The implications of Dominic Zvada’s missed field goal

On Saturday, Dominic Zvada did the unthinkable.

Toward the end of the second quarter, the then-No. 15 Michigan football team lined up on then-No. 18 Oklahoma’s 14-yard line facing a fourth-and-2. Freshman quarterback Bryce Underwood had just sailed the ball over the head over graduate wide receiver Donaven McCulley, who stood blocking his defender unaware a throw was intended for him. The miscommunication was an early sign that the Wolverines’ offense might return to the stagnation it exhibited in the game’s first three drives. 

If anyone could right the ship, put points on the board and cut Michigan’s deficit to four, it was the Wolverines’ senior kicker, who hadn’t missed a field goal since one was blocked last October.

Down 7-0, Zvada curled the 32-yarder left of the goalposts.

You’d have to go back all the way to Oct. 21, 2023, when Zvada was on Arkansas State, to find the last time Zvada missed a shorter field goal. The First-Team All-American kicker was virtually flawless last year with Michigan, setting a record by making all seven of his field goal attempts over 50 yards. 

But in Norman, what’s usually a routine chip shot turned into yet another mistake by the Wolverines. For Michigan coach Sherrone Moore, the best thing to say after a miss like that is nothing at all.

“I don’t talk to Zvada,” Moore said Monday. “I’m not a kicker. I’ve never been a kicker, and I can imagine the mindset of what happens in that moment, that you can think a whole bunch of different things, and the last thing you need is somebody ripping at you or yelling at you.” 

Instead, Moore simply looked at Zvada on the sidelines and nodded. Several drives later, when Zvada was tasked with a 42-yarder, he nailed it down the middle.

“We always talk about ‘FIDO: Forget It and Drive On,’ ” Moore said. “So people are going to make mistakes. People are going to make misses, missed assignments, and that was one. Nobody wants to make that kick more than Zvada. So me telling him, ‘Hey, go make that kick,’ would not be anything helpful. And I have no coaching points to tell him how to make the kick, so I just let him handle it, and he recovered from it.”

Zoom out, and a missed field goal in the Wolverines’ second game of the season — a game that Michigan lost by 11 points — might not seem like a big deal. As Moore said, kickers are going to miss, forget it and move on. Zvada certainly did. 

But zoom in, and it’s hard not to start thinking about the implications, on and off the field. Zvada makes that kick, and it’s a one-possession game late in the fourth quarter. Zvada makes that kick, and the Lou Groza Award — the award honoring the country’s best kicker that played a factor in Zvada’s return to the Wolverines after he didn’t win it last year — remains in the picture. 

Combine that with Michigan’s decision to punt on Oklahoma’s 38-yard line on its second drive of the game after several coaches highlighted the 60-plus field goals Zvada kicks in practice, and Michigan’s kicking game is in a similar place to the team as a whole: loaded with talent, imperfect on execution and making some confusing decisions.

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