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Y E A R B O O K

8 — Wednesday, September 13, 2017
Sports
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com

BY THE NUMBERS

2

Career games Tarik Black has 

played for Michigan

1

Touchdowns scored

6

Passes caught

94

Yards gained

SAM MOUSIGIAN/Daily

Freshman receiver Tarik Black has earned a starting spot early in his career.

AMELIA CACCHIONE/Daily

Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh will give Amazon a closer look at his program. 

Black off to impressive 
start to his career at ‘M’

Tarik Black’s first two games 

for Michigan have been nothing 
short of exceptional. 

A freshman receiver from 

Connecticut — not Texas, Florida 
or any other football hotbed 
— is starting for the seventh-
ranked team in the country. He’s 
starting over his classmate, the 
former No. 1 wide receiver in 
the nation, and producing well 
beyond his years.

In two career games, Black 

has caught six passes for 94 
receiving yards, and he even 
scored a touchdown on his first 
career reception.

“Coming 
in, 
(making 

an 
impact) 
was 
definitely 

something I wanted to do,” Black 
said to media Tuesday. “I knew I 
had to work my tail off and learn 
that playbook, but I knew things 
would happen for me.”

Enrolling early last winter, he 

had time to learn the playbook. 
Black’s 
impact 

on 
the 
field 

is 
already 

apparent, 
but 

he admits that 
he 
struggled 

adjusting to the 
college game.

At 
first, 

Black 
found 

that 
getting 

accustomed 
to 

a new playbook 
and new routes was not so easy.

“I struggled a little bit with 

the playbook,” Black said. “That 
was the hardest part. Once I got 
that down I was able to do what I 
came here to do.”

The 
nuances 
of 
actually 

getting open hadn’t been part 
of Black’s game in high school. 
Both in speed and in his overall 
skillset, he was a step ahead of 
all of his opponents, so beating 
out a safety or cornerback for 
a catch was never a problem. 
Though, with defensive backs 
around college football — as 
he’ll soon learn in the Big Ten 
season — it’s not as easy to break 
free.

In high school, Black did not 

have to worry about whether 
to sit in a zone or take the open 

space, and reading defenses had 
never been a concern. He was a 
four-star recruit and the No. 1 
overall player in Connecticut — 
getting open back then was not 
an issue.

At Michigan, though, there 

has been a lot more to learn.

“We just run a lot of routes 

here,” Black said. “The more you 
do it, you’re going to continue to 
get better at it. The amount of 
routes you run is the reason why 
you get better at route running.”

Having gone through spring 

practice, fall camp and now two 
games, Black is fairly confident 
that he has already proven 
himself. However, he says that 
he still has a lot to work on, 
especially in being more physical 
in order to beat out cornerbacks 
off the line of scrimmage.

“At this level, you actually 

have to work to release,” Black 
said. “You’re not just going 
to run off the ball and run by 
everybody like I used to do in 
high school. That’s something I 

had to add to my 
game in order to 
get open.”

Physical play 

will come with 
time 
as 
Black 

continues 
to 

grow 
stronger. 

But his mental 
game is where he 
feels he has been 
able to make the 
most strides.

Black watches game film with 

redshirt 
junior 
quarterback 

Wilton Speight. He has already 
built a strong relationship with 
his new quarterback, and going 
over film together has helped 
him solidify that bond.

“(Speight) definitely teaches 

me a lot,” Black said. “I’ve 
learned a lot from him about 
college football. It’s definitely 
different than what I’m used to.”

When Black was “used to” 

high school football, he was 
lighting 
up 
backfields 
and 

earning his chance to play in the 
U.S. Army All-American game.

With 
almost 
a 
hundred 

receiving yards and a touchdown 
already, if he’s not “used to” the 
college game yet, Michigan fans 
have plenty to look forward to.

Michigan, Amazon team 
up to create docu-series

Starting in January, Wolverine 

fans will get an inside look at the 
2017 season, as the Michigan 
football 
program 
announced 

a partnership with Amazon 
Prime on Tuesday — geared 
toward creating an eight-episode 
documentary series about how 
Team 138 operates during the 
season. 

The 
documentary 
will 
be 

released 
on 
Amazon 
Prime 

following the end of the season, and 
is part of a partnership between 
Michigan, Amazon, The Montag 
Group and Big Ten Network.

The show will document the 

lives of the Michigan players, 
coaches and staff during the 
season — both at home and on the 
road — and also follow the student-
athletes into the classroom.

“We are proud to partner 

with Amazon Prime Video in 
documenting our University of 
Michigan student-athletes’ daily 
experiences 
and 
the 
lifelong 

lessons learned both on the 
football field and in the classroom,” 
said Michigan football coach Jim 
Harbaugh in the press release. “We 
welcome judgement! We embrace 
this opportunity to showcase 
our 2017 University of Michigan 
football team to a vast audience 
around the world.”

The series will likely bear 

resemblance to documentaries 
like Last Chance U and Hard 
Knocks that give a behind-
the-scenes peek at college and 
professional 
football 
teams. 

Last Chance U, a docu-series on 
Netflix, follows the lives of various 
college athletes that have had off-
the-field issues. Those athletes 
wound up at East Mississippi 
Community College, where they 
were given another shot at playing 
football.

The Netflix show is popular 

among the Michigan football 
team.

Sophomore 
safety 
Josh 

Metellus watches Last Chance U 
with some of his teammates, and 
at one point he thought to himself 
that making a documentary would 
be a good thing for someone to 
do about their own football team 
here in Michigan.

His wish came true, and now 

he’s got a show of his own. The 
cameras have been following him 

and the other Wolverines around 
campus — to practice, team 
meetings, classes and anywhere 
else. Constantly having a camera 
crew on his tail could seem 
distracting, but Metellus noted 
that it’s nothing he isn’t used to.

“We got people following us 

around every day whether or not 
there’s cameras,” Metellus said.

The camera crew also only 

comes three days a week, and 
Metellus described it as “nothing 
too serious.”

With a year under his belt, 

Metellus has gotten used to the 
media attention. The freshmen 
on the team, though, are the ones 
relishing the newfound fame.

“You can just tell by all the 

videos we have that (freshmen) 
post from the Michigan twitter 
page,” Metellus said. “They love 
the camera — mostly the offensive 
players. They just love being the 
flashy type of guys. You know, 
on defense, we don’t really get all 
that recognition, because we play 
defense. The offense likes to take 
it.”

So far, the cameras have been 

following around “the guys who 
get the ball,” according to fifth-
year senior Henry Poggi.

That includes most of the 

players you would usually hear 
about — guys like redshirt junior 
quarterback Wilton Speight and 
freshman wide receiver Tarik 
Black.

For Poggi, not so much.
“I’d be surprised if they 

featured me,” Poggi joked.

Poggi, a self-proclaimed fan 

of MTV’s Real World, admitted 
that 
the 
Michigan 
football 

documentary 
would 
not 
be 

including any major confessions 
like the hit reality show used to.

“Much to the viewers’ dismay,” 

he laughed.

Nonetheless, he and others felt 

that the series could be helpful 
to the program by giving fans an 
inside look at the inner-workings 
of the Michigan football team.

It will certainly pay dividends 

on the recruiting front, but 
sophomore offensive lineman Ben 
Bredeson had his own personal 
reasons for liking the show.

“It’s going to help answer a lot 

of questions from Mom and Dad 
who always want to know what’s 
going on every day,” Bredeson said 
with a grin. “I’ll just tell them to 
watch, and we’ll be good.”

TED JANES

Daily Sports Writer
TED JANES

Daily Sports Writer

“At this level, 
you actually 

have to work to 

release.”

