Jim Harbaugh has elevated Michigan football expectations into someplace between the unlikely and the absurd. In mid-August, Las Vegas listed Michigan as a favorite (along with Alabama) to make it to the NCAA championship game. The odds are a mere six to one. While I wouldn’t place my savings on that kind of bet, it isn’t crazy to speculate that Michigan can be a national force this year.

Everything about Harbaugh, former Wolverines QB and San Francisco 49ers coach, has been a surprise, a cake where who-knows-what will pop out. No one, save for a few romantics in Ann Arbor, thought he would even take the Michigan job. No successful NFL coach had ever gone back to the NCAA. But he did. And no one believed that Harbaugh could take an offense with no quarterback and a running game that had been abjectly inept in Brady Hoke’s last year and turn it into vague competence. But he did, winning ten games and demolishing a good Florida defense in the Citrus Bowl by a score of 41-7.

Harbaugh’s new staff inherited a decent defense but a struggling offensive line, that terrible running game, and question marks at wide receiver. The thoughtful and beleaguered QB Devin Gardner, a warrior if there ever was one, had graduated. No one had stepped up in the spring, so Harbaugh brought in Iowa retread Jake Rudock, a three-year graduate who could play immediately under NCAA rules.

Rudock’s early season wasn’t promising. Michigan lost at Utah, 24-17, when the QB missed open receivers on fly routes and then turned the ball over on three interceptions, including one returned for a crushing touchdown. The lack of a ground game pressured Rudock in the same way it had pressured Gardner.

But the good news was Rudock “managed” the game. He seemed unflappable and improved in wins over (admittedly dreadful) Oregon State and UNLV. Brigham Young was next on the docket, and they were ranked No. 22 in the nation at the time, with a solid defense. The game was a blowout (31-0), and Rudock looked like his sports-talk mantra (“high floor, low ceiling”) in making certain that the Michigan offense hoarded what the defense created. BYU would finish 9-4 and didn’t lose another game by more than a touchdown, but the Wolverines held the Cougars to 105 yards, and Rudock rode a good run game to an easy win.

Two more shutouts, over Maryland and Northwestern, followed–the first time in thirty-five years Michigan had held opponents scoreless in three consecutive games. Rudock threw just one interception in those next two games. He completed the passes he should have completed. High floor.

Rudock settled in, but randomness did too. The Wolverines lost to nemesis MSU on a muffed final punt, one of the flukiest plays in the history of the sport. (The worst officiating I have seen in my lifetime didn’t help.)

U-M won its next four games, but they were sluggish, unartful affairs. They probably should have lost to Minnesota but won on a miracle goal-line stand. The Indiana spread-to-run offense shredded the Michigan defense, but the Wolverines hung on to win in double overtime.

Ohio State came to Michigan Stadium motivated, and the Wolverines (with defensive coordinator D.J. Durkin interviewing for the Maryland job) seemed to be not-even-close-to-ready-for-prime time. The final was 42-13, and maybe it wasn’t as competitive as that. But, after Durkin left, interim DC Greg Mattison put together a plan of beauty against Florida, and the SEC power was humiliated.

The 9-3 regular season exceeded my own expectations for Harbaugh’s first year by a win or two. And there was only one game–OSU–that Michigan had no chance to win. As he had before (with Rich Gannon, Josh Johnson, Alex Smith, and Colin Kaepernick), Harbaugh took a QB of middling regard and turned him into a functional part. Rudock, ticketed for medical school before last season, will instead get his shot at the NFL; he was drafted in the sixth round by the Lions.

From the moment Harbaugh was hired, college fans everywhere divided into collective admiration or enmity societies. In March, I was roaming a small village on Hawaii’s Big Island when a local entrepreneur noticed my Michigan T-shirt and cornered me to talk about Harbaugh instead of hawking his selection of wine and beer. The same day, a jewelry maker at an art fair sought me out to talk about the coach.

Harbaugh has made the college football world “All Michigan, All The Time.” In February, he emceed “Signing of the Stars” at Hill, an Oscar-style spectacular to introduce his recruiting class. Football celebrities on hand included Tom Brady, Mike Ditka, Charles Woodson, Denard Robinson, Mike Shanahan, and Lou Holtz–along with baseballer Derek Jeter, pro wrestler Ric Flair, NASCAR driver Brad Keselowski, actors Vince Vaughn and Owen Wilson, and rappers Migos.

The crowd was standing room only, and national outlets were agog. And, so help me, it worked. It worked in raising $110,000 for the ChadTough Foundation. It worked as theater of the absurd, with Flair complaining that the teleprompter was moving too fast for someone who “had thirteen years of high school.” And it worked for the kids. Why not? A high school kid seated between Tom Brady and Derek Jeter? What a world.

Then Harbaugh took the entire team to the IMG Academy in Florida for a week of spring practice. IMG is rife with national-level recruits, and SEC commissioner Greg Sankey howled over the “unfairness” of impinging on the U-M players’ “free time.” Right. The U-M kids get their twenty hours of practice moved up, allowing them more time to prep for exams. They get a week of practice in Florida, as opposed to balmy Ann Arbor in March. They get their trip, food, and activities paid for. Brutal.

