Michigan has its recruiting swagger back. Can Sherrone Moore raise bar from Jim Harbaugh?

Sherrone Moore didn’t get the honeymoon a new head coach might expect at a program that just won a national championship.

Moore took over at Michigan for Jim Harbaugh in late January and dealt with an exodus of assistant coaches, including Michigan’s strength coach and its entire defensive staff. Safety Rod Moore, one of Michigan’s best players, went down with a knee injury during spring practice. Two staff members — defensive line coach Greg Scruggs and assistant director of player personnel and ex-star quarterback Denard Robinson — left the program after drunk driving arrests. Michigan had two NCAA cases hanging over its head and went more than two months without a commitment on the recruiting trail.

Based on the early trends, it was fair to wonder if Moore and Michigan were headed for a rocky transition. Today, Moore looks like a coach who’s found his footing and Michigan looks like a program that’s regained its swagger.

Michigan was one of the big winners in the June recruiting sweepstakes, landing commitments from 10 players and climbing more than 40 spots to No. 11 in the 247Sports Composite rankings. The Wolverines just flipped one of the top players in Notre Dame’s class, top-100 safety Ivan Taylor, and went into Penn State’s backyard for four-star tight end Andrew Olesh. Fears of a post-Harbaugh identity crisis have dissipated, at least for now.

Nothing encapsulates the cycle of “it’s so over” and “we’re so back” like recruiting. When Michigan was sitting outside the top 50 in the recruiting rankings in early June, rival fans were quick to seize on signs of vulnerability. A month later, Michigan is closing in on a top-10 class and winning the kinds of recruiting battles that a program of Michigan’s caliber should.

For all he accomplished, there were stretches during Harbaugh’s tenure when Michigan underachieved in recruiting. That seemed like a problem when the Wolverines were losing to Ohio State every year and not such a big deal when they were in the midst of winning three consecutive Big Ten championships.

Last year’s team was the pinnacle of Harbaugh’s roster-building creativity. The Wolverines had five-star talents like J.J. McCarthy and Will Johnson playing premium positions, four-star recruits like Blake Corum and Roman Wilson who blossomed into stars and unheralded prospects like Mike Sainristil and Michael Barrett who turned into cornerstones. The Wolverines went 15-0, won the national championship and sent 13 to players to the NFL Draft with a blue-chip ratio of 54 percent, well behind programs like Alabama, Georgia and Ohio State.

It’s taking nothing away from Michigan to say that last year’s team felt like a one-of-a-kind phenomenon. The extra year of COVID-19 eligibility, the willingness of star players to delay the NFL, some timely additions from the transfer portal and a run of exceptional player development helped Michigan achieve the kind of season its fans only dreamed of.

Some aspects of that formula can be replicated, but others can’t. If Moore is going to keep the Wolverines on top, he’ll have to go about it in a slightly different way. The obvious place to start is by capitalizing on Michigan’s untapped potential in recruiting, which Moore appears to be doing.

Based on the 247Sports Composite rankings, Michigan signed one top-100 prospect in the past two recruiting cycles: running back Jordan Marshall, the No. 78 player in the Class of 2024. The Wolverines have three top-100 players committed for 2025 — defensive end Nate Marshall (No. 46), Taylor (No. 54) and safety/nickel Kainoa Winston (No. 91) — plus a top-100 prospect for 2026 in quarterback Brady Hart.

The top-100 designation is an arbitrary cut-off based on non-scientific rankings of the best high school prospects in each class. It shouldn’t be taken as gospel. But it’s a solid indicator of which programs are landing the prospects everybody wants, those four- and five-star recruits who can go pretty much anywhere in the country.

Taylor, the son of former Steelers cornerback Ike Taylor, is a prime example. Michigan gave Taylor his first scholarship offer in April 2022 before his sophomore season at West Orange High School in Winter Garden, Fla. Taylor ended up committing to Notre Dame in December over Michigan, Florida State, USC, Wisconsin and others.

Michigan’s staff was hit hard by Harbaugh’s coaching hires with the Los Angeles Chargers, but at least one of those moves ended up working in Michigan’s favor. Harbaugh hired Chris O’Leary, Notre Dame’s safeties coach, to coach the same position for the Chargers. O’Leary was a big factor in Taylor’s decision to commit to Notre Dame, and his departure opened the door for Michigan to pull off a major recruiting coup.

It’s never wise to overreact to one week in recruiting, but this was a good week for Michigan. It’s a week that gives a realistic look at Michigan’s potential and where the Wolverines might fit in the big picture. Michigan isn’t going to consistently recruit at the level of Ohio State or Georgia, programs that typically sign the largest share of the top 100 players in each class. But there’s no reason the Wolverines can’t go blow-for-blow with programs like Notre Dame and Penn State, load up on players on the high end of the four-star scale and sign classes that finish in the top 10.

That would be a small but measurable improvement from where Michigan typically finished under Harbaugh, with the past two classes settling just outside the top 15. If Michigan’s coaching and player development continue at a high level, that’s a recipe to contend for the College Football Playoff virtually every year.

Prepare for public opinion to swing a few more times before we get a true read on where Michigan is headed under Moore. If the Wolverines lose to Texas on Sept. 7, plenty of people will be ready to declare the end of Michigan’s Big Ten dynasty. If the Wolverines beat Ohio State for a fourth year in a row, get ready for the meltdown of all meltdowns in Columbus. Moore will have good weeks and bad weeks, and it’s going to take time to discern what it all means.

For now, Moore is doing what he needed to do to stabilize Michigan after a challenging start to the offseason. The Wolverines are still the reigning national champions, and Moore is making sure nobody forgets it.

(Photo of Sherrone Moore: Junfu Han / USA Today)