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Texas snooping around on Buckeye commit
So this doesn't even register as a yellow alert for me at this point, but the Texas Longhorns have been trying to get into the game with Ohio State receiver commit Jaxon Smith-Njigba. The long-time Ohio State pledge has given no indication that he is wavering on his pledge to the Buckeyes and there is little to no concern here right now on OSU's end of things, but it's something that we're staying on top of right now.
The Longhorns were not very active in recruiting Smith-Njigba early in the process and that is probably the main reason that I am not buying the smoke here at this point. I don't see Smith-Njigba backing off a pledge really under any circumstances, but with Texas in particular I know there were some hard feelings about the Longhorns' lack of interest early on in the Rivals100 product.
That has left a pretty sour taste in the mouths of the family what I have been told over the past several months and even in a scenario were Jaxon was looking around (he's not), I just think it's going to be way too little too late here for Texas. While Ohio State was recruiting Smith-Njigba pretty hard and taking a close look at evaluating him, Texas did not initially send an assistant to the school to get info on him or evaluate him and that is something that helped the Buckeyes greatly early on.
Since then, Jaxon and his family have become very close with the other recruits, their families, and OSU assistants Brian Hartline and Keenan Bailey. It would really surprise me if this got hairy for Ohio State, but it's out there so I'm addressing it.
Central Ohio loaded in 2021
Ohio's 2021 class is showing more promise than most in recent memory. The class is very strong at the top with five or six huge talents in guys like Jack Sawyer, Lorenzo Styles Jr., Ben Christman, Jayden Ballard, and Reid Carrico.
But where the 2021 class has a chance to really separate itself from most of the recent Ohio classes is with depth. The depth in Ohio has not been particularly strong the last few years, but that is looking like it could change in this class as we can go well past those top six or seven guys and still find Ohio State caliber prospects already.
Central Ohio is particularly strong in 2021. The Buckeyes have already offered three prospects from the area in the aforementioned Sawyer and Styles Jr. as well as Dublin Coffman defensive back A.J. Kirk Jr. who we posted an update on today. We also profiled a few guys to keep an eye on in last week's Skull Session in Dublin Coffman defensive end/tight end Hammond Russell IV and Pickerington Central athlete Garner Wallace.
But wait, there's more.
There are two very intriguing defensive end/tight end types in 2021 in the Central Ohio area that we haven't profiled yet. One is Pickerington North product Elijah Hawk. Hawk transferred in from nearby Groveport this off-season and at 6-foot-4, 230-pounds is going to team up with Sawyer to provide what will likely be the top defensive end tandem in the state of Ohio this fall.
The coaches at North believe that Hawk is a definite Power Five caliber prospect. Whether or not he's an Ohio State/Notre Dame/Michigan type of prospect is yet to be determined, but he's getting very strong reviews from our friends over at North so far during their training camp.
The other guy to keep an eye on is Hilliard Bradley's Jack Pugh. Pugh is the younger brother of Northwestern tight end Trey Pugh who was recruited pretty heavily by Ohio State a few years ago with the Buckeyes ultimately opting to not offer.
What makes Pugh interesting is that he hasn't played football the past few years, instead focusing on basketball where he is one of the area's top hoopers in his class. Jack comes in at 6-foot-5, 233-pounds and the people that I've talked to who have watched him on the basketball floor the past couple of years tell me that he is an even better run-and-jump athlete than Trey was coming out of Jonathan Alder a few years back.
Pugh will likely be a tight end in college, should he stick with football, and that could actually increase the intrigue here for the Buckeyes who seem to have a plethora of options at defensive end in 2021 but not as many high level tight end targets at this point. It also looks like the can is getting kicked down the road a bit with tight end recruiting as this could very well end up just a one tight end class, opening up the possibility of taking a pair in 2021.
Needless to say, this has the chance to be an absolutely special group from the Central Ohio area. Haven't seen the combination of top talent and depth like this in a while.
