TAMPA, Fla. — Michigan football took down No. 11 Alabama 19-13 in the ReliaQuest Bowl on Tuesday. The Wolverines were propelled by four field goals and a strong showing on defense and special teams. Below is every noteworthy quote from Michigan head coach Sherrone Moore following the game.
Notable postgame quotes from Sherrone Moore
On the first quarter:
“Yeah, it was crazy. We had a lot of presentations. Our staff did an excellent job presenting things throughout bowl camp, and we talked about plus two, and Coach Morgan brought up being plus two, and I think in that time we were plus three. They’re going, we’re plus three right now; we’ve got a chance to win this game. We’re going to go win this game now.
“The coolest part of that was it started to rain, and the boys went crazy. It was like a party. I was like, what’s going on. They love stuff like that. They love adverse environments that people don’t expect, but they enjoy that.
“But it was awesome to watch our guys — we talked about being plus two, and to get plus three right there was huge for us.”
On running back Jordan Marshall:
“Yeah, I think he’s got a bright future. Like I said, he reminds me so much of Blake (Corum) in the way he approaches his business and what he does off the field to take care of his body. You obviously saw how he runs. He’s a physical runner. He can make people miss. He can run you over. He obviously has that burst.
“All the credit in the world to Alabama and the way they played defense, a physical style of defense, but I thought our guys really bowed up and played physical ball.
“But Jordan Marshall, he’s going to be a special back. He’s got a lot of ability, but he works really hard, so I think that’s the piece that really makes him different.”
On the Michigan D-Line performance:
“I mean, it was outstanding. You talk about one of the most explosive people in college football with Jalen Milroe, he can hurt you with his legs, he can hurt you with his arm, and I thought they did a really good job of funneling him in the pocket and making it uncomfortable for him, hitting him.
“I thought our D-line just did an outstanding job, Coach Espo, Coach Wilkins, Coach Fee, Coach Lewis, all those guys that work with the D-line, it was unbelievable to watch them.
“Credit to the players. You don’t have Mason Graham, you don’t have Kenneth Grant, so people think there’s this big falloff. Those are two incredible players, but our guys really take a lot of pride in being physical, and we wanted to do that all this bowl camp, and we really did, tried to tune up the physicality to make sure we’re fundamentally sound, and I thought those guys did a really good job.”
On how Michigan ended the year:
“Yeah, we just want to finish. Obviously you want to win every game, and we didn’t do that, so took a lot of pride in after that last — we played Indiana, then we had a bye week, and really honing in and recommitting to the things that we needed to get better at, and it was really the fundamentals, the little pieces, doing those things really, really well, and those usually end up in those results.
“We refocused, we retooled, and really proud of our staff and our players.”
On identity of the team moving forward:
“Yeah, just happy we got those wins. It was exciting to get those wins, to work to get those wins. Yeah, we want to be physical on defense, on offense. But we want to be explosive on offense. Those are things that we’ve got to work on in the off-season to make sure we’re more explosive, especially in the passing game.
“We had a great throw to Fred (Moore) by Davis (Warren). It was a great ball in that back part of the end zone. That was awesome to see. But we want to be more explosive on offense, which we’re going to work to do that.
“But our defense played lights out. At the end of the year, Northwestern, holding them to six, Ohio, holding them to 10, these guys 13, you talk about — especially Ohio and these guys, explosive offenses that can put up points on the scoreboard. I don’t know what Ohio was averaging a game, I think they were in the 40s and these guys were in the high 30s.
“Our defense played incredible these last three games, and big shout out to Coach Wink.”
On learning from losses:
“Yeah, we talked about not losses, lessons. We had a lot of lessons throughout the year, and just learning from them so we learn the things that we need to learn so ultimately end up on the plus side, and we did that in these last three games.
“Finishing on a strong note was huge for us and will build great momentum going into the off-season. We feel like we’ve got a bright future the way we’re recruiting, the guys we’re bringing in, the guys we’re keeping, to make sure that this Michigan is the best version of Michigan that it can be, and that’s all we’re going to worry about. When we get to winter workouts, that’s the first cycle we’ve got. We’re going to attack that as much as we can and get better there, and then we’ll go in the spring, we’ll go in the summer and we’ll go into fall camp and then we’ll work to what that final piece will look like after fall camp.
“But we’re going to celebrate this one. We’ve got a happy flight coming up, so we’re going to celebrate this one.”
On the game’s physicality:
“Oh, yeah. There was some hard hitting going on on both sides. You could hear the pads popping. Our guys were delivering hits, they were delivering hits. Three-yard runs, those dirty runs, those aren’t bad plays, especially those are like body blows, and there was a lot of that on both sides of the ball and physicality, but I thought our guys stepped up in the moments that they needed to, and our offense took a five-minute drive to get down and get a field goal, and our defense did a good job holding them in the red zone was huge.
“The physicality was there. We knew it would be that type of game, so we were ready for it.”
On Davis Warren’s injury and Alex Orji stepping in
“Yeah, not sure exactly what the injury is. Lower body injury. We’ll figure that out and get him right. But I was really proud of the way he carried himself and what he did in the game. Took control of the offense, and he was really like that throughout bowl prep.
“Then Orji came in and handled it well, just continued to — we just felt like the way the game was going, our defense was holding them up, that we needed to possess the ball. I think we had 38 minutes time of possession, so that’s what we wanted to do, and executed that at a high level.”
On winning in spite of players opting out
“That we’ve got a great culture, and we’ve got great kids. No one person wins a game. No one person, no two people. It’s a team. It’s always going to be a team sport. If you look at it any different, then you’ve got issues, and we’re always going to look at it as a team sport and be the best team we can be, whoever is out on the field.”
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