It was 4:30 p.m. on a Friday. The Pickerington North football bus was filling up and getting ready to head to Groveport-Madison, but Jake Butt was nowhere to be found.
Jake’s younger twin brothers, Zac and Andrew, arrived but said their brother was home sleeping.
The then-high-school senior and the Panthers’ star tight end, now Michigan’s second-leading receiver as a junior, scrambled and showed up late, forcing coach Tom Phillips to bench him for two quarters. Butt still finished with five catches for 96 yards in a 35-7 Pickerington North win.
>> Get the most out of college football season, follow BuckeyeXtra on Twitter
It’s a story Phillips likes to tell, not because it was a common occurrence but because it’s the one time he can remember Butt messing up in high school.