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Wilton Speight

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Wilton Speight
Michigan Wolverines – No. 3
PositionQuarterback
ClassRedshirt Freshman
Personal information
Born: (1994-12-06) December 6, 1994 (age 29)
Height6 ft 6 in (1.98 m)
Weight217 lb (98 kg)
Career history
College
High schoolCollegiate
Career highlights and awards

Wilton Speight (born December 6, 1994) is an American football quarterback for the Michigan Wolverines team where he is a redshirt freshman for the 2015 team. He was a captain in the 2014 Under Armour All-America Game. He serves as the backup quarterback for Michigan. In his only significant playing time to date, he led a fourth quarter comeback in the 2015 battle for the Little Brown Jug. He is the grandson of Bobby Speight.

High school

Speight was a highly recruited Virginia high school athlete who was being recruited by the likes of Virginia Tech until a severe collarbone injury during the first game of his fall 2011 junior season that required a metal plate and eight screws to repair caused most schools to lose interest in him.[1] Speight had previously had a medial collateral ligament injury.[2] When Michigan offered him a class of 2014 scholarship on class of 2013 national signing day on February 6, 2013, he immediately accepted.[1] He was unranked by most services at the time.[3] A few months later after player rankings were reassessed following his second chance at his junior season in 2012, he was the number 7 ranked quarterback in the national class of 2014 according to ESPN.[4] Other ratings services also returned him to their class of 2014 rankings: 16 by Rivals.com and 21 by Scout.com following his reclassification.[3] Following his 2013 senior season, Speight (who had offers from Miami and NC State) signed with Michigan on December 13, 2013.[5] Speight was one of seven Wolverine commits that appeared in the 2014 Under Armour All-America Game, compiling passing totals of 2–6 for 63 yards.[6][7] He started at quarterback and served as team captain.[8]

US college sports recruiting information for high school athletes
Name Hometown High school / college Height Weight 40‡ Commit date
Wilton Speight
QB 		Richmond, Virginia Collegiate (VA) 6 ft 6 in (1.98 m) 235 lb (107 kg) 4.73 Feb 6, 2013 
Recruiting star ratings: Rivals:3/5 stars   247Sports: N/A    ESPN:4/5 stars   ESPN grade: 82
Overall recruiting rankings:   Rivals: 27 (VA)  ESPN: 257 (national), 13 (QB, pocket passer), 8 (VA)
  • Note: In many cases, Scout, Rivals, 247Sports, and ESPN may conflict in their listings of height and weight.
  • In these cases, the average was taken. ESPN grades are on a 100-point scale.

Sources:

  • "Michigan Football Commitments". Rivals.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  • "2014 Michigan Football Commits". Scout.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  • "ESPN". ESPN.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  • "Scout.com Team Recruiting Rankings". Scout.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  • "2014 Team Ranking". Rivals.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.

College

2015 season

Speight enrolled early so that he could participate in 2014 Spring practice under coach Brady Hoke.[9][6] Speight redshirted his entire freshman season for the 2014 Wolverines as fifth-year senior Devin Gardner led the team.[10] As Speight entered his redshirt freshman season for the 2015 team, incoming transfer graduate student Jake Rudock and returning junior quarterback Shane Morris were in a high profile battle for the starting job.[citation needed] Ruddock started on opening day against Utah.[11][12] Speight took the mopup snaps rather than Morris in the second game against Oregon State, which head coach Jim Harbaugh initially said was because Speight had used his redshirt and Morris had not.[10] When Rudock was sidelined in the third quarter with the team trailing in the October 31, 2015, Little Brown Jug rivalry game against Minnesota, Speight (who finished the day 3–6 for 29 passing yards) engineered the game-winning drive via his first touchdown pass with less than five minutes remaining in the fourth quarter.[13] Speight subsequently executed a two-point conversion to give Michigan a 3-point lead that forced Minnesota into a decision to attempt to score a touchdown on the goal line as time expired.[14] Speight had not completed any passes prior to that game.[15] Harbaugh explained that Speight had earned the backup role in practice in the preceding weeks.[16]

