Can the Alex Orji-led offense keep winning games for the Michigan Wolverines as they enter Big Ten play?

The Michigan Wolverines shocked the world with their 27-24 upset over the USC Trojans last week. Michigan propelled their team to a win thanks to an astounding 290 yards on the ground, becoming one of the few teams in CFB history to win a game with under 50 yards passing (32).

Is this kind of offense sustainable for Michigan moving forward? Well...maybe.

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On the day, the Wolverines tallied 322 yards of offense, with the aforementioned 290 on the ground. They averaged a little over 5.5 yards per play on the day.

Right off the bat, it's extremely unlikely Michigan will be able to replicate their efforts moving forward. The only non-service academy team to break 290 rushing yards per game in recent years was the 2023 Liberty Flames. While it is possible , I wouldn't count on it happening every single game.

Michigan's 290 yards were buoyed by three runs of over 40+ yards. Without those three runs, Michigan's tally drops from 290 to 133 yards. The Wolverines go from averaging 6.3 yards per rush to 3.1(!) when you discount those three runs. 3.1 yards per rush would place them right near the bottom of the country this season.

Of course, it's not fair to totally discount these kinds of rushes. They certainly matter and speak to what Michigan's offense can do on the ground.

It's just difficult to count on explosive rushes to sustain offense, especially ones built almost entirely on broken tackles. Michigan didn’t have any runs over 40 yards in its first three games, with two of the three coming against Group of Five teams. They only had seven all of last season.

Now, there are some strong signs for Michigan. They sit 20th in rushing success rate and are top-40 in both EPA/Rush and Yards/Rush. They are still effective rushing the ball. But is that enough to win them games?

The offense only scored 20 points on USC, who is a seemingly competent team nationally. Michigan still has games against Washington, Illinois, rival Michigan State, Oregon, a suddenly tough Indiana team, Northwestern, and Ohio State. All of those teams sans Oregon are in the top half nationally in EPA/Rush allowed.

Only Northwestern is scoring fewer points than Michigan's 24.3 points per game.

When you're getting nothing out of your passing game, it's so easy to fall behind in these games. Can Michigan keep winning like this, relying on their defense and run game to win? The offense is starting to draw up more and more plays to take advantage of Orji's ability to run the ball, but at some point, it seems likely they have to get something going through the air.

Teams that aren't establishing passing attacks like Minnesota, Northwestern, and potentially Michigan State aren't likely to be able to put pressure on Michigan's offense to abandon their script. What happens when they get to teams like Oregon, Ohio State, Indiana, and Washington who can put up points through the air?

How confident do you feel in a Michigan team that looked like it couldn't keep up with half of their conference opponents?