Penn State football will travel to Ann Arbor to take on Michigan in the Big House for the first time since it suffered a 41-17 beatdown back in 2022.

In their last meeting, JJ McCarthy led the Wolverines at quarterback, completing 17 of 24 passes for a measly 145 yards and an interception. No disrespect to McCarthy, but the former five-star recruit had extremely pedestrian production in his two career games against Penn State.

Fast forward to 2026, Michigan will deploy another sophomore quarterback against the blue and white. All 6-foot-3 and 230 pounds of Bryce Underwood.

Underwood was the nation’s top-ranked recruit in the Class of 2025 and, after initially committing to LSU in January 2024, he flipped to Michigan a few months later, signing an estimated $12 million NIL package.

It’s been far from sunshine and rainbows since, and after a struggling freshman season, Underwood hasn’t shown much improvement in 2026.

In five games this season, Underwood has just 881 passing yards, five touchdowns, and four interceptions, and has led Michigan to a 3-2 record with no Big Ten wins.

However, make no mistake. The 19-year-old has literally every single physical tool you could want in a quarterback.

“It’s certainly a great challenge,” Matt Campbell said of playing Underwood Wednesday. “Obviously, the respect for the athleticism, the arm talent, all the traits.”

Campbell also acknowledged the need to shift defensive schemes after facing USC quarterback Jayden Maiava’s scramble-to-throw mobility versus Underwood’s pure rushing threat in back-to-back weeks.

The sophomore has dashed for 212 rushing yards and two scores on 57 carries through five games.

Campbell called Underwood a “dynamic” ball carrier and emphasized that his duality can stress a defense.

“He certainly has all the tools with a big arm to make you pay if you put everybody up at the line of scrimmage to stop the run,” Campbell said.

That physical challenge that the Wolverine’s starting signal caller presents as a thrower could be exacerbated by a struggling Penn State pass rush that has produced just two sacks from defensive linemen in six games.

“Obviously, super good quarterback, super mobile, big guy,” defensive lineman Caleb Bacon said of Underwood. “He’s going to be tough in [the pocket] to get him down. But I think really trying to just contain him is going to be the biggest part.”

Underwood has often been criticized for a lack of anticipation downfield, but if the Nittany Lions can’t pressure him enough to speed up his internal clock and make him uncomfortable while scanning the field, Underwood could pick apart Penn State’s defense with his highly touted arm talent.

It’s well documented that the best way to pressure mobile throwers is from the interior, not off the edge. Defensive coordinator D’Anton Lynn and his defensive staff know quarterbacks can’t step up in the pocket or scramble if the pass rush sits in their lap.

“This week in practice, we’ve been really emphasizing the fact that we need to use the interior defensive linemen to put pressure as well and get in that backfield,” defensive tackle Dallas Vakalahi said Wednesday.

Certainly, the Nittany Lion defenders have to account for more than just Underwood’s frame, arm talent, and athleticism on Saturday.

“They have a physical offensive line,” defensive tackle Armstrong Nnodim said Tuesday. “What we talked about in film is [Michigan’s] offensive line coach is very big on being a physical type of guy, like being a mauler, and when you turn on the tape, that’s what you see.”

People often toss around the term physicality loosely in sports, but the Wolverines are not guilty of that.

Vakalahi, who played two seasons under Michigan head coach Kyle Whittingham at Utah, knows this better than anybody else in the Lasch Football Building.

“I think one of the biggest things Coach Whittingham is big on is being physical,” Vakalahi said. “A lot of things he does are having the guys up front being the most physical and out-physicaling their opponent.”

The maize and blue’s offensive play-caller, Jason Beck, has often deployed a “rhino” position while coaching at Virginia, Utah, and now Michigan.

Essentially, Beck utilizes a sixth offensive lineman on the line of scrimmage by making him a jumbo tight end. In Michigan’s season opener against Western Michigan, offensive lineman Manuel Beigel played 26 of the Wolverines’ 51 snaps at the rhino position.

A formation of six big-bodied blockers and the forced allocation of extra gap attention to an ultra-mobile quarterback like Underwood can break down run defense integrity and allow a Michigan team, which has historically trampled Penn State on the ground over the last decade, to blow a defensive front off the line of scrimmage.

While Michigan’s production has dipped from years past, ranking No. 13 in the Big Ten in offensive rushing yards per game with 135, the Nittany Lions allow 167 rushing yards per game, good for second-worst in the Big Ten thus far.

Penn State’s personnel, largely made up of former Big 12 players, has struggled to match the tenacity of Big Ten teams in the trenches.

The blue and white surrendered a season-high 413 rushing yards to Northwestern back in Week 5. Gap integrity will be a premium on the road against an underperforming Michigan team that’s coming off a bye week.

More importantly, Penn State’s defense cannot sleep on Underwood, who hasn’t lived up to his eight-digit price tag yet, but, like a dormant volcano, could explode onto the scene at a moment’s notice.

Don’t be the team that allows Underwood to break out and become college football’s next supernova.