Michigan officially introduces Kyle Whittingham as head football coach

LANSING, Mich. (WLNS) – Just 16 days after stepping down as the head coach at Utah, Kyle Whittingham was officially introduced as the 22nd head coach in Michigan football history on Sunday.

Whittingham was introduced at a press conference in Orlando, Fla. where the Wolverine program is gearing up to play Texas in the Citrus Bowl on New Year’s Eve.

In laying out his vision for the program, Whittingham said his immediate priority is roster retention, and he said he had a 45-minute meeting with Bryce Underwood on Sunday morning.

Whittingham is from California, played football at BYU, and spent the last 32 years at Utah. Given that background, recruiting the Midwest is not necessarily his area of expertise, but he expressed confidence he’ll have no trouble recruiting at Michigan.

“We’re going to have some coaches on the staff that have worked in the ACC and out this way in the Midwest,” he said. “So I think that might be overrated a little bit as far as geographically where you come from. But I can tell you right now that we will have a staff that is very diverse and has roots in many different places in the country. But again, a school like Michigan’s going to recruit the top athletes from east coast to west coast so we’ve got to be able to do it all.”

As far as style of play is concerned, Whittingham fits the longstanding identity of Michigan football. He said his goal is to bring a run-first, tough-nosed approach to Ann Arbor.

“Physicality will be our calling card,” he said. “At the University of Utah, the place I was, we were the most physical team in the league, whichever league we played in, and that’s not going to be any different here. I believe in running the football. We were second in the nation last year rushing the football at Utah and defending the run. If you can get those, if you can win the line of scrimmage, and be physical up front, you’ve always got a chance. So that will be the trademark, and the identity of this team is physicality, toughness and grit.”

Whittingham said he will stay out of the way during the Citrus Bowl. He wants to allow the coaches who have been with this Wolverine team all season to finish it out.

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