Perhaps better than any player on the Buckeyes' football roster, Jack Sawyer understands Ohio State's rivalry with Michigan.
Sawyer grew up in the shadow of Ohio State's campus in the Columbus suburb of Pickerington. He always wanted to be a Buckeye, and despite national competition for his services, he was the first player to commit to OSU in its 2021 recruiting class.
That's why the last three years of losses to the Wolverines have ached him so. Since he all but said he was coming back to Ohio State for his senior year in the leadup to the 2023 Cotton Bowl, announced his return officially on Jan. 5 and throughout the Buckeyes' offseason, the No. 1 reason he stated for his decision to stay at Ohio State for his senior season was to beat The Team Up North.
“When I committed to Ohio State, we had just played in a national championship,” Sawyer said at Big Ten Media Days in July. “Coming off of three or four Big Ten championship wins, haven’t lost to ‘The Team Up North’ in eight, nine years. And then when my class gets there, it kind of reverses. And I think for me, being the type of guy I am, I think naturally I felt like we let, I let not only Ryan Day down, but I let the city down.
“So for me, it's all about coming back. And a lot of us, we all feel the same way, too, is that we can't, we weren't gonna leave here without having one more shot at doing this the right way and leaving here better than what we came here for.”
Sawyer is the poster child for the collective return of many of the top players from his recruiting class. He played as big a hand as anyone in getting them to come back and he's perhaps the best among them at articulating why, likely because of his Central Ohio background. NIL helped pave the way and the Buckeyes have bigger ambitions, but the team's bevy of fourth- and fifth-year seniors who had NFL draft stock in 2023 are back to beat Michigan. And they get their chance this Saturday.
"Everything," Sawyer said on Tuesday of what a win in The Game would mean. "This is the reason why we come to Ohio State. Growing up in Columbus, I think I've said (it) 1,000 times, but this is what you do it for. These games and it'd mean everything to this program and Coach Day and all the guys that have been here for the last four years."
Sawyer has rivalry appreciation ingrained in him, but even players not from The Buckeye State have come to grasp the full importance of The Game, especially as they've lost its past three renditions.
Senior wide receiver Emeka Egbuka hails from Washington, but he too has dreamed of a pair of Gold Pants to set things right. He and Sawyer passed on NFL draft potential to get a set alongside JT Tuimoloau, Jordan Hancock, TreVeyon Henderson, Donovan Jackson, Cody Simon, Denzel Burke, Tyleik Williams, Ty Hamilton and Lathan Ransom.
"It would mean a lot," Egbuka said. "It would cap off my Ohio State career definitely the right way. Not that there's not more to do after we win this game, but you come to Ohio State to beat the team up north and win a pair of Gold Pants. Just handing the Gold Pants to my mother is a memory that I'm really looking forward to."
The return of the seniors came alongside the addition of several key transfers who have yet to experience the rivalry firsthand. Sawyer said the Ohioans on the team and Ohio State's coaching staff were sure to instill the importance of The Game in them from their first days on campus. That rings true listening to Will Howard speak on the rivalry.
"Just feeling how much this rivalry means and how deep it runs and how deep it cuts," Howard said. "I mean, you’re looking around the building and see the countdown clocks. From the moment I got here, it was just different. It was like, you don’t wear blue in the building, you don’t say the M word, like all this stuff. I was like, ‘OK, this is different.’ It’s not really a rivalry. It’s more like a way of life."
With the pain of the past and the usual intensity tied up in The Game, there will be a lot of emotion at play when the Buckeyes take the field in the Shoe this Saturday. Channeling those feelings properly is as much a challenge as the players that oppose Ohio State.
"It's probably one of the hardest things just because, you know, all the history and all the tradition around this game," Simon said. "One thing I've been trying to just get to the younger guys is just to still play free. Like, don't let this kind of wrap you up, like it's still football when you come down to it. So we just got to go out there and play our game and not be afraid to make plays."
Ryan Day said the key to tempering those feelings is to lock in on one's preparation.
"When you focus on the process and you focus around your team and you're with your guys in the Woody, it certainly can avoid distractions this week," Day said. "I think that's what we need to do. To say that this team and those leaders and these seniors want to win this game, it'd be one of the biggest understatements of all time. So they don't need any extra motivation."
Day is another source of motivation all four of Sawyer, Simon, Egbuka and Howard cited as fuel for their fires this weekend. The Buckeyes' head coach opened up this week about the hardships rivalry losses have caused him and his family, calling it – aside from his father's suicide when Day was a child – one of the worst things to ever happen to him. He added, "We can never have that happen again."
"I think a big part for me is to come back for Coach Day," Sawyer said. "I think that no one deserves this win more than he does. And to see what him and his family have gone through in the last three years, falling short to them, it made my decision even more clear to come back. And he's a guy who gave me an opportunity to play here. So I thought that I owed it to him to come back and get this win for him. So that's what we plan to do Saturday."
“It'd mean everything to this program and Coach Day and all the guys that have been here for the last four years.”– Jack Sawyer on what a win in The Game would mean
It's no secret that Michigan isn't the same caliber of team as it has been the last three seasons, and especially not of its national-title-winning squad in 2023. The Wolverines have five losses in 2024 thanks in large part to one of the most anemic offenses in the Big Ten.
But none of that matters to Ohio State's seniors who have suffered three straight losses against them.
"Every year, it doesn't matter what the record is, our record or their record," Sawyer said. "It's going to be a war no matter what."
It's been said already this week, but a win against Michigan would be a catharsis for the Buckeyes' entire program and fanbase. But except for Day, that's more true for the seniors who came back for another shot at the Wolverines than anyone else.
"It'd just be everything," Simon said. "You can't really describe it with anything tangible, but just fulfillment in a lot of areas and joy for the team and all the seniors that came back too. ... I walk to my meeting room and that countdown (clock) is always right next to my meeting room. So it's every day."
