Posts under: Blog

School in the News: Ohio State

Zach Harrison

It was announced today that Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer is “retiring” after the Rose Bowl. (Afterward, he will probably take off a year, let people forget how he housed a domestic abuser, and then take a job as the head coach at Penn State or Florida State.)

Regardless, OSU will be led by 39-year-old offensive coordinator Ryan Day going forward. Day was 3-0 as the interim head coach during the beginning of the 2018 season, when Meyer was suspended for being a big jerk.

On the recruiting front, I doubt many committed prospects will start to jump ship, because the continuity is going to be there. I would imagine Day will keep most of the staff, even if the ax falls on defensive coordinator Greg Schiano. But since this is a site so heavily centered on recruiting, it’s worth taking a look at the Buckeye commits with Michigan offers:

• 4-star S Jordan Battle
• 3-star LB Steele Chambers
• 4-star ATH Ronnie Hickman
• 3-star OT Ryan Jacoby
• 4-star C Harry Miller
• 4-star DE Noah Potter
• 4-star LB Cade Stover
• 4-star WR Jameson Williams

Of those prospects, Michigan was only highly involved with Chambers. For a while it looked like Chambers, a Georgia native, might be a Michigan lean. I really like Cade Stover (a Ben Gedeon clone) and Ronnie Hickman, too, but Stover is a native Ohioan and Hickman never paid Michigan a ton of attention.

Most significantly, the departure of Meyer may push defensive end Zach Harrison harder toward Michigan. There have been varying rumors in the past couple weeks, some that he was leaning toward Michigan and some that he was leaning toward the home-state Buckeyes. Harrison is a 5-star prospect and a top-notch athlete. Of course, the possibility has been out there for a while that Meyer might be on his last legs at Ohio State, but the slight uncertainty of a first-time head coach might be enough to settle the issue once and for all in Harrison’s mind that he wants to pick Michigan.

Ex-Wolverine Updates: Championship Game Week

Damien Harris (image via USA Today)

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DECOMMITMENTS

Damien Harris, RB (Alabama): Harris ran 9 times for 52 yards and caught 1 pass for -1 yard in a 35-28 win over Georgia, giving Alabama the SEC Championship.

Jeremiah Holloman, WR (Georgia): Holloman caught 2 passes for 37 yards in a 35-28 loss to Alabama.

Rashad Weaver, DE (Pitt): Weaver made 1 tackle, 1 tackle for loss, and 1 pass breakup in a 42-10 loss to Clemson in the ACC Championship.

Mike Weber, RB (Ohio State): Weber ran 17 times for 51 yards and caught 3 passes for 21 yards in a 45-24 win over Northwestern, giving the Buckeyes the Big Ten Championship.

FORMER COACHES

Brady Hoke, Defensive Line Coach (Carolina Panthers): Hoke was fired after the Panthers’ 24-17 loss to the Tampa Bay Buccaneers on Sunday. The Panthers are 6-6.

Scott Shafer, Defensive Coordinator (Middle Tennessee): A week after holding UAB to 3 points in a victory, Middle Tennessee’s defense gave up 27 points and lost the Conference-USA Championship game to UAB, 27-25.

2021 Recruiting Update: December 3, 2018

Pickerington (OH) Central WR Lorenzo Styles, Jr. (image via Irish Sports Daily)

It’s been a while since I’ve done a recruiting update on the 2021 class. That’s because they’re over two years away from signing. But now it’s time to catch up on everything we’ve missed. These aren’t necessarily “new” offers, but nobody else is doing recruiting updates on 2021 prospects, so you probably haven’t heard of many of these players.

ADDED TO THE BOARD: 2021

Christian Abraham – CB – Paramus (NJ) Catholic: Abraham is a 5’11”, 195 lb. prospect with an offer from Rutgers. That’s the alma mater of Jabrill Peppers, Rashan Gary, and Drew Singleton, though the former two are gone to the NFL, and Singleton announced he would transfer. Michigan does still have safeties coach Chris Partridge, who was the head coach at Paramus.

Hayden Conner – OT – Katy (TX) Taylor: Conner is a 6’5″, 298 lb. prospect with offers from Georgia, LSU, and Texas, among others. He’s the 247 Sports 4-star, the #5 offensive tackle, and #27 overall.

Hit the jump for a bunch of other offers.

