Birk's Eye View: Michigan football has mental obstacles to overcome

Michigan (5-4, 1-4) has lost four straight games against Football Bowl Subdivision opponents and remains one win shy of bowl eligibility with three weekends left in the regular season.

The Wolverines host a Purdue team clinging to faint bowl hopes this week, and while that’s easily their best shot at getting a sixth win - Michigan closes the season against Wisconsin and Ohio State, two of the Big Ten’s four respectable teams - there are lingering questions about their collective state of mind.

“You get frustrated and you don’t know what to do and the first thing you do is try to take the easy way out and just give up,” defensive end Brandon Graham said. “That’s not going to happen, I can promise you that. We’re not going to quit. We’re going to keep coming every Saturday until it’s over.”

Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez said he would “coach (his players’) mentality” this week, but as with offense, defense and special teams, there are holes there that don’t appear to have an easy fix.

Against Illinois, Michigan squandered several opportunities early and wilted in the face of adversity late, allowing 31 second-half points after failing on four rushing attempts from the 1-yard line.

Before Saturday’s 500-yard outburst, Illinois hadn’t scored more than 17 points or gone a game without a turnover against FBS competition this year.

“I wouldn’t say (the season’s) slipping away, but we’re not getting wins that we should,” cornerback Troy Woolfolk said. “We’re just playing for pride now. We know we’re not winning the Big Ten, but we still have a chance to go to a bowl. Just one more win and if we do that, it’ll be a better season than last year.”

Because the Big Ten is so mediocre, Michigan likely will head to the Champs Sports or Insight bowls if it wins just one more game.

Iowa, Penn State, Ohio State and Wisconsin have the league’s top four bowls all but locked up (or top three if two teams get BCS bids), and Minnesota is the only other conference team likely to win seven games. The Gophers (5-4) play Illinois and South Dakota State the next two weeks.

Michigan State and Northwestern are longshots to top six wins, and Purdue, Illinois and Indiana will be hard-pressed to make the postseason. Purdue and Illinois have to win out, while Indiana must upset either Wisconsin or Penn State.

Michigan, for all its turmoil, is the most attractive bowl option among the second-tier teams.

Of course, if the Wolverines can’t beat Purdue (3-6, 2-3), they’re just as likely to miss the postseason for the second straight year.

“We’ve got to have our best performance next week,” assistant head coach and secondary coach Tony Gibson said. “We’ve got a great Purdue team coming in, the quarterback’s going to challenge us on defense, and they’ll be ready to play.”

Notes, quotes and leftovers
• There weren’t many positives to take from Saturday, but one - and it’s a recurring theme - was the play of Graham.

The senior defensive end had seven tackles, another sack - his 6 1/2th of October- and blocked his second punt in as many weeks in the fourth quarter. In another recurring theme, Michigan fumbled away the possession after Graham’s block.

Graham said he’s not doing anything special to get to the punter.

“Just coming,” Graham said. “Just keep coming and it’ll open up for me. That’s all I think about, just keep coming. It’s got to open up. Somebody’s going to give up on the play. As long as I just keep going, that’s all that matters.”

• Speaking of Graham, how bad would Michigan’s defense be without him? In conference games, the Wolverines rank last in scoring defense, 10th in rushing defense and are tied for last in total defense.

With maybe the worst safety play in the league, the Wolverines would rank lower in pass defense - their seventh - if teams didn’t find it so easy to run on them.

• Gibson on Michigan’s defensive breakdowns: ”We weren’t blowing assignments, we were just missing tackles and not getting off blocks.”

• Michigan had three more turnovers Saturday - a muffed punt by Junior Hemingway and two Tate Forcier fumbles - and now has 14 in four Big Ten games.

“I’m more disappointed in that in two ballgames, the other team’s made plays but we also have not helped ourselves,” Rodriguez said. “And I’ve said it many times, even at the beginning of the year, we’re not going to be good enough to mess around and not play well and have a chance against anybody. And certainly the last couple weeks we haven’t given ourselves much of a chance because of our own errors.”

• Woolfolk on what Michigan has to do to turn things around: “Just come back and get a win next week. That’s all you can do. You can’t mope around. You have to internalize the problem, look in the mirror and see what’s wrong and fix yourself first so we can be good as a team.”

Dave Birkett covers University of Michigan football for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached by phone at 734-623-2552 or by e-mail at davidbirkett@annarbor.com. Follow him on Twitter @davebirkett.