Courtney Morgan’s PhD in football: How Michigan built the Alabama GM

Courtney Morgan looked up at the Orange Bowl photo hanging above his desk. He remembers that day well, 25 years ago. The day when he and his Michigan teammates expected the world to end.

The date of the photo: Jan. 1, 2000.

“It was such a funny time,” said Morgan, Alabama football’s general manager, sitting in his office in December 2024. “We woke up the next day looking around like, ‘alright, we’re still here.’”

That day, the first day of the next millennium, computers didn’t shut down and technology didn’t combust. Instead, Shaun Alexander ran wild, but Alabama lost the Orange Bowl to Michigan because of a missed extra point in overtime.

Morgan watched it all as a freshman on the sideline. The world wasn’t ending, but his budding career in football was beginning. That was Morgan’s first season in the maize and blue.

Morgan played all five offensive line positions and saw time in 28 games while starting 11 from 1999 to 2003. One of those games: The Outback Bowl in Tampa during the 2002 season.

On Tuesday, Morgan returns to that bowl game as Alabama’s general manager. The Crimson Tide will face his alma mater at 11 a.m. CT at Raymond James Stadium in what is now called the ReliaQuest Bowl.

Morgan is all about Alabama now. Make no mistake: He wants the Crimson Tide to beat his alma mater. But to understand the man in charge of building Alabama’s roster, you need to know how Michigan built him.

“I feel like I have a PhD in football by being at Michigan during those times,” Morgan said.

How Courtney Morgan landed at Michigan

Morgan was partly an Ohio State fan. His mom and dad are both from Ohio. Then basketball helped sway Morgan to Michigan football.

Morgan, primarily growing up in Los Angeles, lived in Ohio once for less than a year. But sitting on the floor at the age of about 11 or 12, watching the Fab Five play college basketball, made Morgan gravitate toward the Wolverines. He loved the baggy shorts, the black shoes, the black socks and the way those five Michigan freshmen played. One day, Morgan turned to his dad and made a declaration.

I’m going to play for Michigan.

Football would be his sport, though. Morgan liked to cut out the Sports Illustrated pages. He appreciated the details, like the color of cleats. Morgan also watched the Wolverines on TV many Saturdays. Growing up on the West Coast, he would often wake up, turn on the TV and watch Michigan.

Then in high school, the Wolverines offered Morgan a scholarship at a football camp his junior year. Morgan committed his senior year.

“USC made a strong push,” Morgan said. “But in my heart, I knew I wanted to go to Michigan.”

Class is in session

Morgan had a variety of professors instructing him in his football studies.

Lloyd Carr was one. The third-winningest coach in Michigan history served as the head coach during Morgan’s tenure in Ann Arbor. The late Bo Schembechler also remained around the program; Michigan’s head coach from 1969-1989 is the winningest coach in program history.

Schembechler still had an office in the building. Morgan remembers parking his car, going to practice and Schembechler would be walking in, too.

“Imagine going to Alabama as a player and Paul Bryant is present,” Morgan said. “You’re at practice, you may be playing for Coach (Mike) Shula, but over there on the 50 with a script is Paul Bryant. That’s how it was when I was at Michigan. You’d get cussed out by Lloyd and walk back and get cussed out by Bo.”

Carr strived to foster an environment for learning. Dave Ablauf, who has handled football communications for Michigan since 1996, said Carr always looked at himself as a teacher. After all, Carr began his career in teaching.

As Michigan’s coach, Carr kept a dictionary outside his office. Anytime a player stopped by to see him, the player had to find a new word in the dictionary and write down the definition.

“He was always making them learn something new,” Ablauf said.

The likes of Carr, Schembechler and other coaches taught Morgan and the players plenty. But teammates might have provided the best lessons.

Linebacker John Spytek, Morgan’s teammate and now the Tampa Bay Buccaneers assistant GM, got his football education from Michigan too, like in practice moments when offensive linemen Steve Hutchinson and Jeff Backus buried him. Or when running back Anthony “A-Train” Thomas ran him over.

Thomas went on to become the NFL’s rookie of the year and play seven seasons in the league. Backus became a first-round pick and spent 12 seasons in the NFL. Meanwhile, Hutchinson put together a career that earned him a spot in the NFL’s Hall of Fame.

“You had to put your best foot forward to have a chance,” Spytek said. “It challenged you mentally, emotionally and physically.”

Playing then at Michigan also provided a front row seat to watching young talent blossom into elite players. Morgan was in an offensive line room with Hutchinson, Backus as well as Maurice Williams who became a second-round pick. Morgan also overlapped with Jake Long, who became the first overall pick in the 2008 NFL Draft.

“You could just see what made them special,” Morgan said. “A lot of it wasn’t always God-given gifts. It was their approach to the process … No different than what Coach (Nick) Saban talked about.”

No one epitomized that better than this one guy named Tom Brady.

He left an impression as a player and person. Look to Michigan’s Christmas Eve dinner in 1999.

In the middle of preparations for the Orange Bowl, the team gathered one evening in Miami for a meal and some Christmas carols. All the players had to stand and sing, Morgan included.

However, something else stood out more to Spytek that night — Brady walked over and decided to sit with some of the freshmen.

I’m going to eat dinner with the young bucks tonight.

“It’s one of those where you wish you had the cameras now,” Spytek said. “You could have documented it all.”

The memory lasts from that night, though. So, too, does the image of what greatness looks like in its early days.

“I saw Tom Brady when he was on his come up,” Morgan said. “I didn’t see the Tom Brady everyone knows. I saw the Tom Brady that was building the foundation to be who he was.”

Most people in the football personnel world can identify qualities such as speed and quickness. That’s the minimum. Spotting energy, toughness, competitiveness and other intangibles can take a trained eye.

Spytek said a defensive lineman routinely jumping out of his gap can indicate selfishness, for example. At Michigan, doing that would have earned you a spot standing next to the coaches.

“It doesn’t take very long to see guys on film who won’t play hard and they won’t turn and chase the ball on defense and they jump out of their gaps or they turn down contact,” Spytek said. “I think back to all the great players I played with at Michigan, they didn’t play like that. They were willing to do what was required of them for the team.”

And they provided an example.

Sometimes all Morgan needs to evaluate a prospect is five plays. Coaches tease him about him sometimes. But that’s often all the tape Morgan needs to watch to determine if a player fits.

Said Morgan: “I know what it looks like.”

Lessons in action

Morgan builds Alabama’s roster from his white marble u-shaped desk.

Multiple monitors sit on the surface. There’s a tablet as well. Files and binders are lined up against the wall. He’s got multiple remotes, too. Behind his desk, he sits in his black swivel chair, able to watch film on whatever screen he chooses to evaluate players. Or, make the phone calls necessary to retain players or secure new talent.

The transfer portal is open during this mid-December day in his Tuscaloosa office. College’s version of NFL free agency has already taken some players from Alabama, albeit mostly reserves. Then, on this Wednesday, the Crimson Tide gained another player for 2025.

Not even two hours after Morgan shared the lessons he learned at Michigan, sitting underneath the photo of Brady facing Alabama in the Orange Bowl, the Crimson Tide landed Cam Calhoun, a cornerback who spent a season at Utah.

A player with Ohio roots who began his playing career at Michigan.

Nick Kelly is an Alabama beat writer for AL.com and the Alabama Media Group. Follow him on X and Instagram.