The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/178977
is. Let me enhance that by continuing to work on that.' "A lot of this is an honest assessment of your own skills, and an honest assessment by us on how we can use those skills. That's what he's done for three years, and that's what Gallon has done for three years." The question becomes, who steps up next? It was supposed to be Amara Darboh, the 6-2 sophomore who generated plenty of offseason buzz. But Darboh suffered a fractured foot in fall camp, taking Michigan's best big receiver option off the board. Those taking up the slack have each enjoyed their moments. Jeremy Jackson, a 6-3 senior, snagged a pair of catches against the Irish. Fifth-year senior Joe Reynolds (6-1) has fought off injures after making a 45-yard catch in Michigan's season opener. Meanwhile, 6-3 redshirt freshman Jehu Chesson turned some heads, literally, in helping save the Akron near-debacle. A week earlier, he threw a bowling-ball block that toppled three Irish on Gallon's long touchdown, and Chesson zinged the Zips by bursting free on a 33-yard TD jaunt of his own. Hecklinski doesn't deny that Darboh would have helped — a lot. But with the Big Ten dead ahead, it's no time to be looking back. "Amara was playing extremely well," Hecklinski acknowledged. "Injuries happen, and they're an unfortunate part of this game. You don't want it to happen to anybody. We have to adjust now. "I think Jeremy Jackson has done a good job of filling in. Jehu is an individual that we'll find out more about now. Both of them have done a great job of doing what's asked of them. They play hard and they play physical, and now the ball is going to be targeted to them a little bit more. "Jehu's got really good ball skills. He has to show it in a game. It's something very similar to what we were talking about with Jeremy. We have seen it a lot, behind closed doors. Now he has to do it in a game setting. We keep seeing it in practice, but now we've got to bring it into the game." Chesson started bringing it against Akron, but there's a long road ahead. Hecklinski, meanwhile, sounds a little miffed over the fact that all he heard in the preseason involved Michigan having no playmaker receivers. They've got one who has risen to the challenge already, and simply need to develop more along the way, he insisted. "You feel secure and confident that we've got a bunch of hard-nosed, tough kids, that are going to play Michigan football," Hecklinski said. "We've just got to continue to develop playmakers on the outside, whether that be Joe Reynolds, Jeremy Jackson, Jehu Chesson, whether it be somebody we haven't seen yet, or the continued strong play of Jeremy Gallon and Drew Dileo. "Coach [Brady] Hoke tells us all the time, in 1997, there were two wide receivers they played with. If you're tough, if you're hard-nosed, and if you play Michigan football, we're going to be just fine. We've got a group that's willing to do that." ❑