Big Ten stock watch: Expectations for Sherrone Moore, mounting pressure on Lincoln Riley

Big Ten Football Media Days will have a new look and feel this year as coaches and players from 18 teams are set to descend on Indianapolis next week.

The new-look, three-day event, which will take place July 23-25 at Lucas Oil Stadium, will mark the first time the college football universe will see Oregon, UCLA, USC and Washington as part of the Big Ten Conference.

In anticipation of Big Ten Football Media Days, FOX Sports college football experts Michael Cohen and RJ Young take an early look at the upcoming event, examining the new conference makeup, the fresh coaching faces entering the league, and the top games that will help shape this year’s Big Ten title race.

Big Ten Media Days will take place July 23-25 in Indianapolis. What is the most compelling storyline heading into this year’s three-day event?

Michael Cohen: Of the four West Coast programs that are joining the Big Ten this summer, Oregon sits atop the pecking order when it comes to rosters that are ready and able to challenge the existing league hierarchy of Michigan, Ohio State, Penn State … and then everybody else. The Ducks are led by one of the most aggressive and relentless head coaches in Dan Lanning, who is 22-5 in two seasons at Oregon and continues to recruit as well as anyone in the country. They have one of the most experienced and productive quarterbacks in college football history in Dillon Gabriel, who has thrown for 14,865 yards and 125 touchdowns. They have an elite wide receiver tandem in school record-setter Tez Johnson (86 receptions in 2023) and Texas A&M transfer Evan Stewart, who was one of the most coveted wideouts in the portal. And they have the bottomless coffers of billionaire booster Phil Knight, the co-founder of Nike, whose contributions to the Ducks’ NIL efforts are the envy of many, including Georgia head coach Kirby Smart at this week’s SEC Media Days event. 

All of which is to say that the most compelling storyline in Indianapolis will be what kind of deference and respect — or lack thereof — the remaining 17 head coaches show toward Lanning and the Ducks. Not only is this Oregon team good enough to contend for, and potentially win, a Big Ten Championship in its debut season, but it’s also constructed in a way that should place Lanning’s squad squarely among the conference’s elite for the foreseeable future. This is not like 2011 when a wounded Nebraska program joined the Big Ten. Nor is it like 2014 when middling Maryland and Rutgers were added to the mix. Oregon is a legitimate alpha that is well-positioned for long-term success in the sport’s modern era. And how the old guard receives such a newcomer will be fascinating to watch on and off the field. 

RJ Young: Just how honest, forthright and clear-eyed Sherrone Moore is going to be about the task before him. Michigan lost its entire defensive staff and strength coach to Jim Harbaugh and the Los Angeles Chargers. The Wolverines lost Rod Moore to a knee injury. They lost defensive line coach Greg Scruggs and Denard Robinson, who were each fired after being arrested for operating a vehicle while intoxicated. And that’s before we think about replacing J.J. McCarthy with an unproven starter, ask Donovan Edwards to produce unlike he ever has in his career, and bank on Will Johnson to lock up the opposing team’s No.1 wideout.

Is Moore going to acknowledge that Michigan has been out-recruited and been forced to overachieve? Is he going to acknowledge the Wolverines’ non-conference schedule doesn’t have any of those deliciously soft cupcakes on it this year? Is he going to note that Texas is as tough as any team they’ll play all year? Is he going to acknowledge every program is looking to dunk on his like his first name is Bronny?

Unlike his predecessor’s previous three years, he’s going to get the full dose of one of the toughest non-conference schedules in the country. Michigan’s 2023 opponents went 98-59. Seven teams on the Wolverines’ schedule were ranked. Nine of them beat ranked opponents. Let’s see what the man who graduated from the University of Oklahoma has to say for himself and his team.

‘There will be seven new coaches speaking at Big Ten Media Days this year: Lincoln Riley (USC), DeShaun Foster (UCLA), Dan Lanning (Oregon), Jedd Fisch (Washington), Jonathan Smith (Michigan State), Curt Cignetti (Indiana) and Sherrone Moore (Michigan). Which of those seven coaches are you most interested in hearing from, and why?

RJ: At his introductory presser at Indiana, Curt Cignetti gave his recruiting pitch. “It’s pretty simple — I win. Google me.” He’s right. He did win. He won 52 games in five years.

At James Madison.

Listen here: The Big Ten ain’t the Sun Belt.

You’re in the big-time now, Curt. The Big Ten ain’t about what you’ve done. It’s about what you ain’t done yet — just ask Ryan Day. I can’t wait to hear how he plans to turn Indiana into the kind of program that competes with Michigan, Ohio State, Oregon, USC, Iowa and Penn State, because from where I’m sitting, I think Rutgers might beat the Hoosiers in a fair fight.

Michael: Getting a feel for how USC head coach Lincoln Riley is handling the mounting pressure on him and his program should be a really interesting subplot next week. When Riley left Oklahoma to take over the Trojans following the 2021 season, it’s highly unlikely he would have expected the conference realignment dominoes that eventually followed. By then, Oklahoma and Texas had already accepted invitations to the juggernaut SEC, with those moves also taking effect this summer. And one of the narratives surrounding Riley’s change of scenery was the idea that reaching a four-team College Football Playoff through the Pac-12 would be considerably easier than jockeying with the likes of Alabama, Georgia, LSU and Texas, among others. Nothing about the Pac-12’s eventual demise at the hands of the Big Ten had bubbled to the surface at that point. 

