Max Bredeson is back home in Hartland this week hoping to hear his name called during NFL draft weekend. The former Arrowhead quarterback turned Michigan fullback called the trip home a rare chance to slow down after a career that has taken him from local standout to national champion.
“Definitely cool being back home,” Bredeson said. “Don’t get to come home a lot. Love it. Love home. Hartland's always been a special place to me.”
For a player who once fit only a narrow lane in college football, the chance to reach the draft marks a sharp turn. Bredeson joined Michigan in 2021 as a preferred walk-on and switched from tight end to fullback, then had his breakthrough by 2023, when he earned a scholarship, became a two-time team captain and helped the Wolverines win a national championship.
His path looked different long before Ann Arbor. In high school, Bredeson led Arrowhead in his senior season under head coach Matt Harris, but injuries limited him to seven varsity games. Even then, Harris said the quarterback kept forcing plays to bend around his instincts. “We'd call a pass play … and he'd run the ball instead,” Harris said. “The second I saw him play, I knew he was better than a preferred walk-on,” he said.
Bredeson also won the Classic Eight Conference Offensive Player of the Year award, a recognition that hinted at the kind of athlete Arrowhead had before college turned him into something else. His rise now carries him into draft weekend with a real chance to keep playing at the next level, and it does so with the kind of family backdrop few prospects can match.
Bredeson has two older brothers who both competed at the University of Michigan. Ben Bredeson played football there and now plays in the NFL, while another brother competed in baseball. Max Bredeson said the family connection still shapes the way he sees the place that helped raise him. “Those are my guys — two of the most important people in my life,” he said. “They helped pave the way, and I'm just proud to kind of pave my own path, too.”
He said one detail still stands out whenever he thinks about those early trips to campus. “There's a picture of me as a kid in the Michigan locker room when my brothers went there,” Bredeson said. “That was home right away.” Now he is waiting for a call that would turn a hometown story into an NFL one.
