Previously: Last year’s profiles. S Damani Dent, S/Nk Zeke Berry, S/HSP Keon Sabb, CB Myles Pollard, CB/Nk Kody Jones, CB Will Johnson, LB Deuce Spurlock, LB Jimmy Rolder, DE/LB Micah Pollard, DE Derrick Moore, DT Mason Graham, DT Kenneth Grant, DT Cam Goode, T Andrew Gentry, T/G Connor Jones, G Alessandro Lorenzetti, C Olu Oluwatimi, TE Marlin Klein.

Gooding, ID – 6'6”, 242
[Barron]		247: 6'5/230           3.98*	4*, 91, NR overall #10 TE, #1 ID
		Rivals: 6'5/230           3.92*	4*, 5.8, NR overall #14 TE, #1 ID
		ESPN: 6'4/230           3.86*	3*, 79, #71 West #11 TE-H, #1 ID
		On3: 6'5/230           4.11*	4*, 92, #247 overall #14 TE, #1 ID
		Composite:           4.01*	4*, 0.9011, #302 ovr #14 TE, #1 ID
		Other Suitors	Bama, LSU, Auburn, ASU
		YMRMFSPA	Erick All
Previously On MGoBlog	Hello by me.
Notes	Twitter. Instagram. Early enrollee.
Film:
Senior Highlights: Hudl (6 minute version of above. jr highlights). The Wolverine highlights. TMI interview.

I have learned that most of you are not insane, and do not meticulously watch the entirety of these embedded highlight videos like I did when Brian did these writeups. If you feel guilty, I'll let you off the hook this time, because the above is over 23 minutes (much of it repeated footage) of the same. Colston Loveland is so vastly better than anyone else on the field, at 5 minutes you're wondering why the cornerback doing everything he was coached to do even bothers to stand there in the endzone (spoiler: at 5:33 he gives up). At 7 minutes they have him start running veers outside like he's Blake Corum, stiff-arming cornerbacks, and trundling for 60 yards. Then they show the same thing from another angle. Around 10, at some sort of camp, he throws an edge defender outside so his receiver can kick, gets to a safety, and removes that kid from the picture. At 15 there's a CB in man who glances at the QB and when he turns back to his quarry he discovers he's lost 7 yards.

If you've ever wanted to test your personal empathy for the children of Idaho cheese mongers, it's when you're begging for it to stop.

Loveland is about to face a steep rise in complexity and competition. He's going to have to put on weight, learn to block someone who won't crumple on impact, and sky over one, two, or five far more athletic defensive backs to repeat any of this.

Interestingly, Michigan's (by which we mean Jay Harbaugh's) pursuit goes back to April 2020, most of a year before the "oh, he's a TIGHT END?!?" junior tape was recorded. Coming from Idaho in the pandemic class it took awhile for the tape to reach more eyes, but reach eyes it did. Alabama's interest was of the serious kind, as was LSU's, and a host of other power programs who tried to pry Loveland out of Michigan's grasp before and after he signed his letter of intent. His was a flash recruitment, but a national one nonetheless.

He's only seen FBS-level competition in a few camps and the Michigan spring game, and too thin at this point to be more than a jumbo receiver, but Michigan's coaches have been adamant in public and private that they think he could contribute immediately. They designed one of many spring game double passes into go to him, and LB Kalel Mullings couldn't keep up any better than those Twin Falls grade schoolers.

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Harvests footballs from Earth's atmosphere

The devastation wrought to Idaho secondaries is incredible: Maxpreps has him with 235 catches, 3,139 receiving yards, and 39 TDs (35 receiving) over his high school career. He had 969 yards on 62 receptions, 14 for TDs, plus 32 yards and 4 rushing scores playing TE/WR as a senior, plus 66 tackles, 18 TFLs, 5.5 sacks, and 2 INTs as a DE/OLB.