2016 season

2016 Spring practice began on February 29 with a highly anticipated quarterback battle between Speight, junior transfer and favorite John O'Korn, Morris, true freshman Brandon Peters and redshirt freshman Alex Malzone.[17][18] As Spring practice wound down in late March, Speight, O'Korn and Morris seemed to be the leading three,[19] in that order.[20] O'Korn and Speight were the starters in the April 1 Spring game, while Morris lined up at wide receiver early and threw an interception for a touchdown as a quarterback.[21] Speight passed for a score and ran for another leading his team to a 14–13 win.[22][23]

Personal

Speight's grandfather, Bob Speight, had his basketball jersey retired by NC State.[2]

References

  1. ^ a b Meinke, Kyle (2013-02-19). "Michigan QB commit Wilton Speight overcomes major injury to earn scholarship". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  2. ^ a b Biggers, Adam (2013-05-07). "Michigan Football Recruiting: Getting to Know Wolverines 2014 QB Wilton Speight". Bleacher Report. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  3. ^ a b Meinke, Kyle (2013-04-18). "Michigan QB recruit Wilton Speight soars in ESPN rankings". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  4. ^ Luginbill, Tom (2013-04-17). "QB class down a little this year" (subscription required). ESPN. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  5. ^ "Wilton Speight". ESPN. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  6. ^ a b Logan, Tom (2014-01-10). "Michigan Football: Examining Wilton Speight's Play at the UA All-American Game". Bleacher Report. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  7. ^ Long, Corey (2014-01-02). "Under Armour All-America Game: Michigan commits Jabrill Peppers, Wilton Speight see solid playing time". Detroit Free Press. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  8. ^ "Wilton Speight". MGoBlue.com. CBS Interactive. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  9. ^ Meinke, Kyle (2014-03-21). "Freshman QB Wilton Speight, WR Freddy Canteen turn heads during first half of Michigan's spring camp". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  10. ^ a b Baumgardner, Nick (2015-09-13). "Jim Harbaugh explains why Wilton Speight took snaps over Shane Morris on Saturday". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-09-21.
  11. ^ "Jim Harbaugh era at Michigan opens with 24–17 loss at Utah". ESPN. 2015-09-04. Retrieved 2015-09-04.
  12. ^ Murphy, Dan (2015-09-04). "Utah tops Michigan as familiar problems plague Jim Harbaugh debut". ESPN. Retrieved 2015-09-04.
  13. ^ "No. 15 Michigan stuffs Minnesota at 1-yard line as time expires". ESPN. 2015-10-31. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  14. ^ Newkirk, Josh (2015-10-31). "Michigan backup QB Wilton Speight throws winning touchdown coming off the bench". The Michigan Insider. Scout.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  15. ^ Baumgardner, Nick (2015-11-01). "Michigan's Wilton Speight settles in, steps up and earns plenty of firsts at Minnesota". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  16. ^ Baumgardner, Nick (2015-11-01). "Wilton Speight now Michigan's No. 2 quarterback, Shane Morris is third string". MLive.com. Retrieved 2015-11-02.
  17. ^ Kercheval, Ben (2016-02-24). "Who Has the Edge in Michigan's Quarterback Battle?". Bleacher Report. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  18. ^ Baumgardner, Nick (2016-02-22). "John O'Korn, Shane Morris, someone else? Michigan's QB 'cage match' set to begin". MLive.com. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  19. ^ Baumgardner, Nick (2016-03-26). "Wilton Speight, John O'Korn, Shane Morris are Michigan's top QBs, but no one has pulled away". MLive.com. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  20. ^ Baumgardner, Nick (2016-03-29). "Michigan's top three QBs all want to start, but say the competition is far from over". MLive.com. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  21. ^ "Spring Fling". MLive.com. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  22. ^ Wells, Adam (2016-04-01). "Michigan Spring Game 2016: Recap, Highlights and Twitter Reaction". Bleacher Report. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
  23. ^ Snyder, Mark (2016-04-02). "Wilton Speight best of QBs, leads 2 TD drives in Michigan spring game". Detroit Free Press. Retrieved 2016-04-14.
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