Friday Night Recaps: Week 5

Welcome back to the new and (hopefully) improved Friday Night Recaps!

Simply put, Michigan has too many commitments to give detailed updates on everyone. These things were taking forever to write and probably too long to read.

So I decided to switch up the format to give the same information but condense it a bit. Instead of writing something about every player, each week I’m going to highlight a few guys that had notable performances at the top (spoiler alert, Zach Charbonnet will probably be mentioned a lot). Then at the end of the post I’ll include the scores and stat lines, if I could find one, for every player. The aim is to make the information clearer and quicker to absorb, so let me know if you like the changes!

I’m also going to write these up a tad later in the week. I’ve found if a school is going to upload their box score, it’ll happen on Monday the next week. So look out for these late Monday or on Tuesday. Alright, now that everything’s out of the way, let’s see how everyone did this week!

Eric Gray

Before the season started, Gray set up a fundraiser to help St. Jude’s hospital by having people pledge money to donate every time he scored a touchdown. Well, after scoring SIX touchdowns on Friday night, Gray has totaled 19 in all, a little over halfway through his senior season. He should be well on his way to achieving his $10,000 goal.

One of those touchdowns was a 97-yard scamper that you can watch below.

There’s been a lot of consternation about Gray taking visits to other schools the past couple of weekends. The article I linked above has some interesting quotes about why Gray is looking around. About switching to Ole Miss, Gray said distance is the only factor.

“That would be the only way. If you can give me the same thing as Michigan, but closer.”

I think we can all agree that Ole Miss’ program can’t hold a candle to Michigan’s, but we’ll have to wait and see if Gray thinks so too.

Daxton Hill

First off, I’d like to say that Hill’s season stats in the chart below are from only ONE GAME. His high school has only uploaded one full box score with defensive stats, and I couldn’t find any more evidence of his defensive performances. So if you’d just like to extrapolate that over four games, you probably wouldn’t be off by much.

Anyway, last week Hill contributed just as much on offense, hauling in two passes for 46 yards and a touchdown. He also came up with a big forced fumble in the second half, which helped propel Booker T. Washington to a 43-6 blowout win.

It’s no surprise Hill and his 4.3 speed is used at receiver as well. From what I’ve found, Hill has also caught a 50-yard bomb for a touchdown this year. Being able to follow the rest of his season knowing that he’ll be suited up in Maize and Blue soon is a great feeling.

Denver Warren

All season, Warren and the West Aurora squad has been dominating opponents. Finally, we have some concrete evidence that discusses Warren’s impact. Suggestive title aside, the Chicago Tribune wrote a glowing article detailing how Warren helped shape his team’s latest contest on Friday.

At the start of a tight fourth quarter and the opponent driving, Warren took matters into his own hands. On first down near the goal line, he sacked the quarterback on first down, for a six yard loss. Then, after the defense got to fourth down, Warren blocked the field goal attempt, preserving his team’s lead. West Aurora pulled ahead late, eventually winning 27-12.

The junior has a bright future ahead of him, and should continue an increasingly long line of standout Michigan defensive linemen.

Chart

A few notes about some players this week.

First, Cade McNamara has a rib injury and didn’t play this week. It looks like he’ll miss the next few games as well.

Additionally, I couldn’t find any score from the Quintel Kent game against COF Academy. I’m not sure if it actually took place. COF Academy’s program is new this year, and seems a little sketchy.

Lastly, Erick All finally caught a touchdown pass! About time the coach utilized a four-star tight end through the air.

(Click to enlarge)

Jonathon Simmons