Fast-forward to the present and Riley, who is entering his third season at USC, now finds himself mired in a conference almost as treacherous as the SEC and with the added headache of cross-country travel. He’s coming off a disastrous 8-5 season in which even the eventual No. 1 pick in the NFL Draft, quarterback Caleb Williams, couldn’t do enough to stave off the team’s second-half collapse following a 6-0 start. And on the recruiting front, where the Trojans have the No. 25 class in the country for the 2025 cycle, Riley watched two four-star prospects and one five-star prospect decommit from USC in June alone. He’ll have some difficult questions to answer next week. 

Ohio State-Michigan is always the most-anticipated Big Ten game of the season and could have major conference championship and College Football Playoff implications once again this season. What is one game outside of OSU-Michigan that you believe will go a long way in deciding the Big Ten title race?

Michael: This is an unusual answer because it’s not actually a Big Ten game, but the Week 2 showdown between Texas and Michigan, which will be played at Michigan Stadium, could have a significant impact on the title race for one critical reason: One way or another, it will reveal plenty about the Jim Harbaugh-less Wolverines. 

With Harbaugh now in the NFL, there are so many unknowns about Michigan as it embarks on the Sherrone Moore era. How will Moore’s first staff jell after director of strength and conditioning Ben Herbert and every defensive assistant followed Harbaugh to the Los Angeles Chargers? How will new offensive coordinator Kirk Campbell replace the production of 10 starters from last year’s national championship-winning team? Who will win the quarterback competition that includes Alex Orji, Jack Tuttle, Jayden Denegal and Davis Warren? Can new defensive coordinator Don “Wink” Martindale have the same success as his ex-Ravens’ predecessors Mike Macdonald and Jesse Minter after spending the last 20 years in the NFL?

The non-conference matchup with Texas will provide real insight into what this Michigan team is made of and how realistic it is for the Wolverines to contend for a Big Ten Championship. A win over the Longhorns could springboard Michigan toward its fourth consecutive College Football Playoff appearance. A loss could invite the kinds of scrutiny and second-guessing of a first-year coach that can derail a season before it gets going. That’s why Sept. 7 might be the most important date on Michigan’s schedule. 

RJ: Ohio State at Oregon — no question. The Ducks are flying. They feel like they’re ready to make the leap to contending for a national title and a win against a loaded Buckeye squad would go a long way toward that quest.

Among the five teams with the toughest schedules according to their opponents’ combined 2023 record — Florida, USC, Northwestern, Georgia Tech and Oregon, respectively — the Ducks look like they have the best chance to run the table.

Most of that has to do with Lanning, who wears his big boy britches to work and was first to snub Bama to stay in the city that Bill Bowerman built. Maybe it doesn’t mean much to fans that the Ducks’ 2023 opponents went 101-57, nine of which were ranked and nine of which won games against ranked opponents, but it sure leaves a mark on the rest of us.

Dillon Gabriel recently overtook Quinn Ewers (Texas) and Carson Beck (Georgia) as the odds-on favorite to win this year’s Heisman Trophy. What would Gabriel and Oregon need to accomplish on the field in order for the Oklahoma transfer to take home the Heisman?

RJ: Win the Big Ten title. Short. Simple. True.

If he does that, all of this falls into place. Dan Lanning and offensive coordinator Will Stein went to get a gunslinger from my woods (Oklahoma) to help them wear out Midwestern mushers in Dillon Gabriel.

At Oklahoma last year, Gabriel became the first Sooner QB to ever throw eight TDs in a game and has passed for more than 14,000 yards in his career. He ranks No. 8 on the all-time list (14,865) and one spot behind Heisman winner Ty Detmer (15,031) and two spots behind the last starting QB at Oregon, Bo Nix (15,351).

Nix threw for 4,145 yards, 40 passing TDs and just three INTs in Stein’s offense last year. If Gabriel passes for 4,353 yards, he’ll become the NCAA’s all-time leading passer ahead of former Houston QB Case Keenum (19,217) after three years at UCF, two at OU and this one at Oregon. Helping his cause will be wide out Tez Johnson, who caught 86 passes for 1,182 yards with 10 TDs as the No. 2 target in the offense last year. He’ll be joined by Evan Stewart, a former five-star who has yet to reach his potential.

Michael: RJ has the right answer here. If Gabriel can lead Oregon to a Big Ten championship in his first season with the program and in the program’s first season in a new conference — which means the Ducks likely will have beaten Ohio State and/or Michigan in the regular season, and then potentially defeated one of those teams again in the league title game — he’ll almost certainly have the production to become the school’s first Heisman Trophy winner since quarterback Marcus Mariota in 2014. 

Based solely on statistics, a case can be made that Gabriel’s production at Oklahoma last season was good enough to warrant fringe Heisman Trophy consideration. He ranked eighth nationally in completion percentage (69.3%), ninth nationally in passing yards (3,660) and was one of only four Power 5 quarterbacks to throw at least 30 touchdowns while tossing six or fewer interceptions alongside Nix (45 TDs, 3 INTs); LSU’s Jayden Daniels (40 TDs, 4 INTs) and USC’s Caleb Williams (30 TDs, 5 INTs). The only thing Gabriel lacked was an unblemished, or nearly unblemished, regular-season record that would have pushed the Sooners into the Big 12 Championship Game. He’ll have a good chance to atone for that at Oregon this season. 

Michael Cohen covers college football and basketball for FOX Sports with an emphasis on the Big Ten. Follow him on Twitter at @Michael_Cohen13.

RJ Young is a national college football writer and analyst for FOX Sports and the host of the podcast “The Number One College Football Show.” Follow him on Twitter at @RJ_Young and subscribe to “The RJ Young Show” on YouTube.

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