The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
Issue link: https://comanpub.uberflip.com/i/418536
WHERE ARE THEY NOW? ditch fake punt brought back on a holding call. Soon enough, time came to prepare for 1990, for some in dif- ferent ways than others. Just before he was to report for the 1990 winter workouts, Williams went in to see defensive coordinator Lloyd Carr. "He recruited me out of high school in Milwaukee," Williams recalled. "I sat down with him and told him I'd gotten accepted to law school, and that this was what I wanted to do. He just said, 'Hey, I understand. I appreciate all you've done.'" Williams will never forget the words that followed. Carr said: "Call me when you argue your first case, because I want to be there." Williams felt the rush of memories come swirling past. He'd come out of Wisconsin feeling like Michigan rep- resented the greatest combination of high-level academics and athletics he could find anywhere in the country. He'd witnessed the Wolverines take down Nebraska's mighty Corn- huskers in the 1986 Fiesta Bowl. And he'd fallen in love with the feel of Michigan's surroundings. "When I walked on that campus, and I saw Angell Hall light up the night, saw the law quad, it looked like college to me," Williams re- flected. "When I was young, I used to watch Mickey Rooney films in black and white on the television in my bedroom. "Every once in a while, they'd have one where the movie was based on a college campus. It just reminded me of what the campus looked like in those movies. It was what college should look like." Once he hit the practice field, Wil- liams witnessed what big-time col- lege football players should look like. "When I showed up and I saw guys like Jarrod Bunch and Leroy Hoard … just seeing them get dressed, I was like, holy man, I'm not ready for this game," Williams admitted. "I needed to hedge my bets a little bit. They looked like men. "At 18, I looked like an 18-year- old boy. They looked like 20-year-old men. When I got on the field and saw what true, elite-level athletes were there, it made me think." It also made him stay strong with his academics, a wise move. He red- shirted as a freshman, then got into action early the next year and strug- gled on the field. His role diminished, but as he gained weight and strength, he saw the field increasingly in the last years he played. Williams made his great- est mark on special teams, includ- ing notching a half-dozen tackles on kickoffs in a memorable blowout against Wisconsin. "I may have had six tackles, and missed the seventh," Williams re- called. "I didn't get Special Teams Player of the Week. Bo wouldn't give it to me, because I missed a tackle. That's life." He laughed at the memory, one of myriad recollections from those last two seasons in a Michigan uniform. They were at once memorable and painful. The Wolverines went 9-2-1 in 1988, losing 19-17 at Notre Dame,