Utah and Michigan are going in two different directions in 2026.
The No. 6 Utes, coached by Morgan Scalley, are undefeated and sitting atop the Big 12 after a statement win over No. 14 Houston last week. Meanwhile, Michigan, coached by longtime Utah coach Kyle Whittingham, sits at 4-3 after losing three of its last four games.
The end of Whittingham's 21-year run as Utah's head coach has been well-documented .
Whittingham wanted to return for the 2026 and 2027 seasons and finish out his contract, with his agent asking for a $1.6 million raise in both years that would have increased his total compensation to $9 million in 2026 and $9.6 million in 2027.
Utah countered with a one-year deal that would have increased Whittingham's salary for 2026 to $8 million, but ceded "complete decision-making authority over all football recruiting, roster management, and staffing matters that impact the program beyond the 2026 football season" to coach-in-waiting Scalley.
Whittingham did not agree to that, and instead stepped down on Dec. 12, with his agent negotiating a $13.5 million transition bonus that replaced previous language in the contract that said Whittingham would serve as "special assistant to the athletics director" following retirement for two years at a salary of $3.45 million per year.
Though the fourth amendment of Whittingham's contract prevented him from seeking employment with another university in the state of Utah prior to Jan. 9, 2028, if he wanted to get the "transition bonus," it did not bar him from taking an out-of-state coaching job.
After spending 32 seasons with Utah, it seemed far-fetched that Whittingham would start over with another program at 66 years old, but after Michigan's firing of Sherrone Moore, the dominoes fell in the right direction for Whittingham to be the Wolverines' head coach.
Offensive coordinator Jason Beck, quarterbacks coach Koy Detmer Jr., wide receivers coach Micah Simon, offensive line coach Jim Harding, tight ends coach Freddie Whittingham and defensive ends coach Lewis Powell went with Whittingham to Michigan, alongside players Smith Snowden, JJ Buchanan, Jonah Lea'ea, John Henry Daley and Salesi Moa.
There's a lot of football left to be played, and Utah has an extremely tough three-game stretch coming up, but it's looking like Utah's administration made the right call to stake its claim on Scalley.
Scalley has the Utes sitting at 7-0, and though Utah had a "softer" schedule during the first half of the season, they still took care of business and are one of just three undefeated teams left in college football. After a big-time victory over Houston , the Utes are in the driver's seat of the Big 12.
Players have taken Scalley's "relentless, smart, nasty, ballhawks" culture to heart, but the team's culture is more than just those four words.
Quarterback Devon Dampier emphasized how the team leads with "love" multiple times after Utah's win over Houston.
Scalley has brought new energy into the program and has overhauled a lot, from bringing in new strength and conditioning coach Steve Saunders to changing practice structure, making way for a new offensive philosophy , and implementing a new roster management strategy.
While it seems like Utah is having more fun and playing as free and loose as they have since the Urban Meyer era, Scalley has also instilled discipline and toughness into his team, something he learned from Whittingham.
Utah Utes head coach Morgan Scalley coaches during a game against the Idaho Vandals at Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City on Thursday, Sept. 3, 2026. | Tess Crowley, Deseret News
Scalley has allowed offensive coordinator Kevin McGiven full freedom to do what he wants with Utah's offense, and the result has been a creative scheme with multiple different personnel packages, including two quarterback sets.
Opposing defenses have a lot to prepare for, including times when no one is in the backfield before someone is finally motioned over.
ESPN commentator Tom Hart said Houston's coaching staff counted 17 different personnel groupings that Utah uses.
Utah's defense has bent at times and allowed more passing yards than it usually does, but it has still been dominant. The Utes rank in the top 10 nationally in scoring defense, rushing defense and pass efficiency defense.
Road games against Cincinnati, which just knocked off Texas Tech, and No. 22 Arizona, plus a home game against No. 9 BYU await, but Scalley is off to a dream start.
In Ann Arbor, it's been the opposite.
Whittingham's first game in maize and blue nearly resulted in one of the most memorable upsets in college football history.
Western Michigan looked like it had won the game, but one second was put back on the clock and quarterback Bryce Underwood completed a Hail Mary to Buchanan for the win.
