Archives for July 2017

BREAKING: Ohio State Lands the Country’s No. 1 Tight End

July 17, 2017 by Leave a Comment

Ohio State Buckeyes’ head coach Urban Meyer has always been excellent at recruiting. A preliminary glance at the amount of his former players are on NFL rosters is evidence of that in itself. Well, add another diamond to his treasure trove of talent, as Meyer and the Buckeyes landed the country’s No. 1  tight end, Jeremy Ruckert, Monday afternoon.

The 6-5.5 238 lbs prospect out of Lindenhurst, NY was a star at ‘The Opening’, bolstering him from the country’s No. 52 ranked prospect to No. 11 in the 247sports composite rankings, and earning him a fifth star. Ruckert is the third five-star prospect to commit to Ohio State in the 2018 class, and he certainly won’t be the last.

He is a crucial pick up for the Buckeyes, as, although they have the nation’s top-ranked recruiting class at this particular moment, the one thing it lacks is people to throw the football to. In came Ruckert to help fill that void.

So, what exactly do we get in Ruckert? Well, you get a big-bodied tight end with the athleticism of a wide receiver, whose combination of route-running abilities, size, great hands, and his propensity to make secondaries look bad make him a five-star prospect.

“Updated rankings got me my 5th star.. #1 TE and #11 Overall player in the nation!! #blessed”, Ruckert said on a Twitter post last Monday. 

Yes, indeed Ruckert is blessed. However, he’s not nearly as blessed as Ohio State is after receiving a commitment from him. If the rankings remain the same (or even close to the same) come national signing day, Ruckert will be the highest ranked tight end recruit Ohio State has landed in 247sports.com history.

He is a big reason why Ohio State’s 2018 recruiting class will end Alabama’s six-year streak of having the No. 1 class in the country.

Until next time, God bless and GO BUCKS!

Filed Under: Ohio State Football Tagged With: , , , , ,

OSU Commit Jeremy Rucker

July 17, 2017 by Leave a Comment

By Trevor Arnold

Boooom! Ohio State lands a big time target out of New York. Jeremy Ruckert, a 5-star and number 1 tight end is exactly what Ohio State needed to continue this great 2018 class. Ruckert commits with a crazy go-kart video on his twitter @Jeremy_Ruckert1.

Ruckert is 6 ft-5.5, and has great size and strength. At 236 pounds, Ruckert is hard to tackle, but also has a great vertical. In his Junior and Senior years of high school, Ruckert had 118 catches for 1618 and 15 touchdowns.

Ohio State has had a hard time over the years with recruiting tight ends missing slightly on many. This is a big time commit for Urban and his staff. Kevin Wilson also loves using tight ends, so this recruit is only going to make his offense scarier. Ruckert is going to be a great addition to this stellar class. With many top recruits left, Ohio State is on pace to have the greatest recruiting class of all time.

Filed Under: Ohio State Football

Things That Have Happened Since Michigan Last Beat Ohio State In Football  

July 14, 2017 by 1 Comment

When you’re a fan of arguably the most successful program in the history of college football, the Ohio State Buckeyes, you have a lot to brag about. However, for every single success story that is published or brought up in conversation about the men who have essentially made the sport of college football a secular religion in Ohio over the course of 100+ years, you have a Michigan naysayer around to remind you that the Womanrines have more total wins, more conference titles, more national titles, and have more wins in the rivalry.

For their sake alone, I have written this article. First and foremost, I would like to mention that, as of today, it has been 2,057 days since Michigan has beaten Ohio State in football. Their last win versus the Buckeyes came in 2011 when Ohio State was in between head coaches and had a true freshman at quarterback.

That was the year Luke Fickell was Ohio State’s interim head coach and the Buckeyes had their first losing record in 23 years. Of course that happened to be the year the Wolverines finally topped the Buckeyes (for the first time since 2003). Since then, however, be it due to controversial calls or utter dominance, the Wolverines have failed to beat their cross-state counterparts.

