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Former North Carolina defensive end Beau Atkinson commits to Ohio State.
Even though he was the top-ranked cornerback in the 2025 recruiting class, Devin Sanchez knows he has to prove himself all over again at Ohio State.
The five-star cornerback’s arrival in Columbus has come with massive hype, so much so that he’s drawn comparisons to Jeremiah Smith regarding his potential to be an immediate superstar for the Buckeyes. But Sanchez knows he still has to earn his way onto the field.
“I can't let what people say on the ’net get to me, because anybody can say, ‘Oh, he's gonna play this year.’ But I just gotta prove it. So I just gotta come out here, work and earn that spot,” Sanchez said.
The No. 8 overall prospect in 247Sports’ composite rankings for the 2025 class, Sanchez possesses the physical traits to be a star with great length and athleticism at 6-foot-2 and 185 pounds. He’s demonstrated his ability to be an elite cornerback while starring in the highest classification of Texas high school football. And the Houston native certainly seems to be starting his Ohio State career with the right attitude based on everything he said during his first interview session as a Buckeye on Tuesday.
Ohio State cornerbacks going through drills at this mornings spring practice.
— Dan Hope (@Dan_Hope) March 19, 2025
The athleticism of freshman cornerback Devin Sanchez (No. 4) is noticeable. pic.twitter.com/i2FimDKZNr
He knows he isn’t going to be handed anything just because of his recruiting pedigree.
“When I went into high school, the high school I went to, we were a powerhouse, so I was at the bottom there and I had to work my way up. And I feel like that's just repeating itself here,” Sanchez said. “I'm at the bottom here, I put myself at the bottom, so I have to work my way up to the top. And so just going against these guys, they're competing every day, you're not gonna get a day off where receivers are just coming out here just BSing. So you gotta be on your P's and Q's all the time.”
That said, Sanchez is motivated to make an impact as a freshman just like Smith did on the other side of the ball a year ago.
“Him being able to play and impact the team like that, obviously I want that for myself, so I'm gonna push myself to that limit, try to be on the field year one. That's my plan,” Sanchez said. “That's the biggest reason I came here, because I have the opportunity to play year one. So me having that opportunity is good, and I'm always gonna come out here and compete. Like I said, I'm putting myself at the bottom, so I'm gonna work every day like I'm at the bottom, and I gotta get to the top.”
With one-and-a-half weeks to go in spring practice, Ohio State’s coaches are applying the brakes to the Sanchez hype train a bit more than they did with Smith a year ago. While it was already obvious by this time last year that Smith was going to make an immediate impact in Ohio State’s offense, Ryan Day and Tim Walton both indicated this week that Sanchez’s development remains a work in progress, though they’ve been complimentary of the work he’s put in so far.
“He’s got the right mindset. He's out there competing, and he's doing some good things. He's also making some mistakes and learning from that and growing,” Day said. “I think Devin has the right mindset and just needs to continue to get reps under his belt and grow from it. But obviously, we all know he has the talent and has a bright future. And he's gonna be a really good player here.”
“He's doing a solid job, but he's learning, he's growing,” said Walton. “But he's doing well. He's picking stuff up. He's making some plays. But he still has some stuff to learn. Because you know how it is, a lot of different stuff, a lot of moving parts, man. But he's doing well. We're pleased with his progression so far, but we just got to keep seeing it going with all these guys and seeing how does it go when we finish spring ball, and then when we start moving into camp, is all this stuff still applicable with all the situations and things that we go through.”
With his sights set on long-term greatness, Sanchez is glad that Walton and the Buckeyes are challenging him to get better every day.
“In the recruiting process, it was being developed into the next best corner. And then when I finally got here, it was being coached hard,” Sanchez said of why he wanted to play for Walton. “He coaches hard, very hard. And I feel like if he's not coaching you hard, then it's kind of over. But when he's coaching you hard from the jump, that means he wants the best for you. He's not going to let me slack off, especially on the little coverage things like that, he's always on me. When I watch film, he doesn't show me the good plays, he shows me the bad plays, where I'm doing bad and stuff like that. So it's just making myself better and correcting those things.”
“I'm at the bottom here, I put myself at the bottom, so I have to work my way up to the top.”– Devin Sanchez on having to prove himself all over again at Ohio State
As things currently stand, Jermaine Mathews Jr. appears likely to start opposite Davison Igbinosun at outside cornerback while Lorenzo Styles Jr. is the frontrunner to start at slot cornerback. It’s not out of the question that Mathews could move to nickel if Sanchez proves he should be starting right away, but Sanchez’s most likely initial path to the field seems to be as OSU’s No. 4 cornerback, where he could rotate in with Igbinosun and Mathews like Mathews did with Denzel Burke and Igbinosun a year ago.
Regardless of where he begins the season on the depth chart, though, Sanchez’s mindset is that he needs to be ready to play this fall even though he’s just a freshman.
“Up here, it's not about your age, it's about being a man and stepping up, because they're going to need me to step up,” Sanchez said. “Being 18, they don't care about that up here. So it's developing yourself to have a great mindset early. Having that grown-man mindset at 18 years old is real important, because up here they don't really care about feelings. So it's about just coming up here, being the man that you think you are and having to go out there and prove it.”
Sanchez’s maturity and competitiveness have stood out to his older teammates in his first spring as a Buckeye.
“He's a real good guy. His ego is not crazy, he's a real humble guy. And he's trying to get better every single day,” Styles said. “He's getting better every single day. He has to continually get better. But the traits that you want and the thing about effort, going hard, being a competitor, all those things that are not the technique, not the football part, he has that there. And I think when everything else comes along, he's going to be a great player as well.”
