Ten months ago, longtime Utah Utes head coach Kyle Whittingham stepped down from his post at Utah. Initially, it was believed this was a move towards retirement. Shortly thereafter, his name became associated with the Michigan hiring process.

Michigan, along with several other significant if not blue blood programs, were looking to hire their next head coach. There was a logjam of programs that all believed they had a shot at landing Lane Kiffin. The Kiffin saga caused a delay in the process for several programs. Once that dust settled, it left many programs looking for answers. Michigan was the last of those to hire a coach.

Right about the time the big-name options were thinning, Whittingham’s status became interesting. Was this the beginning of a retirement? Or was he just leaving Utah? Not long after Whittingham to Michigan started to make sense, the move was officially announced.

In 1991, there was a movie released called Necessary Roughness starring Scott Bakula, Hector Elizondo and comedian Sinbad. That movie is the perfect analogy for why Whittingham made sense for Michigan. In that movie, a program faced multiple scandals and needed to return to honest football, even if it meant being bad. The character “Coach Gennero” was given time to run a clean program.

Conceptually, the movie and the state of the Michigan program were similar. Whittingham made a great career in Utah without the budget and resources of a program like Michigan. Creating the idea that Whittingham could take time and rebuild the program and culture into an honorable program again that would not be the subject of scandals.

However, this is the Playoff, NIL, transfer portal era. In a world where those who can spend should not be bad, it seems the leash on Whittingham is much shorter than expected. Currently, the Michigan Wolverines are five spots away from the Big Ten cellar with a 4-3 record and 1-3 in conference.

CBS Sports' John Talty believes there is a real possibility Michigan moves on from Whittingham after one season. “Athletic director Warde Manuel is on the way out, and first-year coach Kyle Whittingham was a bridge hire. Multiple industry sources believe it is at least possible that Michigan could be back in the head-coaching market for a second consecutive cycle. The 66-year-old Whittingham is 4-3 this season and has lost three of his last four games. With games against Oregon, UCLA and Ohio State still to come, there's a possibility the Wolverines will go 6-6 this season.”

The largest concern for Whittingham at Michigan was a significant difference in program mentality. Michigan expects to be good, regardless of circumstances. Utah was more willing to allow Whittingham to build the program over time. Fans, alumni and the university probably did not envision a world where they were a bottom half Big Ten team.

Conversely, it seems that Michigan might have buyer's remorse over the Whittingham move. Utah is thriving under Morgan Scalley to the tune of an undefeated record and a top 10 ranking. The best part is Scalley never attempted to reinvent the wheel.

Utah overall has been minimally changed after Whittingham’s departure. Scalley has been vocal about wanting to preserve the culture and program ideals. Short of their No. 9 ranked total offense and no offensive category that ranks outside the top 40, most of the Utah program seems relatively unchanged.

Utah is facing a situation they haven’t in a long while. A top 10 national ranking and a very winnable final third of the schedule. It's not ‘easy’, but winnable. They play a middle of the conference team in Cincinnati this week that just beat undefeated Texas Tech.

Two weeks from now is the highly anticipated Holy War game against a BYU team who just lost to UCF. Then they face an Arizona team that is slowly moving up the rankings. Rounding out the schedule with two potential trap games in West Virginia and TCU.

If Utah wins out, they would go undefeated for the season and be the favorite to win the Big 12 title. Entering the College Football Playoff with a first round bye and likely a favorable draw. Even with a reasonable loss on their schedule, Utah should still factor into the conference title game.

No matter how you slice it, it seems rather apparent Utah won the Whittingham divorce in terms of on-field accomplishment. In the end, this could be damaging for Whittingham. A possibly unquestioned legacy now could be tainted by a less than successful tenure at a program with big resources. Whittingham is also the highest paid college football coach in the country, considering the pay he is drawing from both Michigan and Utah.

All things considered, Utah hit the ground running and seems to be in great hands moving forward. While Michigan and Whittingham might regret that experiment rather soon.