Sankey, of course, had zero concerns for the students at Michigan. But he was concerned about the satellite camps Michigan (and other northern schools) were holding to horn in on the fertile recruiting grounds in the South. Backed by many southern coaches, the Dixiecrats managed to convince the NCAA to ban all such non-campus activity.

It didn’t last. The primary beneficiary of the camps, under-the-radar high school kids and their parents who couldn’t afford to travel to schools around the country, weren’t happy about the ban. The secondary beneficiary, smaller schools whose coaches could participate in Michigan’s camps and find kids the big guys had not pursued, weren’t happy. The Big Ten wasn’t happy. The MAC wasn’t happy. And most of the PAC conference coaches, who were nearly unanimous in liking the idea of satellite camps, were steamed when their representative “made a mistake” and supported the ban.

Harbaugh had anticipated the resistance. He invited other schools to send their coaches to coach or speak at the Michigan camps, even trolling Alabama’s Nick Saban with an offer (Saban declined). By the time of the Sankey-led counter-revolution, Harbaugh had built a cadre of allies–most notably with smaller schools and the families of high school players.

Red-faced, the NCAA rescinded the ban. Within days, Harbaugh scheduled forty-one camps.

This year, Michigan returns the deepest and best defensive line in the country, with at least six guys who might end up as pros (Bryan Mone, Taco Charlton, Chris Wormley, Maurice Hurst Jr., Ryan Glasgow, and Matt Godin). And that doesn’t count the number-one recruit in the country, Rashan Gary.

Jourdan Lewis is a first-round NFL pick at one corner, and the other corner has two guys, Channing Stribling and Jeremy Clark, who will get chances in the big leagues. Clark was more than solid last year, so it was a surprise when Stribling was leading going into fall practice. Safeties Dymonte Thomas, Lavert Hill, and Tyree Kinnel should be somewhere between good and very good. Michigan may miss the steadiness of Jarrod Wilson, but the talent is there to be better than last year.

And there is, of course, Jabrill Peppers, a likely All-American who will fit in as a hybrid of nickel and strong-side linebacker, much like last year. New defensive coordinator Don Brown should be able to make Peppers as disrupting a factor as Charles Woodson was in 1997. No one, in my years of watching the game, has ever done better at defending bubble and tunnel screens, now the staples in many offenses. The only question is how often Brown will have to loan Peppers to the offense, where he is a playmaker.

Last year, Brown’s Boston College team had the top defense in the country, an astounding feat considering the BC offense was a complete meatball. At Michigan, Brown has the most talented group of athletes he has coached in a long career. But he also has some holes left by the graduation of Desmond Morgan and Joe Bolden.

Ben Gedeon is at least the equal of Bolden. The question is whether long-injured Mike McCray or frosh Devin Bush Jr. can step into Morgan’s shoes. Coming out of the spring, Brown seemed at least satisfied with what he had.

Brown’s history is to blitz and blitz some more. This is, of course, the mantra of every fan, the “aggressive” defense. The problem with pressure out of blitzes or fires (corners attacking the line of scrimmage or QB) is that it stresses the secondary, making them more vulnerable to big plays.

Brown has an unusual conundrum. He has a sufficiently good defensive line so that he might be able to get pressure without blitzes, minimizing long plays and maximizing the chances for turnovers out of coverage. He also has a secondary that can play man-to-man, making blitzing less risky than usual. As of this writing it isn’t clear what Brown will do, but his history is strictly “pedal to the metal,” and Michigan’s talent will allow him the flexibility to change it all up. If everyone remains reasonably healthy, this will be the best Michigan defense since 1997.

Offense is another matter. Michigan will move its best returning offensive lineman, Mason Cole, to center and hope that soph Grant Newsome can handle the left tackle position. Otherwise, Ben Braden (LG), Erik Magnuson (RT), and Kyle Kalis (RG) return. This is an experienced group, but not one that has ever shown much dominance, particularly in the run game. Pass blocking has been only vaguely proficient. Depth isn’t profound.

Michigan has the best tight end in the country in Jake Butt, and the position is loaded. Harbaugh likes to use multiple TEs, and it is likely we will see formations that take advantage of Ian Bunting and Tyrone Wheatley Jr. Wheatley will be a star in the near future.

Running backs are solid. De’Veon Smith isn’t fast, but tackling him is like hitting a tree trunk. Drake Johnson has shown he can play, and in the spring Ty Isaac began to show some of the ability that made him the top-rated high school running back in the country. But while the spring game showed some promise, the fact is Michigan hasn’t had a dominant run game since Mike Hart and Jake Long graduated.

The pass game has questions, too. Amara Darboh and Jehu Chesson proved last year they are NFL-quality players, and slot receiver Grant Perry can catch and block. There is a raft of younger receivers with potential. But who gets them the ball? And can he run the offense as adeptly as Rudock?

In the absence of a clear answer, observers are pinning their hopes on Harbaugh’s history with QBs. Brian Cook and Ed Feng (my compadres on WTKA’s “Roundtable” show) have responded to this question with “and when was the last time Harbaugh had bad QB play?” Good point.

Harbaugh has created a seamlessness to Michigan football. There are the games. And then there is “What in the world is going to happen next in the off-season?” I can’t anticipate the latter. But I am drinking the Kool-Aid on the former. I think there is a reasonable chance that Michigan rolls into Columbus undefeated. Let’s call it 11-1 and a date (perhaps) in the Rose Bowl against Stanford.