How Bowling Green's Harold Fannin battled grief and became one of the nation's breakout players

BOWLING GREEN TIGHT end Harold Fannin Jr. appears suspended in midair, his body lunging toward the goal line. His arms are outstretched, one holding the football, his legs tucked underneath him.

It looks like he is flying.

The image capturing his 9-yard touchdown reception in the Falcons’ 41-26 win over Toledo on Oct. 26 perfectly encapsulates the entire Fannin journey: from under-recruited prospect to the top tight end in the nation, lifted through tragedy, the memories of his sister and grandfather buoying him.

By his own admission, Fannin says, “I could have been scraping by; now I feel like I’m flying by.”

Where to next? ESPN NFL draft expert Mel Kiper Jr. has Fannin listed as the No. 1 fullback/H-back prospect in 2025, but Fannin is quick to point out he is focused on the next game. Bowling Green faces Western Michigan Tuesday night (7 ET, ESPN2) with MAC championship game implications on the line.

There is little doubt Fannin will have a decision to make when the season comes to an end. His projected draft position has skyrocketed thanks to a remarkable junior season. Fannin has 73 catches for 1,033 yards and six touchdowns, ranking No. 1 among tight ends in 17 different categories, including receptions, yards, touchdowns, yards after the catch (585), broken tackles (24) and first downs (49).

Last week, he broke the single-season school record for receptions and is the 16th tight end in FBS history with 1,000 receiving yards in a season. Since he became a starter last year, Fannin has been targeted 146 times. He has one drop.

“I really never could imagine it or never even really thought about something like this,” Fannin said. “It doesn’t seem real at all.”

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BEFORE EVERY GAME he plays, Fannin takes out a black marker and writes something on the tape he puts on each wrist. On the right side: 7/26, the date his maternal grandfather, Benjamin Smith, passed away. On the other, a message in honor of his late sister, Haria Wise. Sometimes he writes “10/23 Haria,” referencing the date she died. Other times he writes “Haria” with a heart, or “In Loving Memory Haria.”

Fannin, who also has an older brother and two other sisters, was especially close with Smith and Wise growing up in Canton, Ohio. Haria was one year older than him, and the two rarely spent time apart. Their mother, Lakeesha Wise, raised a tight-knit family — in her home, dance-offs would break out at a moment’s notice. But Harold and Haria were so close in age that she describes them as twins. They’d always be discreetly whispering to each other or cracking each other up with inside jokes.

Smith lived just down the road and served as a role model to Fannin. While Lakeesha worked, Smith would drive Fannin to his football practices every day, and the two would watch NFL football on Sundays.

“He is basically the reason why I played football,” Fannin said.

When Fannin was in eighth grade, Smith died of organ failure. The family was devastated. “It changed me a lot,” Fannin said. “I just couldn’t really wrap my mind around how death worked.”

Fannin kept pursuing his football dream, but it got much harder when he got to high school and COVID-19 shut down schools. He says he stopped doing his schoolwork, and his grades suffered. By the time schools reopened the following school year, Fannin faced a new reality: He was not qualified academically.

Facing the prospect of not playing in college, Fannin got to work to bring his grades up. Still, most schools stopped recruiting him.

“It was a little depressing, and then, boom, like a white horse — like a falcon — Bowling Green swooped down,” Lakeesha said.

Bowling Green coach Scot Loeffler received a call from former UCLA defensive coordinator Joe Tresey, who was between jobs and helping him at the time.

“He goes, ‘Scot, this Harold Fannin kid, No. 1, is a Big Ten kid,'” Loeffler recalled. “‘No. 2, he is going to qualify, but he needs to go somewhere where he can be developed.'”

Bowling Green running backs coach Brian White, who coached tight ends at previous stops in his career, told Loeffler that Fannin’s ceiling went beyond the Big Ten.

“This guy is going to play in the NFL for a long time,” White said.

