Michigan football beats Purdue to claim second-straight Big Ten championship

INDIANAPOLIS – Michigan football defeated Purdue on Saturday, 43-22, to remain undefeated and claim its second-straight Big Ten championship.

The Wolverines have 13 wins in a season for the first time in program history and will have a chance to add to that total in the College Football Playoff. Michigan will likely earn the No. 2 seed behind defending champion Georgia when the final CFP rankings are announced Sunday.

After breaking a 16-year conference title drought in 2021 by upsetting Ohio State and crushing Iowa, the Wolverines were somehow even better this season. They went into Columbus and won by 22 points to finish undefeated in the regular season for the first time since 1997.

Only two of Michigan’s games -- Maryland and Illinois -- were decided by single digits during the regular season.

Michigan has won its most recent game against all 13 Big Ten opponents -- a streak kept alive by Saturday’s fifth-straight victory against the Boilermakers.

After years of trying to make the jump to the conference’s top tier, Jim Harbaugh and Michigan have cemented themself as one of the teams to beat in the Big Ten.