Justin St. Ours | Daily Press Escanaba’s Bryant Maki powers through a tackle from Sault Ont., Korah’s Tyler Brechin as Korah’s Noah Gasley (3) prepares to make contact, Sept. 13, 2019, at Escanaba.

ESCANABA — Most people who attend an Escanaba home football game on Friday nights know just how special of a talent Bryant Maki is.

The 6-foot-3, 185-pound wide receiver makes a living using his athleticism to go up and catch jump balls. When you hit him on a crossing route over the middle, he’s just as dangerous with the speed to break away for a touchdown whenever the ball is in his hands.

Last season, he averaged five catches and 80 yards per game, finishing the year with seven TDs. For his efforts, he was named to the Detroit Free Press All-State first team in Division 4. He was also an All-U.P. Dream Team selection and Great Northern Conference first team pick.

He’s also a three-sport athlete, starting for the basketball team and playing in the outfield for the baseball team.

But what most folks probably don’t know is he’s just as special of a talent in the classroom as he is on the field.

He finished the last marking period of his junior year with an eye-popping 4.4 GPA, completed three college courses and finished in the top 7% of his class.

So, how does he do it?

Balance.

“I try to split it 50/50 pretty much, with leaving some time for other things obviously,” Maki said in a phone interview Thursday night. “But I try to keep academics first. … I’ll always keep them up there. I’m not leaning academically or leaning athletically, I try to balance them. I’m just trying to work on both of them.”

Maki, who’s a highly touted college football recruit, plans to major in engineering.

“I’ve been taking some business classes and a couple society classes just to get some credits that I’m going to eventually need that can work towards my major,” he said.

Multiple schools have reached out to him, including Michigan Tech.

“They’re definitely still on the radar,” Maki said. “They’ve contacted me along with a few other coaches, so they’re definitely still up there.”

When the coronavirus pandemic wiped out spring sports, Maki — along with everyone else — lost his baseball season. As disappointed as he was, it hasn’t stopped him from working out almost every day.

“(The pandemic) is obviously an awful thing, especially for the seniors who can’t finish their last year of high school or their last year of college or whatever they’re doing. Everything was canceled and we can’t do the things we love, such as spring sports and graduation and all of that,” he said. “In my free time, I’ve still been working. I work out in Marquette with AdvantEdge, but obviously they were closed. … But for six out of seven days we were on zoom calls, working out through there. So we never stopped working out, it was just at home instead of in their building.”

In addition to hard work and talent, Maki noted a big key to his success is setting goals.

“I have personal goals and team goals, which I’m more focused on team goals,” he said. “But you have to have goals to reach and things to strive for, so you can actually reach benchmarks and achievements and have things to be proud of.”

Maki and a small group of other players have also been working on their routes and the passing game to try to build chemistry during the offseason.

“We’re still trying to prepare like there’s going to be a season,” he said. “Hopefully there will be. If there is, we will be ready.”

He noted the coaches have reached out to him, eager to get back on the field. As of Wednesday, the Michigan High School Athletic Association has approved workouts in groups of up to 250 outdoors and up to 50 indoors throughout the U.P.

“We’ve all been talking,” Maki said. “We all want to get back on the field as soon as possible, and we all want to make sure we’re safe. The coaches have contacted us a little bit and have told us they’re trying to see when we can get back and what we can do when we get back. We’re all just trying to get back to normal and trying to get back on the field.”

The uncertainty of the upcoming season makes it hard to predict what is going to happen.

But one thing is for sure.

Whether he’s in the classroom or on the field or somewhere in between, Maki is going to find a way to achieve success.

He’s proven that.