The starting offensive line is experienced, but it will be tested by a much tougher schedule this season. (Press Pros Feature Photos by Jeff Gilbert)
Roster building isn’t what it used to be, but Ohio State can win the numbers game with its built-in ability to recruit top players, develop them and attract as many top transfers as they need in a given year.
Columbus, OH – As Ryan Day surveyed the indoor practice field Tuesday morning on the first day of spring practice, he saw a lot of new numbers.
Returning players with new ones on their back – such as Kenyatta Jackson in No. 2 – were plentiful. But more importantly, he saw 51 new Buckeyes. The days of welcoming in 20-some fresh recruits and a handful of transfers at best, or if any, have been over for a few seasons.
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Indiana famously built its once-thought-unfathomable national championship team with 30ish transfers, raising the game experience level and the average age of the roster. Curt Cignetti, despite the fact that he won everywhere he coached before coming to the Big Ten, could not have won it all without the transfer portal.
Does that mean Ohio State has to fully copy Cignetti’s playbook? No. Cignetti had none of the built-in advantages Ryan Day inherited. No one is persuasive enough to come to Indiana and build a championship team with only high school recruits.
Veteran columnist Jeff Gilbert writes the OHSAA and Ohio State sports for Press Pros Magazine.com. Follow on X @jw_gilbert
But Day is intelligent and observant enough to know the portal provides. He lured Caleb Downs, Quinshon Judkins, Will Howard and Seth McLaughlin to be impact players to help win the 2024 national championship. And while Day can recruit more 4-stars and 5-stars than Indiana and just about anyone else, his transfer philosophy is morphing from a handful to a bushelful. Since 2022 the number of transfers tracks like this: four, nine, seven, 11 and 19 this year.
The evolution to a number like 51 new faces has been more gradual than the trends at places like Indiana and Texas Tech, programs that have gone from rags to riches in talent and NIL spending. But Ohio State’s transfer haul does represent some philosophical change necessitated by the need to be older and more experienced like Indiana was last season.
Day made the point Tuesday that he figures no program has lost more players – mostly to the NFL Draft – after three seasons than Ohio State. He’s probably correct or awfully close to it. That at times leaves the roster young.
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The exception, of course, was 2024 when an army of players returned to win a national championship. This year several key players – Caleb Downs, Carnell Tate, Arvell Reese, etc. – declared for the NFL Draft and more than 30 transferred.
Going to the portal to add game-day experience and depth is non-negotiable. The result is a roster of 112 players, 90 scholarship players, 39 freshmen, 17 sophomores, 14 juniors and 20 seniors.
Devin Sanchez, under the watchful eye Tuesday of head coach Ryan Day, projects as a starting cornerback after gaining a lot of experience as a true freshman.
“If they were fourth- and fifth-year seniors, naturally you just see some guys step into those roles,” Day said Tuesday of the early departures. “When you lose those guys, man, it makes a big difference. The first thing you got to do is you got to get some more veteran guys in that room, or else you’re just constantly young. I felt like we were a little young this year. It’s a different approach, and we felt like we needed that.”
Day always offers the caveat of “every year is different.” But his recruiting actions and his words Tuesday prove this is a different type of year. But it’s also undeniable that future roster building will continue to look a lot more like 19 transfers every year than single digits.
“We felt like when those guys were walking out the door, we better replace them with some more veteran guys,” Day said of this year’s portal haul. “Now that being said, they have to be the right guys, and they have to fit what we do and believe in our culture. Each year it’s a little different based on what you have in the room.”
Ohio State’s fortunate identity as one of the sport’s blue bloods allows Day to build the roster different ways. He doesn’t have to rely on one method.
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High school recruiting will always be strong for a program like Ohio State. Development of raw talent into NFL-ready stars will always be a part of the program. And managing the goings and comings of the portal should enhance the roster building, the experience level and maturity of each team. Nothing guarantees lots of championship runs, but if any program is positioned to do so it is Ohio State.
Indiana, despite what it accomplished this past season, must rely more on the portal more than traditional powers. Cignetti made it work his first two years. But expecting him to mine 24-karat gold every year is fool’s gold. He found a Heisman Trophy winner last year. That’s rare.
Chris Henry Jr., the 6-foot-5 freshman wide receiver, stood out Tuesday morning on the first day of spring drills.
So what can Day accomplish with the assembled talent?
Well, his offense ought to be pretty good, if not explosive enough to build early leads and give the defense freedom to unleash an even more aggressive nature than was seen last year.
Day has a second-year quarterback for a change. He said new offensive coordinator Arthur Smith is impressed with the microprocessor on Julian Sayin’s shoulders. He says the receiver corps is deep despite the losses to the draft and the portal. He says the offensive line depth has more game-ready players than in recent years.
Day also has former NFL head coaches running both sides of the line of scrimmage to attract players and coach them up. No one else has that gold standard.
Matt Patricia came back for a second year after his first defense led the nation by allowing only 9.3 points per game.
“When you get around Matt, you quickly learn how important family is to him and relationships are to him,” Day said. “Matt’s doing a great job, and it’s building momentum.”
Day hired Smith, formerly head coach of the Tennessee Titans and this past season offensive coordinator for the Pittsburgh Steelers. Smith is known as a run game guru.
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“Arthur is very intelligent, he knows how to run the football, but he also really knows how to throw the football,” Day said. “When you look at where he’s had his meetings in all of his career, he’s always with the quarterbacks.”
Starting center Carson Hinzman sports the new look of the players’ names on the back of the helmet instead of “Buckeyes.”
What Patricia evolves the defense toward and how Smith meshes with Day and the offensive position coaches, matters greatly. But Day 1 of spring practice meant trying to spot all the new faces that might help those coaches take this team to where it always wants to finish.
Expectations exist for veteran transfers like linebacker Christian Alliegro (Wisconsin), defensive end Qua Russaw (Alabama) nickel back Earl Little Jr. (Florida State), nose tackle John Walker (UCF), wide receiver Devin McCuin (Texas-San Antonio) and tight end Mason Williams (Ohio) to start. And for some freshmen, most notably 6-foot-5 wide receiver Chris Henry Jr., to contribute.
Spring practice culminates with the annual spring on April 18. Not even that exhibition will provide all the answers fans seek heading into a season with a much more difficult schedule than 2025. But the way this roster has been built makes sense in today’s college football environment.
Football is, and always has been, a numbers game. A game that usually favors the Buckeyes.
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