The other shoe in Ann Arbor could be about to drop, with a topic of discussion at a Board of Regents meeting later this week reportedly the man at the center of the athletic department for nearly a decade.
Warde Manuel's future at Michigan is set to be a major topic at a board meeting set for Thursday, according to multiple outlets on Sunday. Earlier in the day, Justin Spiro of Spiro Avenue took things a step further in reporting that the University was set to part ways with Manuel and the two parties were negotiating the terms of the veteran athletic director's release.
Spiro, as well as additional outlets, have come to the conclusion that the timing likely coincides with the release of the Jenner & Block investigation into Michigan's athletic department, which is also expected to come this week - which makes a ton of sense. When you bring in a heavyweight outside firm to dig through your department, oftentimes the findings and the leadership changes tend to arrive on the same news cycle.
For anyone who has been following this saga since last fall, this feels like where the trail has always been headed.
Michigan engaged Jenner & Block on November 13, 2025, to investigate the football program and the broader culture inside the department. Less than a month later, on December 10, the school fired head coach Sherrone Moore for cause after it found credible evidence of an inappropriate relationship with a staff member. Moore was later charged following an incident at the staffer's residence, and the reporting on his conduct, much of it out of Spiro's reporting, kept getting worse from there.
The investigation has not been cheap. Michigan has been billed north of $11.5 million by Jenner & Block for work done from November 2025 through March 2026 alone, with April's figures still to come. When a school spends that kind of money looking inward, the results rarely stop at one coach.
Michigan officials are expected to further respond to the investigation into the athletic department this week.
Manuel has run Michigan athletics since January 2016 as the program's 12th athletic director, and his ties to the school run deep. A New Orleans native and Brother Martin product, he played defensive tackle for Bo Schembechler from 1986 to 1989 before a neck injury ended his playing career. He was the AD at Buffalo from 2005 to 2012 and at UConn from 2012 to 2016 before coming home. Nationally, he chaired the College Football Playoff selection committee for the 2024 season, the first year of the 12-team field.
His tenure also delivered Michigan's 2023 national championship. It has also produced a run of scandal and legal trouble around the football program in particular.
Start with the illegal scouting case. Connor Stalions and the impermissible in-person scouting operation roiled the 2023 title season, drew a three-game Big Ten suspension for Jim Harbaugh, and later cost Moore games of his own. Separately, the NCAA hit Harbaugh with a four-year show-cause order for recruiting violations tied to the COVID-19 dead period, including a finding that he provided false or misleading information to investigators, a Level I violation.
Then there is the Matt Weiss case, which is a different level of serious. The former quarterbacks coach and co-offensive coordinator under Harbaugh was indicted by a federal grand jury in March 2025 on 24 counts, including unauthorized access to computers and aggravated identity theft. Prosecutors allege Weiss hacked private accounts to steal intimate photos and videos of more than 3,300 student-athletes from over 100 schools, with investigators saying he accessed files from inside Schembechler Hall. Weiss has pleaded not guilty, and his trial is set for September 2026 in Detroit.
More recently, Justin Spiro has been among those reporting detailed rape allegations against former Michigan staffer LaTroy Lewis and questions about how the program handled them, part of the same reporting thread that has kept Ann Arbor in the headlines for months.
Michigan brought in Kyle Whittingham to run the football program in late December, luring the longtime Utah coach out of what looked like retirement on a five-year deal. Now the man who has overseen the whole department could be headed for the exit just days after appointing assistant basketball coach Mike Boynton Jr. the new head coach of the Wolverines men's basketball team, who are coming off a national title of their own under Dusty May who decided to leave Ann Arbor for the Dallas Mavericks head coaching job in the NBA.
Stay tuned to The Scoop. We will have the latest as the situation continues to play out.