Home Grown: Gavin Cupp Proves It's Possible to Go From Small-Town High School to Ohio State

LEIPSIC, Ohio — There isn’t much scenery on the two-hour drive north along Route 23 from Columbus to Leipsic High School. You’ll cruise past some corn fields and old wooden buildings that look like they haven’t been touched in years, and on this specific Tuesday summer afternoon, there was a woman selling jarred honey on the side of the road toward the end of the trip.

It’s a simple drive to a simple place.

Surrounded mostly by farms and open cornfields, the high school here is located on the same campus as the elementary school. It’d be hard to even recognize as a campus if not for the football stadium with light fixtures standing tall.

It doesn't look like a place you’d typically find a high-major Division I college football player. It doesn't have a fancy weight room or a 100-plus member football team. Things are just different.

That doesn't matter to Gavin Cupp, though, because for the offensive lineman signed in Ohio State's 2016 class, Leipsic is home. 

"No matter where you're from," says Andy Mangas, who spent the last two seasons as the varsity head football coach here prior to resigning in May. "If you're good enough, they'll find you."

"All you've got to do is go out there and prove yourself."

Not everything at Leipsic is about the school's playoff streak. Just most things.

The Vikings have made seven straight trips to the postseason. It's a difficult feat no matter what division a school plays in, but for Leipsic, it's perhaps even more impressive.

Leipsic is in Division VII — the smallest of all the divisions in Ohio high school football. Divisions in Ohio are determined by the number of boys enrolled at a particular school. At Leipsic, the boys enrollment total is only 80. Eighty boys in the entire school.

Each grade of incoming players is small — roughly 10 to 15 players — so continuing to replenish enough talent is a tall task. As a small public school in Northwest Ohio, Leipsic relies on players who have come up through the ranks. There are no kids coming from outside school districts to play here.

“I think it’s tough anywhere, but especially at a small public school where you’re relying on the kids that go to school there and they’re there from the time they’re in kindergarten all the way up through,” Mangas said. “Luckily, it’s been a good string of good athletes and the right things have come together for the program.”

The program’s success has allowed Leipsic to have a major advantage on its fellow Division VII schools. Mangas said Leipsic had “around 50” kids on its football team a season ago — a number nearly double the size of other schools in the same division.

“In my two years there I think we had the second-biggest roster in our conference both years,” Mangas said. "Part of that, I think, plays into the success as well. A lot of kids in Leipsic want to play football and we’ve got good numbers and that gives us an advantage to the program.”

Of course, having a Big Ten-caliber player along the offensive and defensive line helps, too.

Cupp committed to Ohio State on Aug. 4, 2015, but not after any shortage of drama. A one-time Michigan State commit, Cupp had his scholarship offer pulled by Spartans head coach Mark Dantonio after he opted to attend the Buckeyes’ annual Friday Night Lights camp. Dantonio has a no-visit policy for any of his commits and Cupp says there was a lack of communication between him and the Michigan State staff.

Cupp left the camp as an uncommitted prospect and didn’t know what his next step would be. But he performed well enough in the eyes of the Ohio State staff to earn a scholarship offer from the Buckeyes.

He didn’t take long to accept it.

“We didn’t give it to him because we felt sorry for him,” Ohio State coach Urban Meyer said back on National Signing Day. “He earned it.”

The offer from Ohio State was a relief for Cupp and his family after a difficult situation for him and his family.

“If anybody knows what a verbal offer actually is, it’s me,” Cupp said then. “I’m just glad to get it on pen and paper and that it’s official now.”

Behind Cupp, the Vikings earned the No. 4 seed in Region 24 despite a 5-5 regular-season record; they hosted a first-round playoff game last season. After disposing of fifth-seeded Arlington, 35-3, in that opening round matchup, Leipsic was eliminated from the playoffs in a 35-12 loss to McComb in the regional semifinals. McComb would later advance to the Division VII state semifinals.

Overall, it was just a .500 season for Cupp as a senior and in Mangas' final year at the helm, but the most important thing was the streak was preserved. Mangas and Cupp have both moved on now, so to make an eighth-consecutive trip to the playoffs it will be all about the new players and new coaching staff.

There's no question the expectation level has been set, though.

"When I got here, Leipsic had been to five straight playoffs and that was kind of the No. 1 goal was to keep the playoff streak going," Mangas said. "We were able to do that these last two years and that was important for me and the program to keep that going. I’m glad we got it accomplished and I hope they keep it going even after I’m gone.”

Students packed the Leipsic High School media center back on National Signing Day to witness Cupp sign to play for Ohio State. Not just Cupp's classmates, either; there were elementary and middle school students in attendance. This was a community affair.

It's not often a town with a population of just 2,000 people sends one of its athletes off to one of the most prominent college football programs in the country. If you were from Leipsic, you didn't want to miss this.

When asked what sending a player to Ohio State does for a place like Leipsic, Mangas could only answer after letting out a brief chuckle.

"It certainly brought a lot of attention to a small community," he said, laughing. "And I think him being such a humble kid helped magnify the town, the community and the school. He didn’t get too big a head about the whole process and it made it a lot easier for people to absorb all of the attention and what was going on. "

No matter where you come from, if you're good enough, you'll be found.

That's what Mangas preached throughout his two years as the head coach at Leipsic. That's what Cupp bought into throughout his standout four-year career with the Vikings and it's that attitude — plus his 6-foot-5, 300-pound frame — that allowed him to become one of the Buckeyes' five offensive linemen inked in the 2016 recruiting class.

Cupp is on campus now as he reported with the rest of the freshman class a few weeks back, but before he made his way down to Columbus, before that somewhat boring two-hour drive south, the kid from a small town in Northwest Ohio had a hard time when asked to sum up his journey.

“It’s surreal. It’s still not believable," he said. "Everything is happening so quick, but it's going to be pretty neat so I'm really looking forward to it."