Michigan football's offseason work in weight room sets stage for a bounceback season

USA Today

a day ago

One of the underrated components to building an elite college football team year in and year out is the work that's put in during the offseason. And for Michigan football, that's been the secret elixir to the team's success.
While rivals drone on about sign stealing and all of that, there were two big factors that led to the Wolverines winning three straight Big Ten titles and a national championship: team culture and gains in the weight room. Called 'the boa constrictor' by Joel Klatt and PJ Fleck, Michigan wore down its opponents and had the talent to keep wearing them down. Last year, the offense was defunct, and the boa constrictor was more of the garden snake variety. But Sherrone Moore hopes that what the maize and blue have done in winter and summer conditioning will return the Wolverines to where they were previously.
At Big Ten media days, Moore noted many of the big gains and pertinent losses -- physical evidence of work done in the weight room.
"There's so many people who've hit on Bryce. He's gone from 215 to 230, and it's good weight, lowered the body fat percentage, and gained lean muscle mass," Moore said. "A guy like Enow Etta, he's 320 right now, came in at like 250. Andrew Sprague, a guy that's changed his body. Deyvid Palepale, a special shout-out to him. He was a guy that was 370. He's down to 345 or 340, touching 338, and a lot of fat mass is gone.
"So there's so many examples throughout the program that have really done a really good job, so that's a special shout-out to Justin Tress' staff and Abigail O'Connor on our nutrition staff and what they've done. It's incredible to watch it, so it's going to be fun to watch them. Big team, strong team, fast team, physical team, but we all got to put it together on the field."
Perhaps one unheralded change during the Jim Harbaugh to Sherrone Moore changeover was losing Ben Herbert to the NFL. While the change itself was commented on, the timing of it -- on January 29, 2024 -- creeped into winter conditioning. That meant that his replacement, Justin Tress, had to learn how to direct that aspect of the team on the fly.
It still went well for Tress and company, but now, he appears to have truly hit his groove as he enters his second season as the director of strength and conditioning in Ann Arbor.
"I think he's taking full control of that team and full control of the locker room and the respect that he has with the players on and off the field," Moore said. "You can see that permeate throughout the staff and throughout him, so he's definitely taking the reins to that crew."
We won't have a good idea of the full impact of Tress and his work this offseason when Michigan takes on New Mexico on August 30. The gains will really be shown off later in the season, particularly against Ohio State in the regular season finale at the end of November.