*****

The second to last weekend in June is becoming the premiere weekend for official visits in college football. It is the last one before a long summer dead period and for many recruits, it is the last time they will fully put all of their concentration into recruiting before two-a-days and practices start in August. Many commit in late June.

Michigan stacked that visit weekend. 13 recruits took official visits the weekend of June 21st.

Over half the group committed to Michigan by the following week.

The secondary would gain a major piece in Jordan Morant, a four-star safety from Oradell (N.J.) Bergen Catholic. Not many sophomores can make the impact on varsity Morant did at Bergen, and towards the end of that fall season, colleges took notice. Boston College was the first to offer followed by Pitt, Virginia Tech, North Carolina and Rutgers. During the winter evaluation period, Michigan came out and offered.

Initially, Morant wanted to wait until the All-American Bowl in San Antonio to announce his decision, but after taking his official visit to Ann Arbor, Morant amended his plan and announced for Michigan. He was joined by William Mohan, another East Coast defensive back who Michigan saw as a VIPER prospect.

The offensive line class was improved as well. Reece Atteberry from Colorado was a prospect Michigan had recruited for over a year. He had 22 scholarship offers but echoed what many recruits who chose Michigan over the last few cycles have said about it being a forty-year decision and not a four-year decision. With him and Zinter, Michigan now had two bigger recruits who could play up and down the line of scrimmage. Ranked as a center, Warinner told Atteberry he was being recruited as “an offensive lineman” not a specific position.

So what about a true tackle?

Early in his career, Jeffrey Persi would not have said that was him. He was a tight end and wanted to be recruited as a tight end. When his head coach at J Serra Catholic in California told him he could be a big-time college tackle prospect, he listened, because that head coach was Pat Harlow, a former first-round draft pick as an offensive tackle.

Under Harlow’s tutelage and with his big frame being filled in with weight room work, Persi became a Power 5 recruit. Like Hibner, colleges liked the growth potential and so did 247Sports. Persi steadily rose in the rankings.

The academics, the change to be developed by Warinner, the total package at Michigan, led a kid Harlow describes as a “home body” to commit to a school many miles from home.

That same weekend, Michigan flipped defensive end Aaron Lewis from West Virginia. Then they received a commitment from Eamonn Dennis from Don Brown’s home-state of Massachusetts, a place Michigan had been recruiting with success under Harbaugh.

He was the first ‘speed in space’ commit of this class. That was the mantra the Wolverines had been touting since the hiring of Gattis as offensive coordinator. They were recruiting a new type of skill athlete.

Dennis had run 4.52 on the laser and faster than that when timed at his school. He was a four-year varsity player described by his coaches as a “prolific scorer” and an “electric athlete.”

The Wolverines now had one commit to show their new philosophy, they just needed to add a few more guys who could run.

*****

From the moment he started playing football, A.J. Henning was fast. His father Antiwan Henning played in high school at Chicago Bogan, but not beyond that. He was determined he would have a son who would play football. He also had dreams of going to the University of Michigan, but he could not afford to go. If that son could have the opportunity one day, maybe he would be a Wolverine.

Instead, Antiwan joined the Army. That meant he had to move around some, but he found time to get A.J. his first football at age 2 and spend time in the yard with him throwing him a ball that was almost the same size as the boy himself. Once a few years went by, it went from Anitwan telling A.J. to go throw the ball in the yard to A.J. asking his dad to take him outside.

A.J.’s parents separated around that time, right as A.J. was starting flag football. His mother Sharika Jefferson attended his first games and has not missed a game since.

“I think once you become a single mother, you adjust to life,” she said. “That’s just the way it is. Family and friends help the best you can and A.J. wasn’t in a lot of different sports, just football. At that time, I could adjust my schedule as need be so I wouldn’t say it was super busy but he loved football so football was our life.”

Both Sharika and Antiwan noticed early on their son was fast and talented.

“He’s been the best player on every single team,” Antiwan said. “He is ten times better than I was. We worked on his speed when he was young but he was naturally fast. I didn’t want him to get a big head because he got all these awards and accolades and I would always say ‘next year, the competition will be better so you need to work harder’ and he would work harder, but the competition didn’t catch up.”

That continued right into high school where Henning made an early varsity impression and was putting up good times on the track. He wanted to start his recruitment, so he talked to his mom about taking him to some camps. He specifically wanted to go to Illinois’ summer camp, where his older sister was a student.

“I said ‘boy, you’re a freshman in high school, you don’t get offers as a freshman,’” Sharika recalls. “I didn’t know anything about the recruiting process, I thought it would start the beginning of senior year so I thought he didn’t know what he was talking about but he was beginning us to go so we finally took him.”

Mom was almost right. Henning had a good day at Illinois, but he left without an offer. Two days later though, while Henning was practice, the Illini called and were the first school to offer a scholarship – and it was Lovie Smith calling. Antiwan, a Bears fan, could hardly believe it.

The Illini made an early impression, and when Michigan offered, that struck a chord with Anitwan because of his prior affinity, but it was actually Notre Dame who raced out to an early lead.

“The very first visit I went on and when we seriously considered a school, was Notre Dame,” Sharika said. “He was a sophomore but he went to their junior day, and I didn’t go on that visit, my husband went but I went the second time and I was like ‘wow.’ Notre Dame was high on his list for a long, long time. They were number one.”

They visited Michigan as well. Mom came away saying she loved it there. She liked the camaraderie amongst the players and coaches. She felt great about the academics. She felt she could leave him there and he would be taken care of. A.J. wasn’t as convinced though.

“He was like ‘Mom, I don’t fit their offense,’” she said. “That took a whole lot of guts for him to say I like a school, I really might even love it but I don’t fit into their offense. So Michigan wasn’t really high on the list. I actually thought he would go to Notre Dame, but we went back after Coach Gattis was brought onto the staff and we fell in love and he felt like he fit the offense now after Gattis got there and talked about how they would use his skill set.”

After a two-hour meeting with Gattis and Harbaugh, everybody felt good about it, but they still left in that SUV only to turn around.

Antiwan lives his Kansas now so he makes games when he can, but Sharika still texts him in-game updates during the games he can’t make. He will be present in The Big House for as many as he can make though.

“It’s like a dream come true,” he said. “We started out us throwing the football in the backyard to now he’s going to play in, I believe, the second largest stadium in the world. It’s going to be amazing.”

Sharika has kept her streak of making it to every game alive.

As a senior, A.J. was lucky enough to be selected to the All-American Bowl in San Antonio and the Polynesian Bowl in Hawaii. Sharika was in the stands cheering at both games.

This year, when A.J. visited Michigan for a game, she was unable to attend, so next fall will be her first experience in Michigan Stadium.

Before that though, to keep the streak going, she will have to make an away game.

“When I saw the first game was at Washington, we were talking about having a viewing party, but now I’m like I can’t miss a game,” she said. “I’m starting to work on that now. We already have a hotel booked for Ohio State and I’m looking into some other ones. We will work on that. I can’t imagine missing a game.”