Michigan's Jake Rudock Is Big Ten's Most Improved Quarterback In Second Half Of Season

When Jake Rudock took his talents from Iowa City to Ann Arbor in the offseason, Jim Harbaugh surely thought he would be getting a smart, veteran quarterback who would take care of the football. That’s what we were used to seeing from him during his time with the Iowa Hawkeyes. His first few games with Michigan showed us anything but that.

Rudock was pretty bad in their season opening loss to Utah, throwing three interceptions. He wasn’t quite as bad in the next few games, but couldn’t really get over the hump. An outstanding defensive unit pitched three straight shutouts at the midpoint of the season, helping the team to a 5-1 start. Then a fluke loss to Michigan State the following week almost ended any hope of a Big Ten championship. For most Michigan fans, though, those hopes didn’t end until this weekend with a 42-13 loss to Ohio State.

Sometimes all it takes for a quarterback to get going is for the rest of his team to pick him up when he’s struggling. His teammates helped him get going and through the final four games of the campaign, Rudock threw 11 touchdowns and just two interceptions. He’s been one of the hottest passers in the conference over the last month. He even played pretty well in spite of the loss in the finale.

Michigan will have to break in a new quarterback next season, as Rudock is a fifth-year senior, but he certainly helped the transition to a new coaching staff. Plus, the leadership that he brought can’t be measured with statistics. Rudock led his team to a bounceback season when the program was going through a difficult stretch, and he should be appreciated in Ann Arbor for a long time to come.

Jason Shawley is a Featured Writer for www.RantSports.com covering Big Ten Football. Follow him on Twitter @jshawls.