The Michigan Wolverines defeated the Wisconsin Badgers 38-13 on Saturday night.

As always, we have some game balls to pass out in lieu of victory.

Michigan Game Balls

Offense: QB Shea Patterson & RB Karan Higdon

We have to give a game ball to both Patterson and Higdon this week.

Patterson had another efficient day passing the football. He did take a couple sacks the made for longer field goal attempts by Quinn Nordin, and one pass was nearly intercepted, but Patterson was consistent on all other plays in the game.

Although going 14-of-21 for 124 yards isn’t eye-popping, Patterson was able to keep moving the chains with his arm.

And he didn’t look too shabby running the football either, taking off on a read-option for 81 yards. Patterson also scored a touchdown on a read-option rush.

This was the first time we’ve seen a concentrated effort from Michigan to let Patterson have a steady dose of designed run plays, and we’ll likely only see more of the same in games to come.

And then there’s Karan Higdon, who really got things cooking in the second half when Michigan needed to tack on to their lead and start controlling the time of possession. Higdon finished the day with 105 yards rushing and 1 touchdown.

Defense: S Josh Metellus

Metellus is turning into a pick magnet, intercepting his third pass of the year off of Alex Hornibrook. Metellus INT came at a time when the game was still close (10-7 Michigan) and the pick fired up the fans, and team too.

Special Teams- Donovan Peoples-Jones

DPJ has improved drastically as a return man this season. And that was on display when he had a 26-yard punt return that momentarily looked liked it was destined to be a touchdown.

Special teams can win a team a game on a given week, and Michigan is surely happy Peoples-Jones plays for them. Electric upside.