Coming off of a banner sophomore year, Donovan Edwards was one of the hot names entering the 2023 college football season. In the offseason, he was comparing himself to greats such as Walter Payton. But they play games for a reason, and Edwards didn’t live up to his own standards.
Until the national championship game.
His success in the biggest game of his career taught him some important lessons about letting go and letting the play come to him rather than trying to force a square peg into a round hole. On his first run against Washington, what looked like a dead play turned into the first of two 40-plus-yard touchdowns, and on the first, Edwards realized part of his fault a year ago — he was too focused on what the play should look like rather than taking the plays that were there.
“So that play right there, I kind of predetermined where it was gonna go,” Edwards said. “I looked at what’s the blocking scheme is, what the D-line is going to do and I thought that was gonna be a front-side A-gap. That’s where like now I have to be a little bit more patient and not just predetermine everything.”
Having seen what happens when he lets go from predetermination and seeing the field, Edwards is learning what he can do, as evidenced by what he did with those two vital touchdowns.
Though he doesn’t like looking back and is more interested in looking forward, he realizes that he put far too much pressure on himself last year to live up to the hype. Now that he’s made good on his name, ‘Big Game Don,’ he’s looking toward the future, knowing that his past struggles have helped him realize what he needs to do to be successful from here on in.
“Just predetermined it, which isn’t a bad thing,” Edwards said. “But I think like just being more patient because I was over-stressing myself last year. I knew that I was gonna go on third-down pass protection as I do. I knew, like, a lot of things that — just trying to kill myself a little bit, deal with my confidence. But everything shaped up the way it’s supposed to be.”
Edwards will be a part of the Michigan football contingent at Big Ten media days next week in Indianapolis. Fall camp will commence in the ensuing weeks as he takes the mantle as the Wolverines’ lead tailback.