Michigan football's offense has struggled through three weeks of the season, but there have been bright spots.

Kalel Mullings' emergence as a top-end running back has been a welcomed development, while young receivers starting to find their form such as Fredrick Moore or Kendrick Bell could pay dividends as the season goes on.

But through three games, one could no position has been important to the offense than the tight ends.

The swiss army knife of the offense, Michigan's unit under Steve Casula hasn't just used H-back Max Bredeson and in-line big bodies in the running game, but used its junior standout Colston Loveland as a focal point of the passing attack. He leads the team in receptions (19) and receiving yards (187) and is one of four players with a receiving touchdown.

The problem this week: There's no guarantee Loveland will play Saturday in the Big Ten opener (3:30 p.m., CBS) against No. 12 USC (2-0), after he left Week 3 against Arkansas State with an apparent upper-body injury in the third quarter.

Casula was evasive when asked about his pupil's participation this week in practice.

"Everybody in our program that’s not dealing with a season-ending injury or an upper-body, head injury of some sort, they practice every day," he said. "That could look a lot of different ways for a lot of different players, whether they’re dealing with an injury or not."

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Whether U-M is transparent or Loveland's about his availability, there's no denying his importance.

Speaking earlier this week, head coach Sherrone Moore said tests came back better than the program had initially feared, but still, it appears too soon to say anything definitive about Loveland's status.

“We’re just taking it one minute at a time, one hour at a time, one day at a time,” Casula added. “3:30 Saturday is still a ways away. You look at it like that. So I try to avoid predicting someone’s availability.”

If there's a silver lining in Loveland's absence — which admittedly can be hard to find when considering losing perhaps the team's best playmaker for any amount of time — it's that Marlin Klein stepped up in a big way when his number was called on Saturday.

The 6-foot-6, 250-pound redshirt sophomore caught three passes for a team-high 43 yards (which included a career long 33-yard reception) to lead all U-M pass catchers last week. He now is third on the team with three grabs for 50 yards, just behind leading receiver Semaj Morgan (nine receptions, 56 yards).

"The past two years it's been my thing to just be ready and prepare like I'm the starting tight end at the University of Michigan," Klein said Tuesday evening after practice. "I think I was prepared by our coaches and even by Colston Loveland, when he came back out he was telling me, 'hey, you got this, whatever you need I got this for you.'"

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The tight ends have been incredibly productive in the passing game, accounting for 53.6% of the Michigan's receiving yards (246 of 459), 47.1% of its receptions (24 of 51) and two of the four scores. Even freshman tight end Hogan Hansen, who was playing in his first career game, caught a 9-yard touchdown from Alex Orji.

Loveland or Klein have now been Michigan's leading receiver for three weeks in a row.

Loveland (6-5, 245), projected by some as a first-round pick in the 2025 NFL draft, is said to be preparing as if he were going to play Saturday.

Casula told a story from earlier this week when he was walking out of his office, and Loveland approached him to give a very pointed observation from his film study about a tendency USC has in a specific area of the field.

"He's like 'they play it X,Y,Z in this area of he field a lot, huh?'" Casula said. "And it's like 'yeah, yeah they do.' So he's on top of it, he's sharp."

Loveland's intimate knowledge of the scheme is only part of the reason U-M doesn't want to make an official call on his playing status. His star power is, of course, another.

The last part, as former head coach Jim Harbaugh used to say, is that players heal at different rates.

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Even if Loveland is taking it easy in practice, or currently not on pace to play Saturday, if something changes on game day, there are few players coaches have more trust in being able to perform their week's specific duties on limited reps than their star.

“If there’s a guy that we’re gonna let roll, man, it’d be him," Casula said. "He’s played a lot of football for us. His understanding of the offense, his recall, his retention from meetings … but at the same time, not at a disservice to him, not at a disservice to us by any means.

“To play tight end here, you gotta be able to do all the different things that we ask them to do. Now, with any gameplan, with any game week, it’s our responsibility as coaches to put our players in the best positions to succeed."

Tony Garcia is the Michigan Wolverines beat writer for the Detroit Free Press. Email him at apgarcia@freepress.com and follow him on X @RealTonyGarcia.

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This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Michigan football desperate for Colston Loveland to heal quickly