Michigan Panthers Can’t Claw Out of Spiral: Lose Again

The Michigan Panthers have been floundering at their home stadium of Ford Field. After starting their season 2-0, looking like one of the best teams in the USFL, the Panthers embarked on a series of home defenses in which they appeared to be a shell of themselves, dropping both games. Of course, one of those games was against a strong New Jersey Generals team, but the week four performance against a winless Memphis Showboats team raised questions about the teams competitiveness. With Mike Nolan and company back at home for the third straight week, the Michigan Panthers needed to rebound against the weaker, but explosive, Pittsburgh Maulers to stay in the playoff mix.

Michigan Panthers QB Duel Continues: Reveals the True Offensive Weakness

Throughout the season, both Michigan Panthers quarterbacks Josh Love and Carson Strong have seen snaps within games, with Love starting and playing the majority. Coach Mike Nolan explained last week, “We like to work in Carson as much as we can in every game.” Trying to give experience to the young quarterback, but also see what he can do within the offense. In the first two weeks, this wasn’t seen as anything major as the Panthers were dominating games, with Love putting up great numbers. The past two weeks, that narrative has changed.

With the Panthers looking stagnant behind a struggling and injured offensive line, the team has only put up 23 points in their last two games, including a 10 point performance against the leagues worst defense last week. Turnovers have plagued the Panthers as well with Love throwing three bad interceptions on crucial drives in the last two games. Often, with passes getting batted down at the line, the Michigan Panthers faithful have began to erupt in chants saying, “We want Strong! We want Strong! We want Strong!”

This week, against a stern and hard hitting Maulers defense, the Panthers offense easily got into the end-zone early. After a quick defensive stop and a huge return, the Panthers found success with quick passes over the middle as Josh Love found Cole Hikutini to give Michigan a 7-0 lead in the first.

Love was looking poised and controlled early at the helm for the Michigan Panthers. Continuing to look comfortable, Love was even embracing pressure, standing in a collapsing pocket on a third and ten, dropping a dime over the corner and between the safety to Trey Quinn, converting for a first down.

With offensive line struggles and little to no run game for the Michigan Panthers, Love was the only player making plays for the offense, that is until his poise vanished and he returned to his form of the last two weeks. Running for his life behind collapsing protection, Love threw a ball into the end-zone, right into double coverage, resulting in a Mark Gilbert interception. With back to back turnovers, it seemed to be the turning point for fans as they began asking for Carson Strong for the third straight week.

This time, Michigan Panthers fans got what they wanted as Strong made his way into the game. Just as last week, he delivered early, seemingly elevating the Panthers offense. Strong has consistently worked through his reads better than Love, and in turn gets the ball out quicker. Unfortunately, the same combo of zero rushing attack and a weak protection unit plagued Strong just as it did to Love. Today, instead of going back to Love out of the halftime break, Strong stayed in.

Still, this wasn’t enough for the Michigan Panthers offense as they lacked any ability to protect anyone behind them, resulting in another quick stop for the Maulers. Normally, this is when Nolan hands the keys to the offense back over to Love, but again Strong came in, pleasantly surprising fans as they cheered when he jogged onto the field. Still, those cheers quickly turned to an eruption of anger as fans realized it wasn’t the quarterbacks causing the issues for the offense, it was the men up front.

As Mike Nolan continues to look for ways to make the offense more consistent, a reordering of the depth chart at quarterback may be coming, but it won’t be the fix the Panthers need on offense, that’s for sure.

Reggie Corbin and Michigan Panthers Rushing Game a No-Show for Third Week in a Row

As discussed numerous times by head coach Mike Nolan, spring football leagues struggle most at building a strong offensive line. With a lack of depth up front, the Panthers have really lacked in the rushing department. Failing to have any running attack the past two weeks, the Panthers couldn’t right the ship against the strong Maulers defensive interior led by Boogie Roberts. Getting shoved around off the snap, the Panthers line had zero ability to open up holes for Corbin, as he struggled to make it to the line of scrimmage on most plays. On one of his few breaks, he fumbled the ball, a clear momentum shift for the Maulers defense.

With the Panthers falling behind, they abandoned the rushing game, a smart move considering the team had -2 rushing yards in the first half. As Mike Nolan continues to say, “Obviously you can’t run the ball when you are trailing late in games.” When the offense needed to move, they just couldn’t rely on the men up front to help them do it. In turn, this limiting the passing attack as the Maulers defense spent the majority of their man power dropping into coverage.