In the time since, a whole heck of a lot of things have happened. Thanks to Wikipedia and onthisday.com, I was able to concoct a small list of such things. Without further ado, here are some of the things that have happened since the Wolverines’ last victory over the Buckeyes on November 26, 2011:

  • December 18, 2011 – Withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq: The last United States troops withdrew from Iraq under the terms of the U.S.–Iraq Status of Forces Agreement.
  • September 11, 2012 – The Benghazi attack: An attack that was coordinated against two United States government facilities in Benghazi, Libya by members of the Islamic militant group Ansar al-Sharia.
  • October 25–30, 2012: Hurricane Sandy: A devastating hurricane wreaks havoc for the Eastern United States coast.
  • November 6, 2012: United States presidential election, 2012: Barack Obama is reelected as president.
  • December 14, 2012: Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting: Occurs in Newtown, Connecticut killing 20 Children and 6 Staff Members
  • January 20, 2013: Barack Obama is inaugurated for his second term as president.
  • April 15, 2013: Boston Marathon bombings: Two pressure cooker bombs explode during the Boston Marathon
  • April 16, 2014: Malaysia Airlines Flight of Malaysian airlines went missing and hasn’t been seen since.
  • May 23, 2014: 2014 Isla Vista killings occurs, killing 6, and wounding 14 others, perpetrated by elliot rodger.
  • June 2014: President Obama orders the return of a small number of troops to Iraq to help bolster Iraqi and Kurdish military forces
  • August 9, 2014: Michael Brown was shot and killed, in what was ruled by a grand jury to be self-defense, by police officer Darren Wilson in Ferguson, Missouri, igniting protests and riots in the following months.
  • November 3, 2014: New building, 1 World Trade Center, opens in New York City.
  • December 17, 2014: President Obama announces a restoration of full diplomatic relations with Cuba for the first time since 1961.
  • April 27, 2015: Baltimore protests: Protests and rioting occur in Baltimore, Maryland after the death of Freddie Gray in police custody.
  • June 17, 2015: Charleston church shooting: A gunman killed 9, including a state senator in a church in Charleston, South Carolina.
  • June 26, 2015: Gay marriage is fully legalized in all 50 states
  • July 20, 2015: Restoration of relations with Cuba.
  • December 22, 2015 San Bernardino attack: Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, a married radical Muslim couple, kills 14 people at a center for the developmentally disabled.
  • June 11, 2016: Orlando Nightclub Shooting: A self-proclaimed Islamic State fighter, Omar Mateen, kills 49 and injures 53 at a gay nightclub in Orlando, before being shot and killed by an officer.
  • July 7, 2016: Shooting of Dallas police officers: Micah Xavier Johnson ambushed and fired upon a group of police officers in Dallas, Texas, killing five officers and injuring nine others. Two civilians were also wounded.
  • August 12–22, 2016: Louisiana floods and prolonged rainfall in southern parts of the U.S. state of Louisiana resulted in catastrophic flooding that submerged thousands of houses and businesses.
  • August 13, 2016: Milwaukee riots: A riot began in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, sparked by the fatal police shooting of 23-year-old Sylville Smith.
  • November 8, 2016: Donald Trump wins the 2016 presidential election
  • January 20, 2017: Donald Trump is inaugurated as the forty-fifth president of the United States
  • February 22, 2017: Discovery of 7 Earth-sized planets orbiting star Trappist-1 announced in Journal “Nature” – raises possibility of alien life
  • March 22, 2017: Terrorist attack on London’s Westminster Bridge and Houses of Parliament kills 4 including a police officer and injures 40
  • May 10, 2017: President Donald Trump shares classified information about ISIS plot with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Ambassador Sergey Kislyak in the Oval Office
  • June 2, 2017: Trump announces the US is withdrawing from the Paris Climate Agreement
  • July 5, 2017: 101 people reported shot, 15 killed in Chicago, Illinois over 4th July weekend

It’s safe to say that for Wolverines fans, a win versus Ohio State is long overdo. This explains why so many of them were so upset about the double overtime fourth down spot in the 2016 edition of “The Game”.  Nevertheless, it has still been over 2,000 days since Michigan has beaten Ohio State in football.