The secret to the receiving was—as you might imagine—a whole lot of chucking underthrown passes in Loveland's general direction and letting him do the rest. The plucking leads the 24/7 evaluation from national recruiting analyst Brandon Huffman:

He's a natural pass-catcher, with soft hands, good, crisp routes, and ball skills to go and high-point it.

Huffman gave a comp to former Stanford TE Austin Hooper, a route artisan and contested ball magnet, who's a willing but lunging blocker. This PFF profile of Hooper out of college is close enough to Loveland's film that I found it worth sharing:

WHAT HE DOES BEST:

• Agility and quickness for a big man. All the physical tools to be a receiving threat in the NFL
• Made some amazing catches in traffic. Great body control and timing. Seven catches graded at +1.0 or higher
• Has some “move” tight end experience and capabilities. Can run every route asked of him from slot or out wide. 56 percent in-line, 39 percent of snaps from slot, and five percent split wide

BIGGEST CONCERN:

• While he made some ridiculous catches, he doesn’t look like a natural pass catcher when out in space. Awkward attacking the ball and it led to 10 drops in 84 opportunities over the past two seasons
• Gives solid effort as a run blocker though he can get very lunge-y. Doesn’t profile to much more than middle-of-the-road in that aspect
• Runs routes too upright. Doesn’t get low and explode at the break point. Costs him some separation.

EJ Holland thought Loveland a "matchup nightmare" over the production that's "a little nuts" and said the prospect had "added some good weight over the last year." Maize 'n Brew's Trevor Woods looked at the tape and saw a "natural pass-catcher, he’s already strong, already a good route runner." Loveland himself said his hands and routes were the things that coaches brought up first when he was talking to Utah, Arizona State, and Colorado.

The guys who replaced EJ and co at Rivals thought Loveland could be a jumbo receiver plus tight end, like the guys PSU or Notre Dame would roll out, or in their words, the Bills' Dawson Knox:

Not your typical catch the ball, go down, then go block the next play tight end. Will be used as a tight end who splits at wideout nearly as much as he lines up at tight end. …  Ball skills are exceptional with good leaping ability, especially useful in the red zone. Runs excellent routes, and timing is advanced. … I don’t know what Idaho high school football has to offer, but whatever it is the defenses couldn’t stop Colston Loveland if they had 22 guys.

They also called him Rivals' new staff called him "one of the more intriguing members of the class" but as of December 15, 2021 this Erick All take was as eye-opening as it was outdated:

His unique positional versatility as both a tight end and wideout is reminiscent of Erick All, but Loveland is far more suited as a flexed wideout than All.

I'm sure they mean All as a recruit—All in 2021 was the best blocking TE in the conference, full stop. Lorenz—who's "super, super excited" noted on our podcast when Brice Marich went out to see him, they were putting Loveland against three DBs with regularity, and is sure if he'd had the opportunity to go to an All-Star game we'd be talking about a top-150 ranking.

Athleticism might have caught up his senior year

There's some disagreement about whether Loveland is not much of an athlete, or the greatest athlete in the history of Idaho. There's a sense that Huffman's opinion was the former, but started to change when a new junior reel began circulating in December 2020 with Loveland's defensive plays. Rivals called him "the most athletic tight end Michigan's recruited under Harbaugh," which…

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

…damn.

They weren't alone. Sam Webb and Steve Lorenz discussed how the staff sees Loveland on their recent podcast (about 39:20):

Word was he completely blew the Michigan staff away. This is a guy that they believe is going to be a star. He’s already a 4-star, but if played in Florida or Texas or California he’d be a top-100 guy. He’d probably be ranked where Oscar Delp is.

Later, when discussing possibly getting all three of their top targets, Sam said Loveland is physically ready to play immediately; the only thing holding him back is the level of competition is going to jump considerably from his Idaho opponents, which…

Conversely, Touch the Banner—based on junior film when he committed—was actually not all that impressed.

