With each passing week and each additional layer of scrutiny surrounding Michigan athletic director Warde Manuel, how differently could this saga have unfolded if not for the tragic news involving Kent Syverud, who was slated to become the university’s next president?
A few weeks after Manuel hired Kyle Whittingham as the Wolverines’ next football coach in late December, the Board of Regents announced that Syverud would become the 16th president at Michigan. Syverud, who was previously the chancellor and president at Syracuse University, was scheduled to take over for interim president Domenico Grasso on July 1 of this year.
But in mid-April, just a few days after Michigan’s men’s basketball team won the national championship, Syverud announced that he had been diagnosed with brain cancer. He stepped down from his presidency before it even began. Grasso was eventually elevated to the full-time position, though not quite in a permanent capacity: The Board of Regents said that the search for a 17th president would begin anew.
Domenico Grasso, Warde Manuel and Dusty May during the men’s basketball national championship celebration in April. (Photo by Aaron J. Thornton/Getty Images)
Correctly or not, it was widely assumed that one of Syverud’s main objectives after assuming his new position would be to change leadership within Michigan’s athletics department. For years, Manuel’s tenure with the Wolverines had been peppered with hiring missteps, NCAA violations and embarrassing conduct from his employees. None more so than former football coach Sherrone Moore, whom Manuel fired last December after the department found “credible evidence” of an inappropriate relationship with a subordinate.
That Manuel interspersed each blemish with four national championships — including one each for football (2023) and men’s basketball (2026), the most lucrative and highest-visibility sports — was enough for him to keep his job longer than most people expected. But all of that ended on July 20, when Michigan announced that Manuel will be stepping down from his position at the end of the calendar year.
So what does this mean? Here’s a look at what’s next for Michigan.
What Does Warde Manuel’s Departure Mean For Michigan Athletics?
In the same way that Michigan’s decision to hire Whittingham represented a noteworthy departure from those who were connected to the pockmarked tenure of alum Jim Harbaugh, this most recent divorce between the Wolverines and Manuel affords the institution an opportunity to do the same atop its athletics department.
Kyle Whittingham after the Michigan 2026 spring football game. (Photo by Scott W. Grau/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
A native of New Orleans, where he was an All-American high school football player, Manuel matriculated at Michigan and played under legendary head coach Bo Schembechler in the late 1980s, including a spell as Harbaugh’s teammate. And though his gridiron contributions were prematurely halted by a neck injury, Manuel still won multiple varsity letters in multiple sports for the Wolverines, shifting over to the track and field team before the end of his undergraduate career. He went on to earn three degrees from Michigan between 1990 and 2005: a bachelor of general studies, a master’s in social work and an MBA.
In other words, Manuel falls neatly within the framework of the proverbial “Michigan Man” persona that was popularized by Schembechler, who manned the sidelines for two decades and eventually became the school’s athletics director. That pedigree alone helps explain why Manuel, now 58, was hired by the Wolverines in 2016. Now, it’s also one of the reasons why so many fans wanted him removed.
A steady stream of shameful institutional missteps and public relations nightmares during Manuel’s tenure have dulled the sheen so often associated with the proud “Michigan Man” archetype.
Most notably, the stomach-turning sexual abuse scandal involving Dr. Robert Anderson, now deceased, and the university officials who overlooked — or flat-out ignored — years of accusations surrounding the physician’s suspected misconduct during a 50-year career. In 2022, Michigan eventually agreed to a $450 million settlement with more than 1,000 of Anderson’s victims. The jaw-dropping revelation that Schembechler, who coached at Michigan from 1969-89, was among those authority figures shielding in real time began to erode the outsized legacy he and his disciples left behind.
Warde Manuel in 2024. (Photo by Aaron J. Thornton/Getty Images)
Though Moore never played for Michigan prior to joining the Wolverines’ coaching staff in 2018, the decision to fire him amid another off-field controversy in December was seen as a necessary step if the program wanted to finally distance itself from anyone linked to Harbaugh, who himself is inextricably linked to Schembechler.
Each victory Harbaugh amassed during an unprecedented run over his final three seasons — a period capped, of course, by winning the national championship in 2023 — seemed to be met with another round of eyebrow-raising headlines:
- Recruiting violations from the COVID-19 dead period
- Cyber hacking of intimate photos and videos by offensive coordinator Matt Weiss
- A self-imposed three-game suspension for Harbaugh during Michigan’s undefeated season
- The sign-stealing saga devised and perpetrated by analyst Connor Stalions
There were plenty of other incidents, too.
Jim Harbaugh in 2024. (Photo by Maddie Meyer/Getty Images)
In effect, dismissing Moore meant that Michigan could finally move on from whatever remnants Harbaugh’s highly successful, highly controversial tenure had left behind — the good, the bad, the unethical and everything in between. It meant the Wolverines could distance themselves from a seminal figure in program history, a true Maize and Blue legend, but someone who also muddied the waters with his ongoing flouting of NCAA rules and longstanding ties to the increasingly stained Schembechler era.
Parting ways with Manuel, whose time at Michigan can be connected to all of those things, offers Michigan another chance to start anew, to finally hit the reset button atop the athletics department hierarchy. His replacement should come from outside the Wolverines’ family.
