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.
Christian visits Tennessee, decision awaits
Three-star Allatoona (Ga.) High School tight end Bennett Christian pulled off a successful visit to Ohio State one week ago on his own dime, becoming the first Buckeye target to visit campus during the shutdown.
Over this past weekend, Christian followed up that Columbus visit by heading to Knoxville for his first visit to his father’s old alma mater since his eighth grade year. Christian tweeted that he had a great time on his visit, and now we play the waiting game as he goes into decision mode before a Sept. 1 announcement date.
UT was awesome!!
— Bennett Christian (@BennettC87) August 22, 2020
Even though Christian had a good visit, I’m still very confident Ohio State is in the lead and will ultimately land Christian as the first tight end in its 2022 class.
Gosnell final three
Speaking of tight ends, the Buckeyes are almost certainly going to bring in two at the position in 2022, as the odds continue dwindling that they bring a second tight end into the 2021 class.
That second tight end could be East Surry (N.C.) High School four-star Benji Gosnell, who released a final three over the weekend of Ohio State, North Carolina and Florida.
— Benjamin Gosnell (@GosnellBenjamin) August 23, 2020
That’s another recruitment that I believe will go the Buckeyes’ way, so I’m putting my unofficial Crystal Ball prediction in for Gosnell to eventually pick Ohio State. And if Christian or a different tight end winds up committed to Ohio State, it will not affect Gosnell’s decision.
“Wherever I go, I know I’m gonna have to compete, and I trust myself to beat out anyone,” Gosnell told Eleven Warriors.
McCord, Harrison may not play
The Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association followed the same path that the Ohio High School Athletic Association is going down, with the plan to move forward with fall sports in 2020. That means Ohio State targets like Derrick Davis Jr. and Nicholas Singleton should be able to continue playing.
However, the Philadelphia Catholic League on Monday chose to postpone the fall season, The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Philip Anastasia reported.
— Kyle McCord (@kylemccord16) August 24, 2020
That would knock Buckeye quarterback and receiver commits Kyle McCord and Marvin Harrison Jr. out of game action this fall, meaning the next time they play a game would likely be at Ohio State. (Since they would likely follow in the footsteps of fellow Ohio State commits like TreVeyon Henderson, Evan Pryor and Sam Hart who have opted out of postponed seasons in Virginia, North Carolina and Colorado, respectively.)
That said, Anastasia reported that St. Joseph's Prep is still looking to potentially move forward with a season as an independent, so there's still a chance McCord and Harrison could get a chance to play their senior years.
St. Joseph’s Prep, like La Salle and Devon Prep, is a member of the PCL but is not under the auspices of the Archdiocese of Philadelphia. Those three schools can continue to pursue fall sports if their administrations make those decisions.
The St. Joseph’s Prep football program, which has won four state titles in the last six years, is one of the strongest in the country and features multiple players who have committed to play NCAA Division I college football.
St. Joseph’s Prep athletic director Dan DiBernardinis said the Hawks will investigate the possibility of playing fall sports as an independent, although scheduling games, especially in football, could prove to be a difficult challenge. La Salle is also looking at that option, according to athletic director Joe Parisi.
New offer
Despite the reported pause Ohio State has put on recruiting, the Buckeyes moved forward on Monday by extending a new offer out to 2022 Shelby (N.C.) High School four-star prospect Malaki Hamrick.
#AGTG Extremely blessed to receive an offer from The Ohio State University @ryandaytime @R2X_Rushmen1 @GldLionFootball @NCPreps @rivalsmike @DonCallahanIC #gobucks pic.twitter.com/5FnnPsaQb0
— Malaki Hamrick (@MalakiHamrick) August 24, 2020
Hamrick is a 6-foot-4, 200-pounder ranked No. 142 overall, No. 12 at outside linebacker and No. 6 in the state of North Carolina’s 2022 class.
He has 15 offers thus far, highlighted by Arizona State, Arkansas, Georgia Tech, Notre Dame and North Carolina, which is where he is Crystal Ball’d to right now with a 10 on the confidence meter of 247Sports NC State Insider Michael Clark.
Al Washington and Co. are looking to land at least four linebackers in the class, so the Buckeyes have now made it clear that they have interest in Hamrick as a potential candidate to join Gabe Powers, Dasan McCullough and C.J. Hicks.
Rivals rankings updates
Rivals released new rankings on Monday, and Ohio State’s highest-ranked commit on the list of 2021 prospects is Jack Sawyer, coming in at No. 8 overall. Donovan Jackson, at No. 16, is the only other Buckeye commit ranked as one of Rivals’ 20 five-star prospects. Very surprising not to see Henderson on the list.
Other Ohio State targets on the list are J.T. Tuimoloau (No. 4), Emeka Egbuka (No. 11) and Tristan Leigh (No. 15), in addition to former Buckeye commit Tunmise Adeleye (No. 14).
Also getting some love from the Rivals network was McCord, who analyst Mike Farrell listed as the top quarterback who is a candidate to earn that five-star billing:
"I like the group of quarterbacks behind the five-stars and McCord has the best chance of having success. He has a very live arm and, once he learns to control it a bit better and develop more touch, he could be tough to stop."
