Saturday's showdown between USC and Michigan is one of the marquee matchups on the college football slate this weekend. The No. 11 Trojans will look to remain undefeated when they travel to Ann Arbor to face the No. 18 Wolverines in the Big House. Michigan enters this game with a 2-1 record after getting blown out by Texas two weeks ago. They pulled out a 28-18 win over Arkansas State last weekend, but the performance left the Wolverines fanbase with plenty of concerns, which is why they opened as 5.5-point underdogs to USC.
Early money came in on the Trojans, moving this line up to -6.5 before going back to -5.5. News of a quarterback change for Michigan pushed the number back to -6 in favor of USC, where it currently sits. The total opened at 48.5 and has been steadily moving down. It dropped as low as 45.5 but has settled at 46.5.
I mentioned a quarterback change for the Wolverines who announced on Monday that they’ve benched Davis Warren and will start Alex Orji on Saturday. Warren has only thrown two touchdowns throughout his first three starts but has six interceptions, including three last week against a Group of 5 team that Michigan should have handled with ease.
As a mobile quarterback, Orji changes the way the Wolverines' offense will operate. There are bright spots in the run game with Kalel Mullings and Donovan Edwards, who combined for 235 yards and 3 touchdowns last week. With Orji adding another threat on the ground, that should, in theory, open up the passing game.
However, I still don’t think Michigan is going to have enough firepower to keep up with the Trojans' high-powered offense. USC owns the nation’s 10th-best passing offense, averaging 336.5 air yards per game. With the Wolverines defense ranked 90th in passing yards allowed, giving up 9.76 per completion and 234.3 per game, quarterback Miller Moss and the Trojans receivers won’t struggle to find success.
Defensively, USC has shown significant improvement from what they had over the last two seasons with D’Anton Lynn taking over as defensive coordinator. The Trojans are also coming off a bye week, so they’ve had extra time to prepare and get healthy after beating LSU, 27-20, in Week 1 and Utah State, 40-0, in Week 2.
It’s not often the Wolverines are significant underdogs at home, but this is not anywhere near the same team we saw win the national title last year. I’ll back the more complete team with a dynamic offense and take USC -6.5.
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