Buckeye Blogger NetworkThe Buckeye hoops team dropped a tough one in East Lansing. Recruiting rankings were released and the Buckeyes are on a roll. My girlfriend is hotter than Kate Upton. Yeah, so what if we’ve only met on the internet?! What’s the worst that can happen? Let’s rumble!
The Rivals top 100
On Monday, the newest and last Rivals top 100 for 2013 was released. Among those 100, Urban Meyer’s coaching staff has received seven verbal commitments and is still waiting patiently for answers from two others. The most “top 100” players the Buckeyes have ever claimed were 8 commits in 2008. If either Vonn Bell (safety from Rossville, Georgia, ranked number 32) or Dontre Wilson (running back from Desoto, Texas, ranked number 100) commit to Meyer’s 2013 class it will match or exceed that ’08 record. I am a math genius.
Vonn Bell… still deciding
There’s about a month left in the 2013 recruiting cycle before the recruits actually get to sign on to their schools of choice. That means that it’s time for the All-America bowls!
Tonight features the Under Armour All-America Bowl, which begins at 5:00 PM Eastern Time. We’ll start the liveblog at 4:45 to get people ready for all the glorious action. The game itself is being played in St. Petersburg, FL, and will air on ESPN.
Two uncommitted players that have shown interest in the Buckeyes are playing this evening – ILB Trey Johnson, and S Vonn Bell.
Several Buckeye commits are playing in tonights game, including:
Recruiting Hotbed
Ken weighs in on the Ohio/Mich*gan recruiting battles-
Last week, there was an article of Massillon Washington H.S. student Gareon Conley committing to Ohio State. This comes after the lad decommitted from TSUN. Of course, this led to some back-and-forth in the comments, generally on the theme of “Ohio H.S. players who commit to play football at TSUN“. I decided to do some brief research to find out if it is ‘Much Ado About Nothing‘, or MAAN.
I thought I’d see if there were something in the profile of Ohio players going to University of Michigan (Michigan). I used Rivals as my source and used the past six years as reference. I based the research on; number of players in Michigan’s signing class, number of players from Ohio, and how many of these Ohio H.S. players were offered by Ohio State. I used the signing classes of 2012-2007, inclusive.
For fun, because this is for fun, I compared Ohio H.S. players that signees with Michigan, that signed with Ohio State and those that had ‘cross-offers’. A cross-offer is where a high school player had offers from Michigan and Ohio State, but chose one or the other.
Below is a brief table, with notes, on the safari through Rivals:
The first three columns should be fairly self-explanatory; number of signees during the period, number of signees from Ohio and the percentage of Ohio signees to total signees.
Summary comments:
During this signing period (2012-2007), I wanted to look at relative Rivals ratings between Michigan and Ohio State signees from Ohio. At first blush the rating difference, Michigan-3.3 stars and Ohio State -3.6 stars seems pretty inconsequential. As expected, combined 4-star and 3-star signees comprised the vast bulk for each university; 92% for Michigan and 93% for Ohio State. Peeling the onion reveals something a bit different. The table below shows the Rivals rankings and number of signees ranked for 2012-2007.
The number of 4* and 3* signees by Ohio State (35, 31 respectively) are fairly well divided. Meanwhile, Michigan’s signees (11, 23) are weighted to the lower end.
It’s quite possible that Michigan and Ohio State’s offers to Ohio high schoolers could be judged on type of talent coming out of high school and each university’s needs. It’s also quite possible, if not more likely, that the ‘not as good players’, based on Rivals rankings, did not get offers from Ohio State, but did Michigan.
A bit of a damper on the July 4th celebration, as Andy Griffith passed away on Tuesday. Since he represented a slice of America for so many folks, it only makes sense that he’d leave us this close to America’s birthday.
Not enough firepower for Urban
Buckeye 411
It looks like Philly native and Friends Central forward Amile Jefferson will finally make the decision of which college to play for Tuesday afternoon. With the late signing period looming Wednesday, it looks like the top 25 prospect has nailed it down to where he wants to go. According to the Philadelphia Inquirer, Jefferson said on Friday that he’s “still looking” at Ohio State, Kentucky, Villanova, N.C. State, and Duke. The Gatorade Player of the Year in the state of Pennsylvania had at one point put the Buckeyes high on his list, but since has seemed to favorite the likes of N.C. State and Duke.The Friends’ Central senior averaged 20 points, 10 rebounds and 2.7 blocks per game in his high school career. The McDonalds All-American has a very good all around game, that best suits him at the power forward position in the college game.
