As one of the top running backs in the state of Ohio in the recruiting class of 2018, Tavion Thomas nearly ended up at Ohio State.
Thomas received an offer from the Buckeyes before his junior year of high school, and he wanted to sign with Ohio State. As a Dayton native, Thomas grew up rooting for the Buckeyes, and was particularly a fan of Braxton Miller and Ezekiel Elliott.
Due to concerns about Thomas’ academics, however, Ohio State decided not to accept a commitment from Thomas, instead encouraging him to enroll in a junior college with the possibility of becoming a Buckeye a year or two later. Thomas didn’t want to go that route, so he signed with Cincinnati instead.
Now, after ultimately making a one-year stop at Independence Community College following two years at Cincinnati, Thomas is the starting running back at Utah, who will play Ohio State in the Rose Bowl on Saturday.
Having rushed for 1,041 yards and 20 touchdowns on just 186 carries this season, Thomas will present a major test to an Ohio State run defense that allowed Michigan to run for 297 yards and six touchdowns in its most recent game. And he’ll be playing like he has something extra to prove after losing the opportunity to play for the Buckeyes four years ago.
“Just to show them what they missed out on,” Thomas said during an interview session Tuesday.
As Ohio State has prepared for the Rose Bowl, it’s surely become aware of just how good a running back Thomas has become. He’s the leading rusher for an Utah offense that ranks second in the country in yards per rushing attempt (5.62) and 13th in rushing yards per game (216.5) this season, and the Buckeyes know he’ll be fired up to play against his home-state team.
“He's a bruiser,” Ohio State defensive play caller Matt Barnes said. “He runs the ball downhill. He's an Ohio kid, so he'll be geeked up for this one I’m sure. He's a really good player.”
Ohio State defensive end Tyreke Smith said Thomas, who’s listed at 6-foot-2 and 221 pounds, has “a bigger frame than a lot of the backs we've played,” which means the Buckeyes have to be sound in their tackling fundamentals.
“Those are the backs you've got to make them feel you,” Smith said. “You've got to put bodies on them. You've got to swarm to the ball, swarm and tackle. With teams like this that like to run the ball, you've got to make sure you get them on the ground. Everybody's got to get to the ball, all of the hats to the ball.”
Utah’s running game is far from a one-man show. TJ Pledger and Micah Bernard both offer changes of pace at running back and have combined for 1,169 yards and eight touchdowns on 181 carries. Quarterback Cameron Rising is also a running threat with 407 rushing yards and five touchdowns this season.
Down the stretch of the season, though, Thomas has been the unit’s workhorse, carrying the ball at least 16 times and scoring at least one touchdown in eight of the Utes’ last nine games.
That didn’t always look like it would be the case early in the year, as Thomas carried the ball just once in Utah’s third and fourth games of the season after fumbling in each of the first two games, but he ultimately regained the trust of the Utes’ coaching staff. Utah offensive coordinator Andy Ludwig described Thomas as a “big catalyst of this offense taking a jump about halfway through the season.”
“There was some times earlier in the season where it's like this young man is not going to be ready this year, but he was committed to it,” Ludwig said. “I am pleasantly, pleasantly surprised with his growth and development as a football player and as a person at the University of Utah.”
Thomas said he used to think about whether he should have just gone to a junior college in the first place to potentially get the chance to play at Ohio State, but he isn’t thinking about that anymore. When asked if he was happy he ended up at Utah, Thomas responded without hesitation.
“Oh yes sir, absolutely. Absolutely,” Thomas said. “I’ve been thinking about it every day. I’m looking at the Rose Bowl like, man, just a few months ago, I was not, you could not ask me what you were going to do in a couple months. I'm seeing all this, I'm here in Cali. So it's really amazing, man. For real.”
Thomas, who said he had a good relationship with Ohio State running backs coach Tony Alford during the recruiting process but hasn’t talked to him since, said he has a “love-hate relationship” with Ohio State now because of the way things played out four years ago. The Dunbar High School product still takes pride in being from Ohio, and he knows several Buckeye players including current Ohio State running back Miyan Williams, who he got to know when Williams visited Cincinnati while Thomas was still with the Bearcats.
Nonetheless, he’d like nothing more than to beat Ohio State on Saturday.
Thomas already played against Ohio State once in 2019, when he was on the Cincinnati team that lost 42-0 to the Buckeyes, and he says he still has a bad taste in his mouth from that loss. But he expects the Utes to be much more successful against the Buckeyes in this week’s game than the Bearcats were two years ago, especially after seeing what Michigan did to Ohio State in November.
“I know Michigan, they were just more physical and stuff like that, and I feel like we could match their physicality with O-State,” Thomas said. “I feel like it's going to be a good game. And I feel like we're going to be able to run the ball.”
