolific-looking attack. While the Maize and Blue were better offensively, it was a far cry from what was expected.
With how things went in Ann Arbor last season, along with Moore being fired, Kyle Whittingham essentially cleaned house and brought his own staff into the building. While he kept both Tony Alford and Kerry Coombs, along with Lou Esposito, who left for the NFL, Whittingham wanted familiarity around him in his new endeavor at Michigan.
One of those coaches he brought with him is his brother, Freddie Whittingham. Freddie will coach Michigan’s tight ends this season and appearing on ‘The Team’, presented by Champ Media, Michigan tight end Zack Marshall spoke about Whittingham and how far along the room has gone under his guidance.
“Coach Freddie’s awesome,” Marshall said. “He is funny. He’s very down to earth, like the kindest human, which is just something that you can really appreciate about a coach. It was very easy to learn this game with him. He’s pretty, pretty forgiving, but obviously, we all know that like come season time, the forgiveness gets eliminated really, really quick. Really, really quickly. But we’re just happy to kind of have a new feel, new flow going.
“It’s a lot of work. I think you can attest to this. It’s very different than what we — it’s a lot of work in a different way. It’s a different way. Like, things used to be a lot longer, but now they are a lot more frequent. I won’t go into specifics, but you know exactly what I’m saying. It’s a new style.
“We should put it that way. It’s a new style, and it’s — Freddie and Ali’i both like, Ali’i (Niumatalolo) is our assistant position coach. Has been a great dude. Has been a tight ends coach before. Like legit dude to have as an assistant and — like those dudes, they really care about us, and they want it to be fun. They know that sitting in a meeting room for hours and hours on end gets a little redundant.”
A lot more freedom under Jason Beck
While the Wolverines’ rushing attack was very good, Michigan’s passing attack was tight. Wide receivers struggled to create separation, outside of then-freshman Andrew Marsh. Between Bryce Underwood having shaky moments and the WRs struggling — it created tough situations for Michigan.
According to both Chase Herbstreit and Marshall, the Wolverines have already installed 70% of Jason Beck’s offense. With most of the offense intact, Marshall spoke about how much more freedom the playmakers have in the 2026 offense.
“Like we’re pretty deep now. And that’s crazy how fast we’ve been able to install these,” Marshall said. “Like it’s unreal. And then you can change things on the fly so easily with this new offense.
“Our former offense, it was very pro-style and it was awesome in that, but it was so like technical, and like, OK, if he’s inside leverage of you, we kind of want you to cross his face because we’ve got to open the window for the next guy. Well, what if the next guy is not open? Like that, that was how my brain thought.
“Now it’s like, OK, don’t just open the window, wrap him and get to the next window so that you’re going to be able to be open and pull the other guy open if he attacks you, you know? So there’s a lot of freedom in this new offense.”
Fans will get a chance to see Michigan’s offense in action on April 18 during the Wolverines’ Spring Game.
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