Michigan linebacker Josh Ross was fielding questions during the breakout sessions at Big Ten Media Days last summer when he was asked which player might surprise fans this season.
Ross, a two-time captain, didn’t hesitate.
“Mazi Smith is going to ball out this year,” Ross said back in July. “D-tackle. Yes he is.”
While edge rushers Aidan Hutchinson and David Ojabo have garnered much of the attention this season — the two have combined for 25 sacks, including Hutchinson’s Michigan single-season record of 14 — the interior of the defensive line often gets overlooked.
Smith doesn’t mind. After all, Michigan is 12-1 and the No. 2 team in the College Football Playoff and will face No. 3 Georgia in the Orange Bowl national semifinal on Dec. 31. The Wolverines have had an all-for-one-one-for-all approach this season and Smith said that has defined the play of the Michigan defensive tackles as well as the team overall.
“Going into this season we all knew that if we wanted to win games, we had to play well, and we had to make sure that we stepped up for everybody that needed us to,” Smith said this week. “I can't really explain it. It's something that you've been longing for, something that you've been wanting to do your whole life but then it's also something that you expect yourself to do when the time comes, so you can't be too 'I did this' or ‘I did that.' It's like, ‘This is what I was supposed to do.’”
The 6-foot-3, 326-pound Smith has 35 tackles this season, including 2.5 for loss, four pass breakups and four quarterback hurries. He arrived at Michigan in 2019 a four-star recruit from East Kentwood in Grand Rapids and played in two games. During the 2020 season, Smith had two tackles.
Entering this season, Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh said Smith had changed his body.
“To a power pack. Big, wide, thick, strong, and retained his speed and athleticism,” Harbaugh said. “His strike, his knock back. He keeps getting better every day, getting stronger every day.”
During Michigan’s final media conference last Tuesday after practice — the team departed for Florida on Saturday to get acclimated to the temperature change — Smith was asked if he gets under the skins of the Michigan offensive linemen in practice and, conversely, who gets to him.
“I'm the guy that gets under people's skin,” Smith said laughing.
When asked why and how that happens, he turned serious.
“Just trying to come and be the type of player that I envision one day,” Smith said. “I ain't there yet, but it'll come.”
Smith has often been introspective about his game and how much he wants to work to improve. As far as the team this season, he believes there have been a number of key things that have happened, and instead of singling one situation or game, Smith believes everything combined has led to Michigan landing in the four-team national playoff.
“Every defining moment has been the same in it's been a defining moment for the whole team,” Smith said. “Like overcoming adversity after the loss versus Michigan State coming back with the same intensity and understanding that this could still work and that we could still get it done. That type of stuff. I don't look at a play or a particular game as a defining moment but the whole body of work that we built.”
The Michigan-Georgia matchup features two top-notch defenses. The Bulldogs are No. 1 nationally in scoring defense, allowing an average 9.5 points per game and No. 2 in total defense, yielding an average 254.4 points a game. Michigan is No. 13 in total defense (316.2) and tied for fourth nationally in scoring defense at 16.1 points.
Georgia is led by defensive tackle Jordan Davis, a mammoth 6-6, 340 pounds, won the Bednarik Award as the best defensive player in college football this season. He sets the tone for the Bulldogs’ stingy defense.
Smith said because it’s not a head-to-head matchup, he can’t get caught up in the mind games of wondering how Michigan’s defensive front stacks up against Georgia’s. It’s tempting, but he said he won’t go there.
“From the outside looking in, yeah, but at the end of the day, the team that wins the game is gonna play the best,” Smith said. “So whether that be the D-line having to play the best, we've got to be worried about ourselves, we've got to be worried about our jobs and what we do as a front. We can't really be worried about who they've got, who they have planned, how they play. We've got to do what we do.”
And that, Smith said, has been the recipe for his success and the team's success this season.