How Could Manuel Leaving Affect Michigan Football?
As the day-to-day leader of Michigan athletics, Manuel preferred to operate beyond the spotlight whenever possible. He was far less outspoken than some of his colleagues across the country — fellow athletics directors like Pete Bevacqua at Notre Dame or Ross Bjork at Ohio State, for example — and reserved many of his regularly scheduled comments for a friendly local radio show in Ann Arbor.
Kyle Whittingham speaks with his team following Michigan’s 2026 spring game. (Photo by Jaime Crawford/Getty Images for ONIT)
The only real exceptions came when Manuel puffed his chest for reporters in the immediate aftermath of championship moments for the football and men’s basketball programs, which were opportunities he seemed to relish.
A connection can be drawn between Manuel’s relative disinterest in occupying the kind of mainstream, protagonist role ascribed to modern ADs and the most common critique surrounding how he approached the job.
Both publicly and privately, detractors have questioned Manuel’s creativity and aggression when it comes to things like general fundraising efforts, NIL implementation strategies and negotiating contracts with Michigan’s coaches across various sports.
It wasn’t until the Wolverines overhauled their pursuit of five-star quarterback Bryce Underwood prior to his senior season of high school that Michigan employed a fully modernized approach to player acquisition, and that was roughly three years after NIL was introduced on July 1, 2021. Even then, sources familiar with the inner workings of Underwood’s recruitment never included Manuel when asked about the most influential figures in that pursuit.
Jim Harbaugh and Warde Manuel in 2016. (Photo by Adam Ruff/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images)
All of which is to say that the Wolverines could benefit quite significantly from selecting a leader focused more on enhancing Michigan’s future than simply honoring, or preserving, its illustrious past. This is particularly important when considering that Whittingham, the new football coach, will turn 67 later this year and has never coached in the power conferences. He built a decorated, Hall-of-Fame caliber career while doing more with less across two decades as the head coach at Utah.
And now, as college football continues to evolve on what feels like a daily basis, he’ll need strong leadership and guidance from atop the department to properly wield Michigan’s considerable institutional advantages.
What About Michigan Men’s Basketball?
For a moment, it appeared that Manuel’s uneven tenure might not last beyond the university’s Board of Regents meeting held in Traverse City, Michigan last Thursday.
The days leading up to that regularly scheduled gathering hummed with speculation and scuttlebutt surrounding an independent investigation by law firm Jenner & Block, whose bill with the school has now soared to nearly $12 million and counting since the project was commissioned.
The Michigan Wolverines celebrate winning the 2026 NCAA men’s national championship. (Photo by Mitchell Layton/Getty Images)
The Wall Street Journal said the investigation had already found evidence that Michigan received “repeated reports about [Sherrone] Moore’s behavior,” as it pertained to the inappropriate relationship with Paige Shiver, his former executive assistant.
The Board of Regents meeting Thursday came and went without any discussion on Manuel’s future. Neither Manuel nor the investigation by Jenner & Block were discussed. Business, it seemed, would continue as usual for at least a while longer. And that’s exactly how Manuel had been operating.
Six days before the Board of Regents meeting, Manuel announced that he was dropping the “interim” tag attached to men’s basketball coach Mike Boynton Jr. after the sides agreed on a two-year contract. Boynton, 44, served as the lead assistant and defensive coordinator for the Wolverines under head coach Dusty May the last two seasons, guiding the program to just the second national championship in school history. He’d worked tirelessly to retain the core of Michigan’s roster ever since May decided to leave for an NBA job last month.
“Mike is a veteran assistant with strong head-coaching experience and a clear understanding of the standard we expect at Michigan,” Manuel said in a press release. “Over the past two seasons, he has been an invaluable member of our staff, bringing stability, leadership and perspective during an important period of success.”
Dusty May and Mike Boynton Jr. during practice day ahead of the first round of the 2026 NCAA men’s basketball tournament. (Photo by Ishika Samant/Getty Images)
Within a week, though, members of the anti-Manuel contingent were given yet another reason to roll their eyes at the way he conducts business. Boynton’s new two-year contract, which will pay him $3.6 million for the 2026-27 season, includes a series of uncommon performance benchmarks he must meet simply to reach the second year of the deal, according to a records request by MLive and an article published Thursday.
“The program can’t have any Level I or II NCAA violations,” writes beat reporter Andrew Kahn, “Boynton can’t violate any policies or rules, and all players must remain academically eligible. The Wolverines must also reach the Final Four or hit at least two of the following: win at least 24 regular season games (out of 31), finish in the top four in the Big Ten, win the Big Ten Tournament, or reach the Sweet 16.”
All of those accomplishments feel reasonable for a program that returns several key players from a national championship-winning squad and has also welcomed another star-studded transfer portal class to Ann Arbor, not to mention five-star freshman Brandon McCoy Jr., the jewel of Michigan’s high school recruiting class.
But with such specific criteria comes plenty of additional pressure for a head coach who already has immense shoes to fill.
Michigan in Joel Klatt’s post-spring top 25 🏈 Joel Klatt Show
