I had heard the rumors of the alleged sign stealing for the last 2 seasons, but I wasn't sure if that was just sour grapes on our part. Well, the reports coming out on Yahoo and in the Athletic put a lot of smoke behind that fire, so I decided to look into the actual margins of Michigan games over Harbaugh's tenure and see if there were any outliers.

For each season, I used the biggest OOC games (ND, Utah, Florida, BYU), traditional Big Ten West Powers (Iowa/Wisconsin), Big Ten championships (Iowa/Purdue), and obviously the Ohio State game as the data points. Each season between 2015 and 2022 had 5 or 6 of these matchups. While the alleged sign stealing has occurred this season, I don't believe games with expected blowout potential are worthwhile in evaluating any edges Michigan might have gained. Those are games a traditional power like Michigan should win regardless. The COVID season was also omitted for obvious reasons. 

From 2015 - 2019 (5 seasons):

1st HALF - The average margin was +3.62 pts for Michigan

2nd HALF - The average margin was -0.22 pts for Michigan (slight edge to opponents)

For 2021 and 2022 (last 2 seasons):

1st HALF - The average margin was +4.4 pts for Michigan

2nd HALF - The average margin was +13.3 pts for Michigan

It seems we've found our outlier. Michigan has been virtually the same team they've been for Harbaugh's entire tenure in the first half, with Michigan generally being 3-4 pts better than their opponents. However, a Michigan team that was basically even across his first 5 seasons, now had a near TWO TD edge on AVERAGE in the 2nd half against these opponents. So where did this new edge come from? We know that Michigan hasn't changed anything philosophically when it comes to their offensive identity. Is it QB play? Cade McNamara does not look any better than the cast of characters Michigan has previously trotted out, especially with the way he looks at Iowa. Is it recruiting? Well, Harbaugh's best recruiting class (5th in 2017) had no effect on the outcome of the last 2 seasons, and the average of those classes was 10th-11th with 1 five star player per class. It seems pretty obvious that a massive shift occurred in the last 2 seasons that specifically helped Michigan in the 2nd half of games against their best competition. That shift did not help when it came to playoff games. I guess what I'm trying to say is....."Ladies and Gentleman, we got'em"