This list could have literally been 100 pages long.

 

Filed Under: Ohio State Football Tagged With: , , ,

Post Spring Game Depth Chart: Defensive Line

July 4, 2017 by Leave a Comment

The biggest strength of the Ohio State defense, the Rushmen, will wreak havoc this season.  After losing multiple starters to the NFL Draft over the past two years, Ohio State managed to return their key D-Linemen for at least one more season in the Scarlet and Gray.

At Defensive End, both starters from last year, Sam Hubbard and Tyquan Lewis have returned and the will lock down the two starting positions for the Buckeyes.  Behind them, Nick Bosa, Jalyn Holmes and Dre’Mont Jones wait patiently to spell the aforementioned starters or during the Rushmen Package.

Defensive Tackle is the most open out of all the positions with Dre’Mont Jones returning and Tracy Sprinkle returning from injury from a season ago.  Michael Hill also has spent some time as a starter, and he will look to build further because his eligibility is running out.  Sprinkle was supposed to be the starter coming into last season, but an injury prevented him from starting.

Jones, Sprinkle and Hill will be fighting for the starting spot, while trying to stave off Landers who shined during spot duty.  Davon Hamilton will be nursing his broken foot and is this years Sprinkle, with an unfortunate injury.

The depth at Defensive Linemen is similar to what Coach Meyer had at Florida and the talent is in place.  Year after year, they team adds a couple of highly touted and quality recruits, and all of them train to make each other better.

A few names to watch for are Robert Landers, Jashon Cornell, Haskell Garrett, Jerron Cage and Chase Young.  They add to the depth of the team and they all will be looking for a more permanent role on the team.  The biggest advantage is that they could all play and most of the DL are versatile and could play multiple positions.  It will be up to Coach Johnson to decide, but this will be an exciting group of players to watch for years to come.

Filed Under: B1G Football, College Football, College Football Recruiting, NFL, NFL Draft, Ohio State Football, Pro Football, Site News

Best Possible (and Realistic) Finish to Ohio State’s 2018 Recruiting Class by Billy “Buckeyebillz” George

July 2, 2017 by Leave a Comment
Oh, what a wonderful time it is to be an Ohio State fan! You may be wondering how can one say this after seeing their beloved Buckeyes get absolutely blown by Clemson in their last game. Well, it’s easy to be optimistic about the future of your program when it recruits as well as Urban Meyer has/is.  

Last year I predicted that Ohio State would end Alabama’s six-year streak of having the No. 1 recruiting class in the country. Needless to say, I was wrong. But I am almost 100% certain that the Buckeyes will dethrone the Crimson Tide in that department with its 2018 class.  

If one were looking for an example of a quintessential recruiting class it would look a lot like Ohio State’s does at the moment. The Buckeyes currently have fourteen commits in its 2018 class thus far, which is ranked No. 1 in the country at this juncture, and the average rating per commit is 0.9530 according to the 247sports.com composite rankings. Expect the class to only get better in due time.  

Players that have already committed to Ohio State are five-star defensive linemen, Tyron Vincent and Brenton Cox, four-star safeties Jaiden Woodbey and Josh Proctor, four-star linebackers Dallas Gant and Teradja Mitchell, four-star offensive linemen Max Wray and Matthew Jones, four-star running backs Jaelen Gill and Brian Snead, Four-star dual-threat quarterback Emory Jones, four-star cornerback Sevyn Banks, four-star defensive end Andrew Chatfield, and three-star running back Master Teague. 

This is merely a small sample size of just how good this class could get. Allow me to present to you what would, and very well could, be the perfect finish to Ohio State’s 2018 class, as each of the potential future Buckeyes I will mention is crystal ball favorites to pick Ohio State.  

