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Jim Harbaugh leaving Michigan football for Los Angeles Chargers
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- Jim Harbaugh leaving Michigan football for Los Angeles Chargers
Jim Harbaugh did what he came to do in Ann Arbor, and now his time is up.
Harbaugh, 60, on the heels of leading Michigan football to its first national championship since 1997, will not return for a 10th season, instead pursuing a return to the NFL as he continues his quest for a Super Bowl.
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Harbaugh will be leaving the Wolverines to be the head coach of the Los Angeles Chargers , the team confirmed Wednesday night .
Harbaugh had also interviewed for the Atlanta Falcons ' head coach vacancy.
Harbaugh previously confirmed to the Free Press he had hired NFL-affiliated agent Don Yee — Yee represents Tom Brady and Sean Payton among other distinguished clients. Harbaugh said Yee had been "working hard" on the coach's behalf.
"I don't even think I have time to talk to him right now," Harbaugh said Jan. 12 , a few days after U-M won the national title. "The game, since the game, been really working, honestly working, on other people's futures. ... Just looking forward to kind of putting the guys' needs ahead of mine. Just been enjoying it, every minute, every second."
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He had reportedly sought a contract extension from Michigan to make for-cause firing harder , with a clause that would "grant him immunity from termination from any finding or sanction" from either of the NCAA investigations the program faces.
FOREVER: Celebrate Michigan's national championship with Detroit Free Press books and front pages!
Harbaugh was hired as the 20th coach in U-M history on Dec. 30, 2014, and nine seasons later brought the Wolverines to the top of the mountain with a 34-13 win over Washington in the national title game.
Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh looks on during the national championship celebration at Crisler Center in Ann Arbor on Saturday, Jan. 13, 2024.
He will finish with an 86-25 record overall and 60-17 in the Big Ten as he set program history this season after leading U-M to a third consecutive outright Big Ten championship for the first time in U-M football's existence.
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Of course, the Harbaugh era at Michigan, even the greatest season in the program's history, wasn't without its own share of controversy and allegations.
Michigan was served a draft of a notice of allegations from the NCAA in January 2023 detailing a handful of Level II violations for analysts serving in on-field capacities as coaches, coaches overseeing workouts of players via video chat and contact with recruits during a COVID-19 dead period.
Harbaugh exacerbated the matter when the NCAA asked him about the alleged violations and he claimed to have no recollection of any, which the governing body deemed to be misleading, so it tagged him with a Level I violation, the most serious of offenses.
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Harbaugh and the NCAA had seemingly worked out a negotiated resolution where he would be suspended for four games; however, it fell apart in the weeks leading up to the season.
U-M administration suspended him for the nonconference portion of the season (three games) as an act of good faith, and he returned in mid-September. However, Harbaugh was only back in the fold a month before the next scandal hit: The Wolverines were being investigated by the NCAA for sign stealing.
Details emerged about Connor Stalions , a former recruiting staffer who would buy tickets to games of U-M's future opponents, then pay accomplices to attend the games and take video of their sideline and send them back to him so he could decode the signals and gain an advantage when deciphering plays .
Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh celebrates during the trophy presentation after the 34-13 win over Washington at the national championship game at NRG Stadium in Houston on Monday, Jan. 8, 2024.
Though Harbaugh was never shown to have any knowledge of the plot, Big Ten commissioner Tony Petitti suspended U-M's head coach for three games for violating the league's sportsmanship policy.
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Harbaugh and U-M found out he would be suspended just hours before the Wolverines' top-10 road game at Penn State ; offensive coordinator Sherrone Moore stepped in for him and called 32 straight runs to end the game in the 24-15 victory.
U-M beat Maryland for the 1,000th win in program history , then beat Ohio State for a third consecutive year to round out the regular season, before Harbaugh was reinstated.
Michigan shut down Iowa in the Big Ten title game and rallied past Alabama in the Rose Bowl in OT before topping Washington to complete a 15-0 season.
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Harbaugh had some immediate success in his return to his alma mater, leading U-M to seasons with 10 or more victories in three of his first four years in Ann Arbor; the problem was each of those regular seasons ended with losses to Ohio State, two of them included losses to Michigan State and all but one ended with a loss in a bowl game.
After taking a step back with a 9-4 campaign in 2019, the Wolverines appeared to bottom out in 2020 when they went just 2-4 during the COVID-19-shortened season. U-M never played OSU that year — it opted out of the final two games of the year after a COVID-19 outbreak within the team — and Harbaugh finished year six having never gone to Indianapolis and with an 0-5 record vs. OSU.
That's when he went to athletic director Warde Manuel with a multipoint plan that emphasized the changes he needed to make, starting with changing his coordinators and moving away from Don Brown's defense to a Ravens-based scheme in Mike MacDonald.
Manuel allowed Harbaugh to prove his plan, but at a cost, as Harbaugh's contract was slashed nearly in half. In response, he led U-M to its best season in 17 years in 2021.
Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh looks on during second half of the College Football Playoff national championship game against Washington at NRG Stadium in Houston, Texas on Monday, Jan. 8, 2024.
Michigan lost a crushing top-10 clash in East Lansing, 37-33, and it seemed another year may end with the Wolverines short of their goals, but it responded with a road win at Penn State and then for the first time in a decade, a 42-27 win over Ohio State on a snowy day at the Big House.
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U-M followed with a 42-3 pounding of Iowa for Harbaugh's first Big Ten title but was dismantled by Georgia in its first CFP appearance. The Wolverines followed up with a 13-0 season in 2022 — that included more history, the team's first victory in Columbus in more than two decades — but it ended in heartbreak when the Wolverines lost 51-45 to TCU in the Fiesta Bowl.
That all led to 2023, the best season in U-M history, and the program's first championship in more than a quarter of a century.
Contact Tony Garcia: apgarcia@freepress.com . Follow him at @realtonygarcia .
Michigan fans! Celebrate the national title with our two commemorative books: "Blue Reign : The Story of the 2023 Michigan Wolverines' Legendary Run to the National Championship" and "Maize & Grand : Michigan's Epic March to the 2023 National Title" — preorder now to save! You can also buy a commemorative copy of the front page of the Detroit Free Press from the morning after U-M's historic championship victory, and purchase our four-page special Stadium Section .
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Jim Harbaugh leaving Michigan football for Los Angeles Chargers
