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Michigan football attacked the offensive side of its 2021 recruiting class with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind on early signing day, securing the known commodities, retaining four-star WR Xavier Worthy (who was entertaining Alabama), and adding elite RB Donovan Edwards.
The defensive side of the ball, however, wasn’t nearly as fortunate.
The Wolverines lost two pledges, including DE Quintin Somerville, who wasn’t expected to flip to UCLA until maybe national signing day actually took place. Losing Florida LB Branden Jennings to Maryland also stings, and, as of this writing, there’s still some unsurety about St. Thomas Aquinas’ CB Ja’Den McBurrows.
So when 247Sports’ Andrew Ivins was tasked with a national overview of the winners and losers across college football, the Wolverines were, as he puts it, somewhere in the middle.
It was an up-and-down day Jim Harbaugh. Yes, the Wolverines edged some other blue bloods for five-star running back Donovan Edwards and were able to hold onto Top247 wide receiver Xavier Worthy, who was also considering Alabama. But at the same time, Michigan also lost a pair of commits as Sommerville opted for UCLA and four-star linebacker Branden Jennings flipped to Maryland.
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However, it does appear that it will get better for the maize and blue. The Miami Hurricanes also made Ivins’ list of ‘somewhere in the middle,’ and he included this nugget about commit Ja’Den McBurrows.
It’s hard to ignore the fact that the Hurricanes didn’t sign a true cornerback prospect as they aren’t expected to pry three-star Ja’den McBurrows away from Michigan.
Should the Wolverines secure him on Wednesday night that would certainly be welcome news. Equally welcome is the news that McBurrows’ teammate, LB Jaydon Hood, is signing after all after it was expected that he would wait until national signing day proper in February.
With Hood in the fold, Michigan then will have signed three four-stars on the defensive side of the ball, with LB Junior Colson and DE Kechaun Bennett being the others.
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