Fox's Joel Klatt analyzes whether Michigan football is a contender for Big Ten title

No. 19 Michigan football is on its bye week and coming off a big 30-27 win at Nebraska this past Saturday to start 1-0 in the Big Ten and keep the 2025 season on the right track. Now a quarter of the way through the season, while still early, the picture is becoming clearer on the Big Ten race in terms of which teams are establishing themselves as contenders and which ones are falling out of the mix.

However, with many big games ahead, questions remain as to how the conference standings might shake out by the time the college football season comes to an end.

Fox Sports' Joel Klatt laid out his tiers for the Big Ten through Week 4 and identified the teams he believes are the favorites, contenders and "in the mix" to win a conference title.

Klatt listed the Wolverines, along with Washington and USC, in the same tier as teams who are in the mix to compete at the top of the conference as the season moves along.

"Michigan had a very impressive performance at Nebraska this past weekend," Klatt wrote. "The Wolverines totally owned Nebraska at the line of scrimmage, running it for nearly 300 yards and getting seven sacks on defense. Frankly, I didn't think the 30-27 score was indicative of how the game went. Bryce Underwood is going to be a star. Simply put, Michigan is further ahead now compared to this point last year. "