He does a nice job of snagging the ball out of the air and has an ability to high point the ball … But the biggest drawback with Loveland is his lack of standout athleticism. … he just doesn’t do very much on film. He plays against weak competition in Idaho, and yet his highlights are pretty ho-hum – no long touchdowns where he outruns everyone on the other team, no big runs where he just powers through tiny defenders, etc. For having 69 catches in his junior year alone, his highlights are fairly sparse.

Overall, I have a hard time getting too amped up about Loveland. He is a decent prospect, but his 247 Composite ranking (3-star, #588 overall) seems about accurate.

Magnus gave Loveland a grade of 65 versus an 81 for Klein, but this might have changed with the senior film full of long touchdowns where he outruns everyone on the other team and powers through tiny defenders like they're his doubters' faces. However by the time Magnus wrote that 24/7 had already seen Loveland at a couple of camps and bumped him up to a 4-star for their part.

"Colston killed it against all defensive backs and linebackers," said RARE Showcase founder Juss Jackson. "He showed his quick moves to separate from defenders."

The other sites followed, save fire-and-forget ESPN, whose interest melted away when Alabama didn't win the recruitment. On3 finally moved Loveland into its top-150 at the very end without explaining more than "now his rankings match his talent." As for Rivals, Adam Gorney was getting caught up circa October 2020, which explains why "could still add significant weight to his frame" and "will probably grow into a flex tight end" were still in there, but Gorney also saw the best athlete out of Idaho in some time. The following July, EJ Holland was comparing Loveland, athletically speaking, to the five-star that got away:

I'm not so sure Delp is that much better of a prospect that Loveland. The latter just hasn't gotten any eyes on him since he's basically in the middle of nowhere.

Sherrone Moore certainly thought Loveland looked like a future pro athlete in spring:

He’s got all the physical tools — he’s big, he’s tall, he’s strong, he’s long, he can run.

Still growing?

That Loveland might have just been that much better as a senior makes a lot of sense given he was getting used to an entirely new body circa fall 2020. Rivals notes he "bulked up since his early years and is now a big-bodied, physical, strong head-to-toe with glue on his hands."

They seem to be understating how much: One global pandemic ago, Loveland was a 6'0"/170 wide receiver garnering regional interest. He shot up to 6'4"/215 as a sophomore, according to this coach, still playing outside, then 6'5"/230 as a junior, 6'6"/230 at the Boise 7v7 event. Loveland checked in at 6'6"/230 at the Boise 7v7 event, and 6'6"/242 by last December according to 24/7. Huffman also reports a 79-inch wingspan.

He is on the younger end of his class (April 2004), which helps explain the late growth spurt, and why people evaluating him later kept rating him higher. That 6'6" might not be the end of it, because a sophomore year growth spurt, while normal for American males, is late for an athlete. As I mentioned in the Klein writeup, this can often make a huge difference in recruiting, since early bloomers get tracked towards the schools and camps that lead to 5-star rankings, and the late ones require the rankers to put a lot of trust in senior film when they've already decided in their minds where guys should slot.

That said, Loveland still looked too thin for regular tight end use in the spring game. This—

"One thing he lacks is bulk. He needs to thicken up and get stronger for the next level."

—was the other half of Touch the Banner's surprisingly low opinion, though you might say it of most college tight ends at 16. It's also part of why I suspect Mangus's opinion could change when he gets to Loveland on the countdown. The Harbaugh family did not agree, according to Cameron Anderson, Loveland's high school coach:

“When he is in the middle of a workout, he is an imposing figure, a giant human being … Both Harbaughs right away were talking about his physical stature, he looks like a junior on his program right now. And his physical abilities are going to make him physically so he can compete right away. They were like kids in a candy store watching him work out.”

And yet close to the field?