Fannin played safety and receiver in high school, but Bowling Green coaches told him they wanted him to switch to tight end — one of the key pieces to their offensive scheme. Loeffler and several assistants have had success developing tight ends throughout their careers — from Jordan Reed at Florida to Trey McBride at Colorado State to Hunter Long at Boston College.

During his time at Bowling Green, Loeffler has coached multiple All-MAC tight end selections and felt confident he could develop Fannin, too, based on what he saw on the high school tape; Fannin had the size (6-foot-4, 230 pounds), body control, natural hands and raw talent to make the transition.

Once Fannin got his grades up and qualified, he signed with Bowling Green, eager to make the switch to tight end. He had no idea what was to come.

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FANNIN ARRIVED AT Bowling Green in 2022 and got to work learning the ins and outs of his new position, playing in 12 games with one start. All the while, his sister, Haria was in the fight of her life back home.

Shortly after high school graduation, their mom noticed Haria felt lethargic all the time and suggested she go see the doctor. Doctors diagnosed her with leukemia and delivered a grim prognosis: Haria had three months to live unless she began chemotherapy treatments immediately.

They made the only choice they could make, and Haria began treatment.

Haria and Lakeesha tried to shield Harold from the severity of her illness, which eventually required surgery on her brain and lungs, and a bone marrow transplant, in addition to the chemo. He would come home on breaks and go with her to the hospital, rubbing her back or giving her massages. But as her condition deteriorated into the fall of 2023, Haria told her mom not to tell Harold. She wanted him to focus on football.

“Haria didn’t want Harold to see her like that,” Lakeesha said. “Because he made it so far, and she didn’t want him to feel sad. She’s his big sister, and she was trying to protect him. I respected it, and I definitely understood it. So when Harold would say, ‘Should I come home?’ I was like, ‘She’s going to be OK.’ I thought, ‘Let me have the burden. I’m her mother.’ It was nothing you want your other kids to see.”

Haria begged doctors to let her go to one of Fannin’s games. On Sept. 9, 2023, she went to Bowling Green’s home opener against Eastern Illinois. Fannin had his first career 100-yard game, catching seven passes for 109 yards with a touchdown.

“Looking back at it, that really meant a lot,” Fannin said. “We took pictures after the game. I felt great at the time. Felt happy.”

Lakeesha went to another home game, against Akron on Oct. 21. The following day, Harold got the call: Haria had taken a turn for the worse, and he needed to go home right away. “I just remember I started crying,” Fannin said. “I couldn’t really believe it. I was shocked.”

Fannin got in his car and made the 2½-hour drive home, getting there in time to say goodbye to his sister. Haria Wise died on Oct. 23, 2023, at age 20.

“I really thought that she would beat cancer,” Lakeesha says through tears. “I thought she would.”

Fannin stayed home with his family, taking care of his mom and helping her with whatever she needed. Loeffler came to the funeral and handed out water bottles, constantly asking whether there was anything he could do to help.

Bowling Green had a game against Ball State on Nov. 1. Fannin asked his mom whether she would be OK if he left. She told him he needed to go back. So he decided he would play.

“Football always has been my getaway,” Fannin said. “Whenever I’m playing football, I’m not really thinking about anything else. Everything just goes away.”

In Bowling Green’s 24-21 victory, Fannin had five catches for 92 yards and a touchdown. After he scored, he lifted his jersey to reveal an undershirt that read, “Rest in Heaven My Sister.”

Fannin finished the season on a tear. After starting 2023 with 17 catches for 201 yards and two touchdowns in six games, he had 27 catches for 422 yards and four touchdowns in his final five. His season performance earned him a first-team All-MAC selection.

“I really just thought about where I’m at, and how grateful I should be for where I’m at,” Fannin said. “Ever since then, I’ve just been taking advantage of the opportunity.”

With that as a start, Loeffler knew Fannin could do so much more. He called Lakeesha and told her Fannin needed to stay at Bowling Green one more year so the staff could help him reach his full potential. To do that, Loeffler believed Fannin needed to “move towards what a pro looks like,” with a greater focus on doing the little things right — from timeliness to watching tape to learning more about his position.

