Michigan Football: Kerry Coombs Is Awesome

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Kerry Coombs is in his first full season with the Michigan football program in 2026. Coombs is in his 43rd year coaching, having mentored players at the high school, college and NFL levels. He was named the 2017 Rivals.com National Recruiter of the Year and was also selected as the Big Ten’s Recruiter of the Year on three occasions.Coombs joined the U-M staff in December 2025 and coached in the Cheez-It Citrus Bowl.

When you hear him at the podium it's very easy to imagine him absolutely killing it on the recruiting trail. He has a great energy about him and knows his way around the sport better than most after having put more than 40 years into his craft. He talked about his unit as a whole and identified some areas to improve.

"Oh, there's a ton of things we'd like to improve," he said. "I obviously am very happy with with our punter, with our specialists in general. They they performed well. Cam [Brown] had a really good game on Saturday, although he would tell you there was a couple balls he'd like to have back.

"But we've kicked the ball off well with our freshman kicker. Trey [Butkowski] has done a good job making kicks. Nico [Crawford] snapped well. So from a specialist standpoint, that they've performed well.

"We got lots of things we can improve, but in the punt block, the penalties have been an issue, and we got to fix that. We absolutely will. And kickoff return, we're close. So there are things. There are a lot of things that we can improve on, and we look forward to doing that this week."

Hearing him talk about special teams is genuinely entertaining. He broke down Cam Brown's success, strategies when it comes to punting, kickoff and placekicking duties and more. You can just tell that he oozes knowledge and expertise and it's not surprising that he's been so well received by his fellow coaches and his players. He even talked about players coming to him to ask if they contribute on special teams.

"Every day, and it's it's rewarding. We've got young players that want to play. We got starters that want to play. We got guys that want to play, and and that is fantastic," he said. "And so we're constantly working on figuring out where can a guy help us. And even if it's one play or one unit, how can he help us? And honestly, how can we help them? How can we get them on the field so that they can have that experience, which is going to help them as offensive and defensive players?"

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