The highest of expectations are being foisted upon Michigan football running back Savion Hiter, though he's yet to play in a single college game.
The former five-star is expected to be a big part of the Wolverines' run game, likely as the No. 2 back. Thus, despite his inexperience, the No. 1 overall tailback in the 2026 recruiting class is working diligently to get up to speed. And offensive coordinator Jason Beck is pleased with his progress thus far.
"Made a lot of progress, improved. Becoming more consistent, more reliable," Beck said. "There's always an element of something that can go a little off because we ask the backs to do quite a bit more than your normal offense. Where the backs are just in here getting handoffs and pass protecting.
And then we line them up a lot of different spots. We motion them quite a bit. So that puts a lot more on a young kid to learn all that stuff. So he's done a really nice job as he's continued, just to play really hard and great effort. And yeah, I'm really happy, really excited with everything as well.”
Beck had said in spring that Hiter presented so much talent that the program is considering putting both he and junior Jordan Marshall out on the field at the same time.
It's not that Beck is necessarily rethinking that, but as Hiter, Marshall, and Bryson Kuzdzal are the only backs they feel they can trust at the moment, he might be a little less inclined to run the two-back formation as he was earlier in the year. That doesn't mean it won't happen as much as it means they will pick their spots to have two backs on the field at the same time.
“We want to get our best players out there," Beck said. "There's no doubt we have three backs that can play and help us. So the ability to get two of them out there at the same time is positive. What we have to balance that against is we're a little thin. We've got three guys. So the second something changes, now we've just got two guys doing the two back spots.
"So we obviously have to have things in place for backups and depth and that kind of stuff. But it's a strength of what we're doing to have both those guys out there at the same time. There's also the ability to just have them rolling fresh guys in there to keep them always fresh and going hard. We've got to balance that with we have three guys to go this season, and how much are we going to put two of them out there at the same time. So it's just kind of making that all work.”
Fall camp will continue for another week and a half, with game week preparation for Western Michigan beginning immediately after.
This article originally appeared on Wolverines Wire: Jason Beck impressed by Michigan RB Savion Hiter's rapid progress
