The Hurry Up is your nightly dose of updates from the Ohio State football recruiting trail, keeping tabs on the latest from commits and targets from around the country.
A STRONG LINEAGE
Earlier this week, offensive coordinator Kevin Wilson talked about how Ohio State's appearance in Friday's Cotton Bowl could pay dividends down the road with some of Texas' top underclassmen. After all, the program's 2015 national championship win in that very stadium played a rather large role in running back J.K. Dobbins, cornerback Jeffrey Okudah and linebacker Baron Browning choosing the Buckeyes in the last recruiting cycle.
So this week, Ohio State's staff has reached out to several top targets in the Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex and invited some — like Allen four-star quarterback Grant Tisdale — to watch practice. The Buckeyes also hosted Cowboys legend and NFL Hall of Famer Emmitt Smith on Wednesday, at which time they extended a scholarship offer to his son, Dallas Jesuit running back Emmitt “E.J.” Smith IV.
I have received my first BIG 10 offer by Ohio State University. God is Good. Thank you. pic.twitter.com/9nOxhXt7RJ
— EJ (@ejsmith_22) December 28, 2017
The 5-foot-10, 180-pound Smith is not yet ranked by any major recruiting sites, but is there any doubt in your mind he'll be among the top-rated all-purpose backs in the Class of 2020? He rushed for 1,177 yards and 24 touchdowns and racked up 540 receiving yards and seven more scores for the Rangers this season, and picked up offers from Georgia, Jackson State, Kentucky and SMU as a result.
Smith attended the practice with his father, but NCAA rules prevent him from having in-person contact with the staff during college football's recruiting dead period — there can only be electrontic communication through Jan. 11.
The elder Smith, you may recall, played his college ball at Florida, where Ohio State's Urban Meyer coached from 2005-10. He was in attendance for all three of Meyer's national championship wins.
THANKS FOR ALL THE ACCESS, COTTON BOWL
Last week, Ohio State landed signatures from 21 prospects from 11 different states, which shows how strong the program's brand is nationwide. It also speaks to the confidence the staff has when it goes into non-traditional states or competes against other top programs for elite recruits.
“We have so much to offer that we don’t really worry about who we’re recruiting against,” defensive coordinator Greg Schiano told reporters during his Cotton Bowl media availability on Wednesday afternoon. “I worry about, 'Are we putting our best foot forward?' Whether it’s USC or it’s Alabama or it’s Notre Dame, that part isn’t significant to me as much as are we doing our job presenting our best foot forward to these kids and showing them what we’re about.
"If a guy wants to go to USC, that’s the old deal in recruiting," he continued. "You always say, it doesn’t matter if you finish second or 62nd, in recruiting, only one wins. And that’s our job to make sure that we do our best job in recruiting that we can.”
The Buckeyes have done a tremendous job in recent years going into talent-rich states and stealing elite prospects away from underachieving local programs, and that includes three of the top six players in Texas last cycle and two of the top six in both Missouri and Tennessee this year. It's certainly by design, too.
“It would be naive to say we’re not going to navigate the landscape of each area that we’re going into and say ‘OK, these guys have been down a little bit, we got an opportunity here,” Schiano said. “All of a sudden, the program’s cranking, it’s not as easy to get a kid out of there anymore. That’s trends that you have to follow in recruiting. And then the other one is the distance trend, like if your guy’s going to come over all those schools, he’s going to fly over them, well there’s going to have to be some connection. Otherwise, why? Why doesn’t the best player in California stay home and go to SC? They’re kind of supposed to, right? And why doesn’t the best player in Ohio stay home and play at Ohio State?”
Of course there are outliers, as the Buckeyes watched Fairfield five-star offensive tackle choose Clemson last week despite being the program's top target and the highest-rated player in the state. Ohio State also overcame distance this cycle, as four-star defensive tackle Tommy Togiai became the first-ever player from the state of Idaho to sign with the Buckeyes.
“Every situation’s different, and we’re dealing with such, the kind of the cream of the crop, that you kind of identify them early on and you know them as a younger kid, you get to know them and you get a feel, ‘Is there a connection or not?' There’s plenty of great players in the areas we recruit that we don’t recruit, because there’s just no connection,” Schiano said. “Whether it’s what we have to offer, or maybe as we get to know them, they’re not our kind of guy. So when we go national, we’re very selective on who — we’re very selective, period, because of who we are — but I think there needs to be a connection. Otherwise, what you have to be careful is you don’t spin your wheels.
“We put a lot of time, effort and money into going after guys, and if you don’t end up getting them, you can’t do that too many times,” he continued. “Again, like we talked about with this Early Signing Day and bowl preparation, there’s only so many hours in the day and you only have nine guys plus a head coach that are allowed to go out and do it.”