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Jim McElwain, Ex-Wolverine

Jim McElwain

Michigan wide receivers coach Jim McElwain will reportedly be the new head coach at Central Michigan. McElwain spent just one season in Ann Arbor after previously being the head coach at Florida and Colorado State, along with being an offensive coordinator at Alabama. Central Michigan fired head coach John Bonamego at the end of the season, a 1-11 year and the worst in program history (Bonamego was 7-6, 6-7, and 8-5 the previous three seasons).

McElwain appeared to do a good job as the wide receivers coach this season. I heard positive reports from behind the scenes about his personality. And on the field, his charges performed well. While they didn’t put up huge numbers, they generally caught the balls that came to them and created some big plays. Donovan Peoples-Jones was a third team all-conference player (39 catches, 541 yards, 7 TD), Nico Collins had a breakout season (33 catches, 552 yards, 6 TD), and freshman Ronnie Bell was a low-ranked prospect who came in and caught 8 passes for 145 yards and 2 touchdowns.

It’s unclear how much McElwain was involved in play calling, since Michigan did not name an offensive coordinator this season. It has been assumed that McElwain, Pep Hamilton, and Ed Warinner all had some say in game planning, along with head coach Jim Harbaugh. McElwain also has not been known as an ace recruiter, so he should not be missed too much in that respect, either.

It’s too early to tell who will emerge as a possible replacement. Graduate assistant Roy Roundtree (a former Wolverine wide receiver) came to Michigan this season to work with the position, but his resume is rather thin after one year at Michigan and previously having coached at Indiana State. I would be very surprised if Michigan promoted him to the open wide receivers coach gig, except perhaps as a short-term replacement through the bowl game and for recruiting purposes.

Who should be in the College Football Playoff?

Kyler Murray

I’ve seen a lot of debate about this topic, and the debate is borderline ridiculous to me. So I thought I would bring it to you readers for your thoughts.

Which four teams belong in the College Football Playoff?

My thoughts:

#1 Alabama: They’re 13-0 and won the SEC Championship. Their non-conference schedule was a joke (Louisiana-Lafayett, The Citadel, Arkansas State, Louisville), but they handled their business against SEC opponents and beat everyone on their schedule.

#2 Clemson: They’re 13-0 and won the ACC Championship. They had two solid non-conference games (a 56-35 win over South Carolina and a 28-26 win over Texas A&M). Their only other close game, aside from playing A&M, was barely beating a Syracuse team when the Tigers were down to their #3 quarterback (Kelly Bryant transferred, Trevor Lawrence got hurt).

#3 Notre Dame: They’re 12-0 with no conference championship game. They have some solid wins, but nothing great. However, they scheduled some tough teams (Michigan, USC, Virginia Tech, Stanford); it’s just that three of those four teams had down years (USC, Virginia Tech, Stanford).

#4 Oklahoma: No, they don’t play defense, but they’re 12-1 and avenged their one loss in the Big 12 Championship game. That was against a solid Texas team. Otherwise, they played some tight games, but that loss to Texas was better than the Purdue loss for . . .

#5 Ohio State: Yes, the Buckeyes won the Big Ten Championship, but their loss to 6-6 Purdue was not only a big letdown, but it was a blowout loss. The Buckeyes have the potential to beat those other teams in the top four, but the big-play guys for the top four would gash OSU more so than the all but Oklahoma. (For the record, I don’t have strong feelings about whether Oklahoma or OSU should be in the CFP – I think both would lose to Alabama in the first game.)

#6 UCF: UCF beat everyone on their schedule. They even won their conference championship without their starting quarterback.

#7 Georgia: This is the biggest, dumbest debate I’ve seen. Georgia played Alabama close, but they have already proven they can lose to TWO teams. How could you name a national champion who has two losses when three teams only have one? For example, should a 2-loss Georgia team be named national champions above a 1-loss Alabama team who split the season series between the two? The Patriots were 16-0 in the regular season before losing to the 10-6 Giants, and yet the Giants were the Super Bowl champs and go down in history as the best team that year. I don’t care if Georgia “looks” like a top-four team, because that’s subjective. What’s not subjective is that this season, they were worse than Alabama and worse than 9-3 LSU when it came time to playing those teams. They had a chance to settle the issue on the field, and they didn’t do it.