Kyle Whittingham’s ‘train wreck’ and Morgan Scalley’s seamless transition

NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos...

For better or worse, the fortunes of Utah’s new head coach Morgan Scalley and Michigan’s new head coach Kyle Whittingham are linked. It’s the mentor and the protege, the old man and the young(er) man, the former boss and the underling.

Whittingham coached Scalley as a player, then gave him his first coaching job, little knowing that he was also hiring the guy who would take his job 20 years later. The acrimonious nature of their parting has only added to the intrigue of their connection.

Now they’re on different sidelines, separated by 1,500 miles and heading in different directions.

Utah is 4-0, ranked 12th in the country and in the hunt for a Big 12 championship.

Michigan is 3-2 and unranked. The Wolverines should be 2-3 if you account for the game against Western Michigan in which they were erroneously granted an extra play that resulted in a “winning” touchdown after time had expired (the NCAA conceded this point but said there was no means to overturn the results).

To be fair, Scalley’s team has had a ridiculously soft schedule — Idaho, Arkansas, Utah State, Iowa State. Who put this thing together, the Eccles family? Their big tests will be No. 22 Houston and No. 8 BYU.

Michigan has a murderous schedule; as bad as things are now, it could get much worse. The Wolverines’ schedule includes No. 7 Indiana, No. 13 Oregon, No. 21 UCLA and No. 5 Ohio State, to say nothing of Penn State, this week’s opponent and a must-win for Whittingham.

At the outset of the season, Utah seemed to be the more unstable of the two programs. Whittingham took five Ute assistants and four star players with him to Michigan.

Utah had to begin the season with a new head coach, a new offensive coordinator, a new quarterback coach, a new offensive line coach, a new tight ends coach, a new wide receivers coach, a new defensive coordinator and a new safeties coach.

The transition has been surprisingly seamless. This week, six college football reporters revealed their early predictions; three of the six think Utah will advance to the College Football Playoff.

Michigan’s transition to a new coaching staff has been anything but seamless. The coaching staff is composed of six coaches from last year’s Utes staff, plus defensive coordinator Jay Hill, who coached under Whittingham at Utah before joining BYU in 2023.

It is a staff that had worked together for years and succeeded. They also had the added advantage of taking four of Utah’s best players to Ann Arbor — John Henry Daley has 16 tackles (six solo), three sacks, 4½ tackles for loss; Jonah Lea’ea has 10 tackles; JJ Buchanan has a team-leading 24 catches for 446 yards and four touchdowns; Smith Snowden has 12 solo tackles and an interception.

Despite such stability and the influx of talent, the Wolverines are reeling. The ridiculously early calls to fire Whittingham began during the season opener and have gained momentum since then among fans.

The Wolverines are college football royalty and their fans aren’t long on patience. It’s all but forgotten that they defeated No. 11 Oklahoma since the last two weeks have resulted in losses to Iowa and Minnesota, marking the first time in 12 years that they lost to the latter and opened with two conference defeats.

The season is just five weeks old and already the Wolverines’ hopes for the College Football Playoff or a conference championship are gone (at this rate, even a bowl berth might be a reach).

“It’s a train wreck right now,” says former Utah/Florida/Ohio State coach Urban Meyer.

When Whittingham raided Utah’s roster heading out the door, he should’ve pursued quarterback Devon Dampier, the Utes’ veteran quarterback. Whittingham’s starting quarterback (for now), Bryce Underwood, was the nation’s No. 1 prep recruit in 2025. He was lured to Michigan by a $12.5 million NIL deal. Let this be Exhibit A in the folly of paying 18-year-olds generational money and banking your coaching future on them. Underwood has been a huge liability, averaging just 176 yards per game passing.

Eric Weddle, a former player under Whittingham at Utah and a former All-Pro NFL player, predicted this while watching a Michigan practice last spring.

“Don’t be surprised if the backup’s playing early because that Underwood kid, I don’t think he can throw or play quarterback.” In a subsequent interview, he doubled down on his comments, saying, “Prove me wrong.”

Offense and quarterback play have often been problematic for Whittingham. In this case, he inherited the quarterback and he will probably have to make the difficult decision to bench his $12 million player.

The Wolverines rank 17th out of 18 teams in the Big Ten in offense and 88th nationally. In a league in which teams routinely put up 35-40 points a game, Michigan is averaging 23 (17.5 if you toss out the 52-point outing against lowly UTEP).

While Utah has edged up in the rankings week by week — from 15th to 13th to 12th — Michigan has slid, from 18th to “others receiving votes” to nothing.

The Scalley-Whittingham intrigue continues.

More at NCAAF College Football News, Photos, Stats, Scores, Schedule & Videos