Given the transfer portal, and the way Group of 5 players frequently move to the Power 5, there was some concern Fannin could leave for a bigger opportunity. Fannin said he never considered entering the portal, nor did he hear from any other schools.

“A lot of people kept saying to me, ‘Why is he still with Bowling Green?'” Lakeesha said. “Harold is loyal. Coach Loeffler came to the funeral. That meant a lot to Harold. It meant a lot to me. It was confirmation that Harold was meant to be there. Harold was like, ‘Why try to fix something that’s not broken?'”

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AS SOON AS offseason workouts began in January, Loeffler and his teammates saw a new, rededicated Fannin. He was never late to meetings anymore. He watched more tape. He ate better, trained better and listened to everything the coaches told him.

“He really took this year as an opportunity to really grow up, to start developing and moving more towards what a pro looks like,” Loeffler said. “He’s done a great job of starting to learn and understand the game. His habits have been great. He’s taking care of his body like a pro, training like you’re supposed to train. So he really bought into our model of, ‘You need to make this year look like you’re a pro because you can be one.'”

Fannin showed off all his improvements while under the national spotlight in back-to-back games against Penn State and Texas A&M in Weeks 2 and 3.

In a 34-27 loss to the Nittany Lions, Fannin had 11 catches for 137 yards and a touchdown — the only player to have 100 yards receiving against Penn State this season. What stood out to Loeffler was the way Fannin owned his matchups, particularly on defensive end Abdul Carter and safety Kevin Winston Jr. — both rated as possible first-round draft picks.

“I always knew Harold was good, but then I watched him literally kick ass up and down the field, and I thought, ‘We were right with this one,'” Loeffler said.

Fannin followed that up with eight catches for 145 yards against Texas A&M — including a remarkable 65-yard touchdown catch in which he completely turned around defensive back Marcus Ratcliffe twice, then brushed off Trey Jones III, who slid off him trying to make a tackle. Through 11 weeks, nobody has more receiving yards on the Aggies’ defense than Fannin.

“He was the best player on the field in both games,” Bowling Green quarterback Connor Bazelak said. “Those are supposedly the best defenses in the country. Against the best competition on the biggest stages, he played the best.”

Because Fannin is a quick study — Loeffler calls him a ‘one and done guy’ because you only have to show him something once and he remembers — the Falcons have used him in a variety of ways this season, lining him up as a traditional tight end, in the backfield and as a quarterback.

As a result, he becomes much harder to defend because he could be lined up anywhere on the field. To that point, Loeffler said after a win over Central Michigan last week that the Chippewas played in various defensive alignments that Bowling Green had never seen on tape. Fannin finished with seven catches for 86 yards anyway.

“We’re doing a great job of hiding him, putting him in unbelievable matchup situations, moving him on every play,” Loeffler said. “To his credit, he is handling it. That’s why I know he is going to be a great pro because those hybrid tight ends that everyone’s looking for, they do the same thing in the NFL.”

Indeed, all 32 NFL teams have come to watch Fannin multiple times as his stature has grown. Fannin is a semifinalist for the Mackey Award, given annually to the best tight end in the country. His stats compare to the best receivers in the country — as Fannin ranks No. 3 in the nation in receiving yards, No. 4 in receptions and No. 1 in yards after catch.

Fannin rarely talks about his accomplishments, always deflecting to his coaches and teammates. “I think he’s almost embarrassed to even talk about how good he is,” Loeffler said. “It’s business as usual to him. He doesn’t think it’s special.”

It is more special than he knows, far beyond the stats. As he has lifted himself, Fannin has helped lift his family, too, giving them something to cheer for.

“It feels good to have something to be happy about,” Lakeesha said.

Fannin believes there is a higher power at play here, that spiritual forces have helped him become the best version of himself.

He has his grandad and his sister lifting him higher.