Michigan Panthers Defense Finds Footing, But Can’t Without Offense

Similarly with the offense, the Panthers defense got off to a flaming hot start to their season. As the top defense in weeks one and two in both yardage and scoring, the Panthers were running hot into their week three matchup against the New Jersey Generals. From there, they were absolutely dismantled, allowing multiple huge plays from both quarterback De’Andre Johnson and running back Darius Victor.

Struggling to stop the run and having zero QB contain, the Generals rushed for 200 yards and 7.6 yards per attempt. The woes continued for the Panthers against the Showboats, as they allowed 240 total yards, a 50% red zone efficiency, and failed to take the ball away once. A clear difference from their opening two weeks.

Today, against Troy Williams, a quarterback who can move quite well for the Pittsburgh Maulers, the defense got off on the right foot, stopping the Maulers first drive fairly quickly with rookie linebacker Santrell Latham stopping a breaking run and Breeland Speaks bringing down Troy Williams in the backfield on second down. After a batted down pass, the Panthers punt team set up perfect blocks allowing for Ishamel Hyman to take the punt return 75 yards from his own end-zone into Maulers territory, setting up the Panthers for the touchdown. Off to a hot start, the Panthers defense needed to continue their momentum, as we know with from weeks one and two, they can be a game changing group.

73-yards has never looked so easy, @HollyWood_Ish13! ?

?: @USANetwork pic.twitter.com/lD4Pfz1ulf

— Michigan Panthers (@USFLPanthers) May 13, 2023

After setting up their offense early, the Michigan Panthers defense continued to dominate early as Warren Saba swatted a Troy Williams pass which then fell into the hands of linebacker Frank Ginda. Head Coach Mike Nolan put emphasis on winning the takeaway battle like the team did in the first tow weeks of the season, today, that goal was apparent.

Lets go, @frankginda05 with the pick! ?

?: @USANetwork pic.twitter.com/PBiyu70d4T

— Michigan Panthers (@USFLPanthers) May 13, 2023

With the Panthers offense going three and out, short rest proved too much to overcome for the Panthers defense. Troy Williams let loose on a deep completion to Bailey Gaither before flipping a pass to Mason Stokke for the touchdown. After tying the game, the Maulers continued to cause problems for the Michigan Panthers QB contain. With another turnover shifting the momentum to the Maulers, the Panthers defense crumbled as Troy Williams threw another touchdown, giving the Maulers a 14-7 lead early in the second.

The Michigan Panthers did show some ability to rebound on the next drive though as they created pressure with Breeland Speaks, who sacked Williams and forced a punt. Speaks, the lone star up front for the Panthers defense, had three sacks, continuing to add to his league leading total of seven. The hard part to accept was that it just didn’t matter at this point. The Michigan Panthers offense was almost assisting the Maulers with constant turnovers and the defense was worn out. As much as they looked solid, they were given no help, destroying any ability to stop the Maulers offense.

With the only Panthers points today coming after a big defensive stop and special teams return, defensive coordinator Steve Brown’s group did what they could, but had no help to give the Panthers the win.

What Does Another Weak Performance Mean?

Losing 23-7, falling to 2-3 on the season, 0-3 at home, and falling out of the playoff picture, the Panthers are in desperate need of a reset. Whether that is an influx of new talent or another change at the coaching position, only time will tell. The morale of the story is, you can’t win a game without making offensive adjustments and trying to get creative to open up the rushing game. At the same time, you can’t do anything without protection and consistent time of possession. The Michigan Panthers struggle in both aspects. No matter what, change must come if this team wants to survive.

Ford Field Attendance Dwindles After Panthers Back-to-Back Losses

The most important part of the expanding hub for the USFL is fan attendance. The league knows that continued support and attendance is the only way for the league to survive, and even compete with the well performing XFL. In the home opener in Detroit, it looked like Michigan would be one of the leagues success stories as around 10,000 fans were in attendance for the Panthers return to Detroit. After a rough loss, there was a little fall off, but fans still rallied and showed passion with 7,500 making their way downtown for the Panthers game against Memphis.

This week, with only one game on Saturday, two miserable performances behind the team, a hot Detroit Tigers team playing at the same time, and the hyped up XFL Championship game on television, attendance looked weak to say the least. With what appeared to be 7,000 fans in attendance, Mike Nolan’s words became a reality. The past two weeks, in each post game presser, he has said, “The fans have showed up and delivered. We need to hold up on our end, but I can only hope the fans come back to support us.”

Sadly, this week was an example of that fear and with now back-to-back-to-back losses. With fans leaving midway through the fourth, fed up with their teams performance, The Michigan Panthers are in desperate need of a win to draw more fans in. There are two games left for the Panthers at Ford Field, next week and the season finale. One thing is for sure, if the Panthers give Detroit a reason to, the team will show up and show up big time.