The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/1404875
32 THE WOLVERINE SEPTEMBER 2021 touchdowns over the course of three seasons. Bell's 48 grabs for 758 yards led the Wolverines in 2019, and his 26 recep- tions for 401 yards — in only a six- game season — paced them last fall. Bell now seeks his best year yet in a Michigan uniform, and his coach has witnessed the sort of evolution making that a realistic expectation. " J u s t c o n t i n u a l growth," Harbaugh assessed. "Ronnie's always been a tremen- dous competitor, I'd just start with that. A gamer. He's got a way of mak- ing contested catches, making plays, getting open. "His level of attention to detail, how he treats practice, how he treats his recovery, how he treats his nu- trition, how he treats his study of the game, those are the things that have dramatically improved and are showing up in his play." Of course, that's an easier sell now than it was when Bell com- mitted to Michigan. Back then, he hadn't attended any football camps, nobody outside of Missouri knew much about him and recruiting ser- vices had him "ranked" somewhere around No. 1,500 in the national depths. "Nobody knew my 40, and I weighed like 170 pounds or some- thing," Bell recalled. "Nothing about anything was the norm. I saw on Twitter that they had me ranked like 1,347th in my class or something crazy like that. Oh man … "So a lot of people were doubtful of what I could bring to the table, what I'd be able to do. I already had a ton of motivation on my own, just from the standpoint of going from basketball to football. I wanted to prove I'm not just a basketball player. "When I signed, everybody thought I was just some basketball player. That was a huge chip placed on my shoul- der, impossible to ignore." He came in like any other freshman, although he didn't require as much convincing as most about his place on the demonstration teams. Still, Bell didn't regard himself as mere practice fodder. He saw an opportu- nity and quickly took advantage. "Off the rip, I'm put on the scout team — of course," Bell said. "I just remember running my routes. I was winning against the defense. "Specifically, on the turf, [former U-M quarterback] Dylan McCaffrey had rolled out to his right. I remember this play. I ran a post on the other side, and he launched it. I jumped up, and it was like a movie. I reached back, right hand, one hand, snagged the ball and scored a big touchdown. "That was the first play that I really made that got anybody to turn their head. That play got people to look." It helped achieve more than that. It led to a freshman season in which he played in all 13 Michigan games, with eight catches for 145 yards and a pair of touchdowns. The kid with no football offers sud- denly saw a sterling football future. Not that he didn't believe in himself, right from the start of his Michigan career. "After the first day of camp my freshman year, I remember walking off that field," Bell said. "I just knew. I'm going to be good. That first day, the way it went, the way I was running my routes, the way it felt … "I called my dad, and I was telling him, I just had so much confidence. I could really do this. I just had my feet underneath me, and I was fully ready to go. I've just taken off in a full sprint since then." The nadir? There's no question on that topic. Bell's drop of a fourth-and- goal toss at Penn State in 2019 remains burned onto his memory. The pass could have tied the game in the clos- ing moments of a 28-21 loss. Bell doesn't shy from the topic. His reaction at the time, and the way his teammates rallied around him — start- ing with McCaffrey, never leaving his Head coach Jim Harbaugh "Ronnie's always been a tremendous competitor, I'd just start with that. A gamer. He's got a way of making contested catches, making plays, getting open." Bell's 48 grabs for 758 yards led the Wolverines in 2019, and his 26 receptions for 401 yards — in only a six-game season — paced them last fall. PHOTO COURTESY U-M ATHLETICS