Wolverine Digest

Top Michigan football prospect shuts recruitment down after receiving projection to play for Wolverines

This was a crazy turn of events.

Trent Knoop

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It was a crazy three-hour ride for Michigan football and Georgia commit Brady Marchese. The four-star WR took a surprise official visit to Ann Arbor two weekends ago, and the visit went over well. Following the OV, the Wolverines started picking up traction in his recruitment. Then on Tuesday -- everything happened.

There were multiple predictions placed in favor of Michigan landing the speedster -- including from On3's Steve Wiltfong. But that changed quickly. In a three-hour time span, Marchese told On3's Hayes Fawcett that he had shut his recruitment down and he was staying committed to Georgia.

There are a few things that could have happened here for Michigan to suddenly miss out on the 6-foot-1, No. 250-ranked player in the 2026 cycle. Either the intel wasn't strong, but that's hard to believe with Wiltfong on top of everything. The Wolverines weren't recruiting Marchese as hard as he had hoped for, or someone at Georgia gave the No. 42 overall WR in the '26 class a deal that was too hard to pass up.

We may never know the answer, but that was one of the craziest three hours you will see regarding a flip candidate. Assuming Marchese is now all in with UGA, Michigan will look elsewhere to add more WRs to the class.

- Enjoy more Michigan Wolverines coverage on Michigan Wolverines On SI -

More Michigan News:

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Trent Knoop
TRENT KNOOP

Trent began writing and covering Michigan athletics back in 2020. He became a credentialed member of the media in 2021. Trent began writing with Sports Illustrated in 2023 and became the Senior Writer for Michigan Wolverines On SI for the 2024 football season. Trent’s love of sports and being able to tell stories to fans is what made him get into writing.

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