Rich Rodriguez: Michigan should compete for a Big Ten championship

Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez said he expects the Wolverines to be back in the postseason this year.

“If we’re not in a bowl game we’re all going to be ticked," Rodriguez said Monday at Big Ten football media day in Chicago. "If we’re not competing better in every game, we’re all going to be upset. Not talking about the fans, but us. We think that we should be a whole lot better in a whole lot of areas even though we lost a lot of guys on defense."

Rodriguez said he's optimistic the Wolverines will rebound from the worst season in program history - last year's stomach-churning 3-9 campaign - because of the strides players have made this offseason and the fact everyone's more comfortable in the second year of his system.

"I understand it’s a bottom-line business," Rodriguez said. "Until we have the wins and losses, that type of success, people will always question it. I wish there was more patience, but I ain’t got much patience myself so I hope it shows up pretty soon."

Rodriguez was asked if a 7-5 record and a bowl would be good enough.

"The only thing I ever talk to them about is we expect to compete for championships," he said. "Are we good enough to win a Big Ten championship? There’s a whole lot of things that got to happen for that. That’s our first goal every year is compete for that, and there’s lot of things got to happen for us and a lot of bad things happen to someone else, but if we’re at least not competing for it and being more competitive in certain situations than I don’t think we’ve made the progress we wanted to."