Michigan Football OC Sherrone Moore discusses matchup with Alabama, OL…….

Sherrone Moore speaks on OL combo, another key position group for Rose Bowl vs. Alabama

The Michigan Wolverines are into their Rose Bowl prep for Alabama having to do a bit of a reset on the offensive line. After All-American Zak Zinter was injured in the Ohio State game, suddenly U-M found itself needing to search for answers up front.

Following Zinter’s season-ending leg injury, Michigan rolled with an offensive line group that went LaDarius Henderson, Trevor Keegan, Drake Nugent, Karsen Barnhart and Trente Jones from left to right. Those five closed out the win over Ohio State and started the Big Ten Championship game against Iowa, setting the Wolverines up for a 30-day layoff between games.

Offensive coordinator/offensive line coach Sherrone Moore spoke about the state of the offensive line on Tuesday, saying that he is pleased with where they are at with less than two weeks remaining until the Rose Bowl.

“We’ve done different things but feel good with where we’re at,” Moore said. “Not going to speak to who is doing what but we’re excited about where we’re at and it’s been a good week of preparation and a really good couple of weeks. Excited to see what the rest of the weeks look like.”

Michigan won the Joe Moore Award – given to the best offensive line in the country – the last two seasons for its sterling play up front, but followed it up with uncharacteristically bad showings in College Football Playoff losses to Georgia and TCU. Some of the line issues crept into this season, and now the team has something to prove after being eliminated from award consideration.

“I don’t think they’re looking back at it, they put the effort in they wanted to put in, we just weren’t as good as we wanted to be those days,” Moore said. “Not looking at the past, attacking right now, attacking the future and doing what we can to be better today.”

The offensive line play will be critical in the showdown with Alabama, but the tight ends have the potential to be mismatches for Michigan. Moore seemed to indicate that they will continue to be an emphasis in the offensive game plan heading into the CFP.

“I think those guys are extremely important like they are every week,” Moore said. “They’re a great defense, they’ve got great players all over the place. We’ve faced top-ten defenses the last four weeks but we understand and know what we see on film. They’re a great football team and they’ve got great players everywhere. Everybody is going to have to execute at a great level for us to go win the game.

“I think we just have to stay balanced, stay unpredictable. Keep to the plan that we have and go attack it.”

Michigan’s biggest offensive key to the Rose Bowl may very well be the play of junior quarterback J.J. McCarthy, who was voted team MVP at the award’s banquet last weekend. Moore weighed in on his progress throughout the year and what he has set U-M up to accomplish.

“From a passer standpoint, he’s always been really good just reading his progressions and doing his daily bit,” Moore said. “I think as a leader, he’s been such a young guy playing at a high-level role, he was a sophomore playing with a lot of juniors and seniors. I think being a junior now, I told him one day during training camp, I threw him my whistle and said, ‘These are the keys, you have the keys to the castle.’ So take it. He’s done that with the whole group. Taking a lot of ownership, he’s in here all the time. Just seeing his leadership has been the biggest piece.”