Michigan upset then-No. 11 Oklahoma the following week — an impressive win — and improved to 3-0 with a blowout win over UTEP, but things started falling apart shortly after.
No. 17 Iowa won 20-19 in the Big House on the last play of the game, then Michigan lost at Minnesota, 20-14, for the first time in 49 years. Michigan mustered just 180 yards of offense and turned the ball over three times, including two interceptions by Underwood in the loss in Minneapolis.
Michigan did just enough to beat a down Penn State team 21-18, but Whittingham had finally seen enough from Underwood, who was the No. 1 recruit in the country in 2025, and benched him in favor of Tommy Carr.
Michigan's defense, called by former BYU DC Jay Hill, has been largely great.
Last Saturday, Hill's unit held defending national champion Indiana to just 212 yards and 13 points and forced a turnover. Michigan's offense could not do anything with the impressive defensive performance, mustering just 224 yards and two field goals in a 13-6 loss.
The final straw for some Michigan fans was when Beck, with the Wolverines down 6-0 in the mid-third quarter, called a play-action rollout pass on third-and-goal from the 1-yard line that looked like it was supposed to be thrown to one of Michigan's "rhino" tight ends.
Carr was sacked, forcing a 32-yard field goal that missed.
Veteran Detroit News columnist Bob Wojnowski called it "the dumbest play call in Michigan football history."
Beck, Whittingham and the Wolverines are a long way from the offensive success they found at Utah last year.
Michigan's offense ranks No. 130 in the country with 300.6 yards per game. The Wolverines are scoring 20.3 points per game (No. 118) and producing just 165.9 passing yards per game (No. 127).
Utah ranks 39th or better in all those categories, including No. 9 in total yardage and No. 14 in points per game.
Sure, Michigan has faced a harder schedule than Utah (No. 37 in SOS vs. No. 89), but the Wolverines have more "talent" than the Utes do, at least on paper.
Why isn't Beck's offense, which worked wonders with Dampier, Wayshawn Parker and a talented offensive line, translating to the Big Ten?
"We're asking ourselves all those questions that you're posing. Hasn't got much traction yet. We're looking at everything and it's not one thing. There's a combination of things," Whittingham said at his weekly press conference on Monday.
"We got to coach them up better at pretty much every position and we're not getting that done right now. Plain and simple. We're not getting it done from a coaching standpoint at this point in time."
A growing cohort of Michigan fans are wondering if the Wolverines should move on from Beck.
"Now's the time of year where you're seeing head coaches lose their jobs, play callers being demoted and that type of thing," Whittingham said. "My job is to do whatever is best for the program and I'm fully aware of that. And if there's tough decisions to be made in that regard, I'll certainly have made them before and will again.
"But right now I don't think it's time to panic. I guess you could say we're two or three plays away from 6-1 or 7-0, but primarily due to our defense. We're in games each week because of the defense."
What Beck did at Utah with Whittingham last year gives Michigan's coach confidence that the offensive coordinator can turn it around.
"Well, the things he's done in the past for one thing, and I know you can't live on that forever, understandably, but it's been very successful," Whittingham said. "For example, I mean, we're abysmal in the red zone right now. Last year I think we led the nation in the red-zone touchdown percentage, or in the top two or three.
"That matters. Things that you've done do matter to a certain extent, and then it comes a point in time where, OK, now that's all fine and dandy, what's happened in the past, but we're not getting it done right now."
With Utah off to an undefeated start and Michigan struggling, the question was posed to Whittingham: What's it been like to see your former team have so much success?
"Oh, it's great. We left them with a lot of good players and there's good coaches there and couldn't be more happy, thrilled, elated that they're doing so well," Whittingham said. "I mean, I know all those guys. We recruited all those guys — well, most of them — obviously (there) was a portal cycle that we weren't involved with, but no surprise to me. They got good players and they're playing at a high level."
There's plenty of football left to be played this season, and for Utah, the most important games on the schedule arrive now. Michigan, meanwhile, could turn things around. Whittingham is a talented and proven coach.
At this moment, though, Utah looks like it made the correct decision to believe in Scalley.
Utah head coach Morgan Scalley smiles before a game against Houston at Rice-Eccles Stadium in Salt Lake City on Saturday, Oct. 24, 2026. | Lukas Katilius, Deseret News