Early on, it looked like Duke and Ohio State would be in a battle to convince Jefferson they were the school for him. But as of late, N.C. State has really put together a push to convince the undersized forward. And now, with one scholarship left for 2012, Calipari is putting in his last sales pitch for Jefferson in Lexington. Back in December, I profiled Jefferson in a 2012 recruiting update:
A lot of what has kept the Jefferson recruiting wheel rolling has to do with the likes of Anthony Bennett, who has yet to sign a Letter of Intent, and might even opt to wait until after the late signing period. Both Power forwards were on the radar of Kentucky and Duke. Jefferson has also continued to explore his options based on probable NBA Draft picks. NC State, who was the most recent to jump in the mix, has a top five class heading to campus in 2012. If they could add Jefferson, they could really be a threat in the ACC right away next season. With the talented C.J. Leslie returning though, many wonder if Jefferson still has them as a favorite heading into Tuesday. I personally believe that Duke would be the perfect fit for Jefferson to develop his game and get immediate playing time. In fact, in due time, he could become the next Eldon Brand or Shane Battier in that program. His skill set really plays into how the Duke program has handled it’s undersized bigs in the past. His game is similar to that Sheldon Williams, Carlos Boozer, Christian Laettner, Leoul Deng and the tons of forwards that have come through the program and made their way to the NBA. All we can hope for is that his announcement doesn’t take as long as former recruit Tony Parker, who selected UCLA after three hours of non-sense. |
Making Fans Already
And the good news keeps rolling, as North Carolina’s Lewis Neal becomes the lucky thirteenth member of the OSU class of 2013.
The 6’3″ Neal is projected as a defensive lineman, and plays weakside end at James Hunt HS in Wilson North Carolina. He visited the ‘Shoe on Saturday for the spring game, which gave us what could easily be the most awesome recruiting photo ever, seen on the right.
Neal’s offer list is a strong one, particularly given that he is rated as a three star by most of the major recruiting sites. He held offers from Clemson, North Carolina, North Carolina State, Tennessee, South Carolina, Wake Forest, Vanderbilt, and Purdue.
After the jump, you can get a better look at his film- great first reaction and tenacity, although the technique is a bit raw (who’s wasn’t in high school?). From what we hear, he’s just now coming into his own in terms of his abilities, and is a hard worker both on and off the field.
It will be interesting to see if Ohio State keeps him on the line or bumps him back to linebacker- our recruiting team seems to think that this commitment more than makes up for Courtney Love’s decision to head to Nebraska over the weekend.
Welcome To Columbus, Mr. Bosa!
Ohio State’s work during their big recruiting weekend continues to roll, as they add the twelfth member of the 2013 class, defensive lineman Joey Bosa from Fort Lauderdale’s St. Thomas Aquinas High School.
Bosa, a four/five star athlete that’s ranked in the top 30 nationally by the major scouting services, is currently plays strong-side defensive end (think John Simon) for STA. The junior is listed as 6’5″ and at 260 pounds, and has amazing Buckeye ties- he’s the nephew of former Ohio State linebacker Eric Kumerow.
Bosa is another OSU verbal with an incredible laundry list of offers from BCS schools, including Alabama, the Big Three schools in Florida, Tennessee, Michigan State, Wisconsin, and Auburn; he made visits to Madison and Ann Arbor last weekend when he also came by Columbus.
When you watch his film (after the jump), it’s hard to not see why Coach Meyer would be so high on him- his strength and athleticism are disruptive for opposing offenses. Having Bosa as a part of the Ohio State team, in addition to the current defensive line and incoming 2012 class makes me weep for B1G offensive coordinators and quarterbacks- Wonder what ACC school Wisconsin will pillage to find their next cannon fodder?
Buckeye Legend, and Legend To Be?
Sorry to be a bit late on this one… we were busy celebrating the Buckeye Spring Game victory/grieving the Buckeye Spring Game loss. As you can imagine, beverages were involved in both scenarios.
Anywho- Since Buckeye Hoops Nation grew by one today, it only made sense that the Football team bring one into the fold as well; and following the Spring Game Pennsylvania Wyomissing’s Alex Anzalone gave his verbal commitment to become the eleventh member of Ohio State’s 2013 recruiting class.
A rumored Buckeye lean for the past few weeks (given his mail, can you blame him?), Anzalone is one of the top rated outside linebackers in the country this year- a four star recruit on all three major scouting services. It might be easier to list the schools that haven’t offered him a scholarship at this point, since his list is a veritable “Who’s Who” of BCS powerhouses that might require Yakko Warner to adequately cover in totality. A short list: Alabama, Florida, Florida State, Georgia, Michigan State, Oklahoma, Penn State, and Southern Cal. Michigan also offered him a scholarship, but I’m sure Wolverine fans will tell you they’d “cooled on him recently”.
A 6’3″ student athlete, Anzalone played both linebacker and running back for his high school- after the jump, you can see his athletic ability on display (as well as his team’s ridiculous looking helmets… can’t win them all). I’m most impressed with his work on offense, his speed is evident as he pulls away from folks on numerous runs, and he will deliver punishment running the ball equally as easily as he does on D.
