Michigan hires Biff Poggi as associate head coach

Biff Poggi was an associate head coach and special advisor for the Michigan Football program back in 2016, and now he’s back in Ann Arbor.

According to the Baltimore Sun, Poggi is returning to Michigan’s staff as an associate head coach, helping head coach Jim Harbaugh “mentor younger assistants and working hands-on with the team’s offensive linemen.”

“It’s a younger man’s game,” Poggi said. “This was a chance to go one last time on a really big stage, to a legendary program.”

Poggi comes to Michigan after doing exceptionally well as head coach at St. Frances Academy in Baltimore — a high school that has produced two current Michigan players in running back Blake Corum and linebacker Nikhai Hill-Green.

Poggi told the Baltimore Sun that he’s cutting all ties with St. Frances to meet NCAA requirements for the new job at Michigan, and he’s agreed not to recruit any St. Frances players for two years.

When Poggi was with the program in ‘16, his son, Henry, was a fullback at Michigan. This time around Poggi’s daughter is starting school at Michigan this fall, another factor that drew him to Michigan. “I was very happy at St. Frances; it was a highly competitive national program that we built from nothing,” Poggi said. “But this is the last chance my wife and I will have to be with her.”

The 61 year old Poggi noted that he had serious discussions to be the head coach at another college program, and although he envisions being at Michigan for the long haul, he’d revisit his options if something were to change at Michigan.

“I’m going to Michigan with the idea that I’m going to be there until I finish coaching,” Poggi said. “I’ll be there, I hope, as long as Jim is there and wants me to stay there. If he goes someplace else or doesn’t want me to stay, then I’d look at other opportunities.”