New Mexico head coach Jason Eck will bring his Lobos to Michigan Stadium as a nearly five-touchdown underdog on Saturday against the Wolverines.
Earlier this week, Eck met with the media to discuss the challenge facing his team and what he expects from No. 14 Michigan, which is entering Year 2 of the Sherrone Moore era coming off an 8-5 record in 2024. Here’s what Eck had to say about the Wolverines and playing in the largest football stadium in the country this weekend.
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Opening comments and first impression of Michigan:
“The team is excited to play. Training camp is long these days. We get a great opportunity to go play a really good team and test ourselves against one of the best teams in the country. Players are very excited to play. This is a historic stadium to play in. I was lucky to be there a couple times when I was at Wisconsin as a player and graduate assistant. A great atmosphere for football. Night game, national TV. We’re going to be excited to play, ready to go.”
On releasing a fake two-deep depth chart, poking fun at the fact Michigan does not release a two-deep for its games:
“I’m not a big movie guy, so I glanced at that, and I knew probably less than half of the names on there. We are not releasing a two-deep because Michigan doesn’t like to release a two-deep. You can kind of figure things out from watching film last year and see how they got transfers, but we’ll have a regular two-deep out next week. Leave you guys a little suspense.”
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On his impressions of Michigan:
“You know, I think they’re a physical, well-coached team. They were very low-penalized last year. It shows they have good technique, well-coached, very physical front seven. You know, their front seven really impresses me. Barham and Hausman, they’re two inside linebackers, they’re great players. Derrick Moore is a great player, the defensive end. You know, they lost some guys in the D-line room, but they still have a lot of good players who are left. You know, Benny’s good. Payne, the Alabama transfer’s good. TJ Guy’s good.
“And then on offense, you know, return three starters in the O-line. They have a good back returning, plus they picked up the Alabama transfer, who’s a good player, and then they got the number one, you know, recruit in the country, at quarterback. So they’re a very good team. Their kicker is a great player. He’s an all-American first team, all-Big Ten. So definitely a good test for us in the opening game to play such a great team.”
On how he’s gone about scouting Bryce Underwood and Michigan’s offense under first-year offensive coordinator Chip Lindsey:
“Yeah, you know, it’s different. I mean, it’s been a cross-section of everything. We looked a lot at their tape last year. Their offensive coordinator, Lindsey, came from North Carolina. So, we watched North Carolina stuff to see their things. We looked at the spring game. You know, he didn’t run a lot in the spring game, but you watch his, you know, high school film, you see he’s a really good athlete. So we got to be ready for him in the quarterback run game.”
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More on the Michigan Stadium environment:
“You know, they have a great crowd, whatever, 107,000, 110,000. They’ve got great tradition, but, you know, Tom Brady’s not playing on Saturday. We got to play the 11 guys that are out there and deal with that. It’s a little bit like the movie Hoosiers, you know. Maybe you have to measure the goalposts like the coach did in Hoosiers.”
On simulating the crowd noise of The Big House:
“Yes, we were planning on sending the offense indoors to the indoor facility just to get some echo of crowd noise. We ended up having everybody go in because we get these late afternoon thunderstorms. So everyone ended up going in there. But we’ll do the same throughout the week just to try to get them acclimated to operating where you can’t hear very well.
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On going to Oregon last year as the head coach of Idaho, and what he’ll take from that experience into this matchup at Michigan:
“Yeah, I think really this goes back, when I was at South Dakota State, Coach Stig wanted us to play better against North Dakota State and the Fargo Dome is a real loud environment for that, even though it’s not as big as Michigan Stadium.
“So really it’s probably a plan, 10 years in the making of playing in places that are really loud. And it really affects your offense you know it really doesn’t change a lot for your defense or special teams preparation a little bit maybe for PAT or punt if you’re backed up but it’s largely your offense but you have to get the offense ready to go and operate even if they can’t hear well even if they can’t hear the snap count still be able to go.”
On Bryce Underwood’s reported NIL deal, if he thinks the freshman quarterback will try to do too much to prove he’s worth it:
“Yeah, I mean, obviously that’s quite the investment, you know, they’ve made. I mean, that’s, you know, probably more than all of our players, myself, and all of our assistant coaches together when you talk about $12 million. So he’s a very good player, you know, and, you know, obviously you never know. You know, some young ones are pretty good. You know, Michael Jordan and LeBron James were pretty damn good when they were 18 years old. So, again, I definitely don’t want to take him lightly.
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“You know, I’d probably rather, you know, last year he coached against Dilllon Gabriel, who was like a fifth-year senior and started 50 games. So I’d probably rather take a guy in his first start versus a guy who started 50 games. But we certainly can’t take this guy lightly. I mean, they’re paying him all that money for a reason. He was the number one player in the country for a reason. And we better be ready to go against him. He’ll be motivated to prove them right that they gave him all that money for good reason.”
The most difficult thing about playing in a hostile environment like Michigan Stadium:
“Well, two things. I think just a hostile environment, I think dealing with the noise on offense because most hostile environments make the most you know noise when you have the ball so your communication on offense is the biggest challenge.
“And then, you know, when you play a team that’s, you know, Michigan’s one of the blue bloods of the country, probably, you know, one of the top ten programs in the country year in and year out. I know they’re not ranked quite that high this year, but, you know, they’re very talented. You know, they’re big, they’re fast, they’re strong across every position. You know, we’re going to have to be very selective to try to get some good one-on-one battles for us. A lot of those one-on-one battles are probably not great matchups for us, but, you know, we’ve got to hang in there with those and then, you know, try to manipulate some where we can get some of our best players and some of their worst to have a few opportunities to to get some big plays out of there.”
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Does he expect Michigan Stadium to be a more daunting venue than Autzen Stadium (Oregon):
“No. I mean, Autzen’s very, very loud. You know, we probably were not quite as talented, we only had 63 scholarships at Idaho. We got 85 now. We have some NIL money and not any NIL money with (Idaho). So I wouldn’t say it’s more daunting.
“There’s going to be more people there certainly than Oregon, but you know, the acoustics of how the Oregon stadium is, it’s a very, very a loud venue, probably one of the, and again, I haven’t been in Michigan 25 years, so maybe it’s gotten a lot louder, but my memories of the two places in Oregon is a little louder, even though it’s less people. They’re both very good teams. Neither of them is easy, but I wouldn’t say this feels more daunting.”
This article originally appeared on Wolverines Wire: What New Mexico HC Jason Eck said about Michigan, Bryce Underwood