The Five Stars:  

Along with the two five-star prospects that have already committed to Ohio State, the Bucks are in good shape –and are the favorites – to land five-star defensive end Micah Parsons, five-star offensive Tackle Jackson Carmen, and five-star cornerback Anthony Cook.  

Parsons, the one-time Penn State commit, would be the fifth five-star defensive lineman the Bucks will have landing in the last three recruiting classes, and the third one in this class alone. Before he even verbally committed to Penn State, he seemed to have narrowed his choices down to Ohio State and Penn State. After having de-committed from Penn State, however, many speculate that he will end up playing his college ball in Columbus. That would give the Buckeyes by far the nastiest d-line haul in the country.  

Perhaps the biggest (no pun intended) “must-get” prospect from Ohio that Urban Meyer has targeted since his arrival at Ohio State, Jackson Carmen could very well be the best offensive lineman in the country. Carmen is the No. 1 ranked offensive tackle in the country according to the 247sports composite rankings, and the majority(66.7%) of recruiting experts that have cast their crystal ball on him have him going to Ohio State, despite him stating that Clemson was his leader.  

Anthony Cook, the nation’s eight-ranked prospect overall and second-ranked cornerback, has been high on Ohio State from the get-go as well. At the moment Ohio State seems to be his leader, but it may be hard to lure him away from in-state school Texas and its new high profile head coach Tom Herman, whose offensive wizardry helped Urban Meyer and Ohio State win a national title with its third-string quarterback in 2014.  

Nevertheless, it’s exciting to see such high-profile prospects showing so much interest in Ohio State, which has become a regularity under the tutelage of Meyer.  

The Four Stars: 

Four-star targets whose crystal ball predictors have favoring Ohio State are Tyson Campbell, Kamryn Babb, Jeremy Ruckert, Tyreke Smith, L’Christian Smith, Michael Harris, Christopher Oats, and K’Vaughan Pope. 

Oats, Tyreke and L’Christian Smith are three prospects that the Buckeyes are hoping to keep in Ohio. L’Christian is listed as an athlete, but will likely play either wide receiver or h-back in college. One of a small handful of receivers that are showing strong interest in Ohio State in this class, he is a top priority of Urban Meyer’s. And, like Jalyn Holmes a few years ago, Tyreke Smith is a four-star Ohio defensive end that the Buckeyes are really high on. Christopher Oats, on the other hand, seems to have an equal amount of interest in Cincinnati University as he does in Ohio State. He is the second-best linebacker prospect in Ohio.  

Along with L’Christian Smith, Kamryn Babb is another four-star receiver who’s favored to go to Ohio State, and is a crucial piece to its 2018 class, as it is starving for receivers at this point. The country’s tenth-best receiver and second-best player in the state of Missouri, Babb is considered a heavy Ohio State lean. Another Ohio State lean that could potentially help the Bucks out in the receiving corp. is Jeremy Ruckert, the second-best tight end in the country.  All signs are pointing toward the 6’5.5″ 238 lbs. New Yorker becoming a Buckeye.

Lastly, Tyson Campbell is the nation’s third-ranked cornerback, stemming from Fort Lauderdale, Florida’s American Heritage high school, the very place where Ohio State landed Torrance Gibson in its 2015 class. Ohio State is deadlocked with Miami (Fl) University as Campbell’s leader in crystal ball predictions, with five out of thirteen (38%) of them. Campbell could be yet another stud that the Buckeyes add to its already stacked secondary.  

So, in conclusion, you may be wondering just how Ohio State’s class would look if all of the players that are crystal ball favorites actually did wind up picking Ohio State. Don’t worry, I already did the math for you. Assuming there are no de-commitments, the addition of the prospects mentioned above would give the Buckeyes’ 2018 class a composite score of 323.25. 

In other words, Ohio State may very well be in the process of piecing together the greatest class in247sports.com history! 

Filed Under: Ohio State Football