Uh, yeah, and they've been pretty steady about this despite a depth chart that surprisingly returned all three of All, Schoonmaker, and Honigford, has Hibner and Hansen reportedly ready to go, and walk-on contributors like (coach-beloved) Carter Selzer and spring darling Max Bredeson on hand. The fact that Loveland was the recipient of the Erick All double-pass suggests the coaches wanted to highlight Loveland for the fans, an honor they bestow on dudes they think are going to be stars. Moore spoke like Loveland was doing what he has to to be part of that monster rotation in the aftermath:

…he’s done an outstanding job. He’s playing on of the hardest positions to play, especially in this offense with all the stuff we do. So he’s done a really good job.

MnB's Woods also believes Loveland will see the field this year, and pass some of the guys on the depth chart above. I believe a lot of that talk during the cycle was with the expectation that they would lose All, if not Schoonmaker as well, to the draft. But the inside-outside talk does jive with what the Michigan coaches' short-term plans seem to be, via Loveland:

They really like me as a hybrid tight end. They’re going to get me to bulk up a little bit. I feel like I’m going to get my feet wet with special teams. I’m going to get an opportunity. I just have to take it.

Long term, I imagine they want to make him the move tight end, with Klein the inline guy.

Workout warrior

It's a thing. In interviews Loveland’s high school coach Cameron Andersen regularly emphasized Loveland's love of the gym, to the point that Jim came and joined him:

“He said he wanted to work out, so we got that in first thing,” Loveland said. “We did some squats, pushups and curls. He surprised me. It was wild for sure. I was like ‘damn, okay.’ It was cool. It was a special moment. Not a lot of people can say they’ve done that (laughs).”

Can he mash?

As you might imagine with a true freshman they're talking about as a quasi-receiver who spent 75% of high school lined up at receiver, the blocking is going to be another of those development things. Loveland said as much:

"My hands are definitely up there, but I definitely need to show that I can block, and then I'm always trying to get strong and faster."

Holland's word for the blocking was "adequate." Woods called it a "willingness to block and get dirty." The film shows Little Timmies sprawled across the yard, which tells you little.

Etc. Basketball player and Track: 12.3 in the 100m, 5'4" in the high jump, 46' shot put, 143'6" discus. Sorry Auburn.

Why Erick All? Late-rising TE that some schools (Ohio State, in All's case) snorted at when he was still getting used to his growth spurt and Michigan leaped on before he rose to a 4-star. Came in with a reputation of dominating camps with his receiving, to the point where we wondered if he might play receiver in truth, but actually had some hands issues while developing into the most effective blocker at the position we've seen in a minute.

Remember, this is an "if he works out" thing, but I do see a lot of young All in Loveland already. The blocking all came at Michigan under Sherrone Moore, Jay Harbaugh, and Grant Newsome, all of whom are still around. Jake Butt is another comp if Loveland ends up refining his receiving skills more than his blocking.

Guru Reliability: Low. They were playing catchup, making guesses based on footage versus Idaho competition and two camps.

Variance: Medium-high. Seems to already be close enough that they were including him in playing time plans before they got their dudes back, but you can't guarantee he becomes a blocker. Floor is a pretty effective flex TE like PSU or Notre Dame always seem to have. Ceiling is Erick All except a better receiver.

Ceiling: Erick All but Butt.

General Excitement Level: Butt. (Mathlete: that's an 8.5)

Projection: Given the depth at tight end—I'm a believer in Hansen and Hibner, not to mention the starters—I'm inclined to think Loveland gets on the field his four games but they preserve a redshirt. They may in fact use those four games strategically, however, if they truly believe Loveland's ball skills are a notch above the other guys. His abilities to catch in traffic and high-point the ball are excellent, but no more than Hansen's were against Massachusetts competition. The Butt-like option routes take time to develop, but a guy who can downshift and cut like Loveland has a lot of potential if he can work with a QB who likes him enough to get those down. I expect Loveland to be in the rotation as of 2023, when Schoonmaker and All are probably gone, and will compete with the two H's for the next top dog of the next generation. Given how keen the coaches seem to be to get him on the field, he's not a bad bet.