Ohio State-Miami: Top Recruiting Hauls Meet In Columbus

(Week 2 is a showdown weekend across the college football landscape, including several big non-league clashes for the Big 10. We continue our series of sneak peaks at the league’s out of conference games with a little July perspective on the big one that day in Columbus between the Buckeyes and Hurricanes. Previous installments of the series can be found here. )

Everyone remembers the last time Miami and Ohio State met on the football field. The Buckeyes beat Miami in the 2003 BCS National Title Game. Maurice Clarett, to this day,  is still keeping himself in high stead with the cigarettes by regaling his tales and legends from this contest during motivational speeches he gives the various cellblocks as part of his prison job. One of the most popular: Justifiable Assault: The Story Of Cie Grant And Ken Dorsey. Even the most novice inmate lawyer knows there’s a justifable defense in there somewhere, but it’s still such a cool story that it’s easily the heaviest attended of his speeches. So much so that the Ohio Corrections Department actually receives a state grant for extra security and they bus in convicts from state pens across the Buckeye state to hear his words. Clarett would rather recite some of his personal favorite bits, lincluding Real World Applications: What I Learned From The Canes;  From Wine Coolers To Goose, Going Hardcore In 6 Easy Steps; and I’m Taking My Talents To Stuebenville,  but some of those are just too dry and clinical, more for the convention scene. Besides, Mo-C is all about the fans, so he gives them what they want.

How many people, though, remember their other most recent head-to-head matchup? Does the 1999 season opener ring any bells?  It was played in the now defunct Kickoff Classic game that, along with the Pigskin Classic, broke the seal on the new season a week before the first scheduled week of fulltime action. An August oasis of football, so close to the finishing line of the dry off season. What a perfect idea. The Kickoff Classic was always played in Meadowlands in the shadow of New York City. Armed with your favorite underneath a hot August sun cliche, lets go into the Wayback Machine for a quick trip to that summer afternoon 11 years ago.

The Buckeyes had just finished an elite run of four years where they did virtually everything but win a national championship. Some killer losses to Michigan during that stretch probably kept them from winning a national crown. They had lost only two regular season games to anyone other other than the Wolverines. NFL Draft Day had become a celebration of riches for Buckeye players. Miami, meanwhile, was granted to have had a load of budding talent, but hadn’t competed much on the national level in the wake of their 1995 probabtion. The stars of this team included, all underclassmen, Najeh Davenport, Jeremy Jackson, Santana Moss, Reggie Wayne, Dan Morgan, Nate Webster and Mike Rulph. Ken Dorsey was a year away from starting. Ed Reed was a year away from arriving on campus. But plenty of pieces were already in place. We had seen a glimpse of it in the season finale the prior season when an Edgerrin James powered Cane outfit upset undefeated UCLA, knocking the Bruins out of the national title picture. James had bolted for the NFL, but the Canes still had enough untapped talent to throttle the Buckeyes that day 23-12, in a game that was never less than a double digit spread the entire second half. At this time in the college football world it was a seismic outcome to see Ohio State not only lose this early in the season, but also as decisively as they did. 

Despite losing a nice core from their 1998 Rose Bowl Champion team the season before, the Buckeyes had been installed as 5-point chalkChalk is another name for the favorite team to win. that day. I dont think most people knew just how mediocre that Buckeye team, which eventually didnt even make it to a bowl game, would be. How many guesses would the OSU fan on the street need to guess who the starting QB was in that game? How many of them would even recognize Austin Moherman’s name? And I know we werent thinking the Canes as a legit contender for national honors. But even though they had a couple dozen or so more losses than OSU over the previous four seasons, they had more talent in their starting lineup that day than the Bucks. Who knew? It took another season before the Canes put up a national title contending season, but it became clear against OSU that day that the Canes were officially on the rise. Of their four 1999 losses, one came to Penn State, who owned the top ranking from the start of the year through their upset loss to Minnesota in Novemer, and two others came to Florida State and Virginia Tech who squared off against each other for the national championship. Over the next three seasons, Miami only lost two total games.

The second of which, of course, was to the Buckeyes in that aforementioned title game. The roles had been reversed. Miami was the elite of the elite, while OSU, after three average seasons, was trying to re-establish its place at the head table. And, like in 1999, the winner extended on a long run of unparalled success (OSU has won 5 league titles in a row and six straight against the hated Wolverines) while the loser for a variety of reasons sagged back into the depths of the middle class and December, at best, bowl destinations. The Canes bottomed out on their end of this trend going 13-14 from 2006-07.

This bizarre torch passing of their place among the game’s elite class has become the historical pattern for this series. Will it repeat itself this season? Is OSU the power thats fading and we just dont know it. Are the Canes crafting another era of collegiate football dominance? Will this game spark those forces into action? Eh, I dont know. I dont see OSU going anywhere. They’re offense is on the come and the key pieces will still be in place next year. And, well, I just cant envision this program’s defense ever falling off the charts. But, I do think the Canes might be growing into a national power. They’re loaded with young, yet experienced talent. They too will still have just about every key piece in place for 2012. But can they ever navigate the always competitive ACC and miss all the underrated landmines thrown at them? Look at their slate this year. Non league games at OSU and Pitt, the brutal Atlantic Division round robin with Virginia Tech, Georgia Tech and North Carolina, all legit top-20 or better teams, games at Clemson and at home against Florida State. That’s seven really talented teams. Does anybody else in the country have a more grueling hardest seven games? I doubt it. This team could go 8-4 and still have a lot of good things on its resume.

