2015 RECRUITING ISSUE
to get there. It's going to be a differ-
ent Michigan; it's not going to be the
same."
Cole did entertain a few schools.
He visited Nebraska, Purdue and
Wisconsin late in the process, and
that had some Wolverine fans wor-
ried. In Cole's mind, he always knew
that he was going to be enrolling
at Michigan in January as an early
graduate — but he smartly kept
other options available just in case.
Once Jim Harbaugh was hired, he no
longer needed those other options.
"Some guys in the class decommit-
ted, but they left too early I think,"
Cole explained. "They didn't even
know who the coach was yet. I
wanted to see who the new coach
was going to be and when Harbaugh
came in, I knew I made the right de-
cision.
"Decommitting never really crossed
my mind. I just had to keep these
other places in my mind just in case.
Really those other places were just
my backup plans. In all areas of life
it's good to have a backup plan, but
I always wanted to be at Michigan."
— Brandon Brown
Cole was recruited hard by Nebraska, Ohio State, Purdue and Wisconsin, but ultimately
stuck with the in-state Wolverines.
PHOTO BY TIM SULLIVAN