BATTLE OF TOP END RECRUITING CLASSES

The talent level, at least per recruiting gurus’ marks, is pretty even. The upperclassmen on these teams are from the 2006-08 recruiting classes. Per Rivlas, each of these years  OSU only finsihed a spot or two higher than Miami each time in the recruiting rankings. Of course, the Buckeyes added those classes to an on-going talent factory. They were just reloading. Miami is using these classes as a way to re-open their talent factory. They’re rebuilding with these crews and they improved from 5 to 7 to 9 wins heading into the year. The 2008 recruiting cycle was a gold mine for both clubs. This matchup represents in many ways the #4 ranked recruiting class of OSU vs the #5 ranked recruiting class of Miami. Both talent hauls are in bloom with the cores of both teams locked down by players enterting their third year in college from those high end classes.

On offense for Ohio State, you only have 5-star players Terrelle Pryor and Devar Posey from that class. Pryor was the top ranked recruit in 2008. The Bucks have two more 5-stars from 2008 on the line with Mike Brewster and Mike Adams. JB Shugarts, a 2008 4-star joins them up front after starting 10 games a year ago. They’ll be knocking heads with a Cane D that’s equipped with six starters who were either a 5- or 4-star recruit from the very same recruiting class: DE Marcus Robinson, DE Marcus Forston, LBs Sean Spence and Raymond Buchanan, CB Brandon Harris and S Vaughn Telemaque. All are returning fulltime starters except for Buchanan, but he played in every game a year ago and did start twice when Spence was out with an injury.  The OSU offense has been a steady work in process with Pryor under center and could be primed for big things in Year 3. The Cane defense has been a steady work in process having inserted the talented 2008 freshmen class almost instantly and, after improving their points allowed from 26 ppg to 22.2 during their first two years, are they also primed for big things in Year 3? Two of the most intriguing sides of the ball in the college game will be meeting in this one.

When the roles are reversed and the Canes have the ball, they’ll be led by Jacory Harris, a 4-star 2008 recruit. One of his most dagerous targets is Travis Benjamin a fellow 4-star recruit from that class. As for the OSU defense, they’ll be abosrbing three of their five new starters on D from the 2008 class: DE Nathan Williams, LB Etienne Sabino and DB Orhian Johnson.  We’ve seen enough of Williams in more than spot duty to know he can play. But Sabino and Johnson have barely seen the field. Are these legit question marks for OSU? Something tells me there is an option or two in place if these cats dont work out right away, but we’ll see. The bottomline is you would expect top-5 recruiting classes to be moving into championship contention by the time their respective upperclassmen years begin. While only OSU is being given a chance at the BCS title among these two, both are favorites to win their conference. The Bucks are significant 2/3 to win the Big 10 automatic BCS bid while the Canes get the slight nod from the betting public right now in ACC futures at +275 with Virginia Tech at 3/1 and Florida State and UNC at 6/1. This series may not look as sexy as the Bucks two game wars they’ve had recently with Texas and USC. But with the 2008 classes at both schools looking more than on track to live up to their top-5 recruiting billing, its a gift for football fans that these programs will be knocking heads in 2010 and 2011 during their third and fourth year on campus.

UH, THIS IS GETTING TL;DR, DO YOU HAVE A LEAN OR SOMETHING? WHAT’S YOUR POINT?

The Bucks are signinicant favorites in this game as well. On-lines are offering a price of OSU -8 as we approach the 50-day window until kickoff. I think that’s a little too high. I think we’re seeing some lingering perceptions based on the last snapshot we got from these teams during bowl season. Miami was rolled by Wisconsin while Ohio State upset Oregon in the Rose Bowl with Terrelle Pryor showing Heisman Trophy contending caliber play. But had it happened the other way around, then Miami is coming off a 10-win season and OSU is the same old Buckeye squad that cant win big out of conference games. They’d probably still be chalkChalk is another name for the favorite team to win. in this game, but not by this much. And certainly, the Canes would be getting top 10 hype, instead of a boring old ranking in the teens or low 20s. I just think those games are about as irrelevant as you can get when handicapping this game. Miami, because Jacory Harris is a more accomplished passer than Jeromiah Masoli, should have more offensive success than the Ducks did. Michigan, on the arm of freshmen Tate Forcier has no trouble generating offense through the air. Neither will Harris and if he can avoid the tunrover bug–a big IF for a player with a 36-25 TD-Int ratio over his career–then the Canes might stroll out of the Shoe with a win.  At the very least, the points they can get in the passing game will have them in this contest the whole way. They’re 12-8 ATS as a road dog, while the Bucks at 9-10 ATS at home the last three seasons arent exactly a profit mill at the Shoe. This might be one of the more talented underdogs to come into Columbus during that stretch. I dont think you can give them more than a touchdown headstart and expect to come out with a winning ticket. We’re not booking anything just yet, but we’d be lying if we said we’re not interested in taking a chance with the Canes here.

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