It wasn’t easy choosing which Ohio State players we’d most want to have on our team this year. Ohio State’s star-studded lineup for the 2024 season gave us plenty of options to choose from as we conducted our annual Real Pod Wednesdays draft to build head-to-head lineups for a hypothetical game of Buckeyes vs. Buckeyes between our two hosts. Eleven…

Ohio State’s quest for the No. 1 recruiting class in 2025 is looking more and more real. The Buckeyes have strengthened their position at the top of the team composite recruiting rankings, currently leading No. 2 Alabama by nearly 20 points, by landing commitments from 11 prospects since the start of June: running backs Bo Jackson and Isaiah West, …

Sports have always played an important part in Ted Carter’s life, but he’s come to understand just how much they mean to Ohio State fans in his first six months as OSU’s president. Just before the halfway point of his year as the leader of The Ohio State University, Carter sat down with us for a 30-minute conversation last week to talk about his fi…

The Big Ten will officially expand to 18 teams next week. Oregon, Washington, USC and UCLA will officially become members of the conference on Monday, bringing in a new era for what’s traditionally been a Midwest-based conference. From a football standpoint, the Big Ten’s newest round of expansion should immediately make the conference more competi…

Gene Smith is ready for the next chapter of his life. Less than two weeks away from his retirement, Ohio State’s athletic director says he isn’t having any second thoughts about his decision to move on at the end of the month. After 19 years leading OSU’s athletic department, Smith feels ready to move to Arizona, play more golf and spend more time …

While Ohio State’s primary focus right now is on competing for a national championship in 2024, it’s also working toward building its roster for the future. With high school football camps and official visits ongoing at Ohio State this month, the Buckeyes are in the heart of their efforts to build their 2025 recruiting class. Those efforts have gon…

The busiest recruiting month of the year is underway. Ohio State has already hosted its first 10 official visitors of June, netting the Buckeyes their first commitment of the month from running back Bo Jackson. Camp season begins at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center on Wednesday as the Buckeyes will host seven high school football camps – five skill …

College sports are about to change in a big way. As part of a settlement of three antitrust lawsuits last week, the NCAA committed to allowing schools to share revenue with their athletes beginning in 2025, ending the NCAA’s longstanding ban on schools paying athletes. We spend this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays discussing why it was time f…

There hasn’t been much that’s noteworthy in Ohio State’s spring transfer portal movement. The Buckeyes added some key depth at safety in the form of South Carolina’s Keenan Nelson Jr., but no players that will make an immediate impact have been or appear likely to be added to the team in the second portal window. With Dan Hope on vacation, Eleven W…

Depth could be as important as it's ever been for college football’s national championship contenders in 2024. With the eventual national championship game participants facing the possibility of playing as many as 16 or 17 games this season, Ohio State coach Ryan Day said this spring the Buckeyes need to have depth they can rely on at every positio…

The spring transfer portal window has come and gone without Ohio State losing any key players. Six players from Ohio State entered the portal during the spring window, but none of them – running back Dallan Hayden, wide receiver Kyion Grayes, guard Enokk Vimahi, linebacker Nigel Glover and safeties Ja’Had Carter and Cedrick Hawkins – were in line t…

The post-spring transfer window has been quiet so far for Ohio State football but plenty busy for Ohio State men’s basketball. While there’s still one week to go in the post-spring transfer window for college football, Ohio State has seen just two players leave the program since the end of spring practice. That goes hand in hand with what’s been a …

Spring football showcased how much talent Ohio State has on its 2024 roster, but two of the biggest question marks surrounding this year’s Buckeyes. Quarterback and offensive line have been the biggest positions of concern for Ohio State dating back to this time last season, and that didn’t change this spring. While Will Howard still looks like the…

Ohio State’s spring game will be headlined by a quarterback competition for the second year in a row. While Will Howard entered the spring as the frontrunner to start at quarterback, the competition has heated up over the past five weeks. Not only is Devin Brown pushing Howard for the starting job, but true freshman Julian Sayin is becoming a real …

There’s been no shortage of Ohio State football and basketball happenings over the past week. On the gridiron, Ohio State has now completed 10 of its 15 spring practices, highlighted by its Student Appreciation Day scrimmage on Saturday. Jeremiah Smith and C.J. Hicks are among the Buckeyes turning heads on the practice field while quarterback and o…

The offseason is officially underway for both Ohio State basketball teams. Ohio State’s men’s basketball season ended Tuesday with the Buckeyes’ loss to Georgia in the NIT quarterfinals while the women’s basketball season concluded with an upset defeat to Duke in the second round of the NCAA Tournament. While both teams had hopes of continuing thei…

Ohio State men’s basketball has a new head coach while Ohio State football has an unexpected opening for a running backs coach. Both teams have championship expectations. The Ohio State basketball coaching search ended over the weekend when Jake Diebler was promoted from interim coach to head coach. While Diebler has never been a full-time head coa…

It’s a season-defining week for Ohio State men’s basketball. The Buckeyes are headed to the Big Ten Tournament with a chance to earn their way into the NCAA Tournament, but they’ll need to win at least two games in Minneapolis – which means beating an equally desperate Iowa team and a top-15-ranked Illinois team – to have a real shot of landing a s…

Ohio State doesn’t have as many holes to fill this spring as it usually does, but there’s still plenty to talk about after the Buckeyes’ first spring practice. The biggest headlines from the first day of spring practice included Sonny Styles’ move to linebacker, Luke Montgomery starting the spring as the first-team right guard and Devin Brown getti…

The start of spring football is less than one week away, Ohio State men’s basketball could play its way back into NCAA Tournament contention, a frontrunner has emerged in Ohio State’s coaching search and the NFL Scouting Combine is underway. That gives us a lot of ground to cover on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays, and we discussed it al…

There’s finally something positive to talk about with Ohio State men’s basketball. After struggling through most of January and February in Chris Holtmann’s final weeks as head coach, the Buckeyes started Jake Diebler’s interim coaching tenure off with a bang by upsetting No. 2 Purdue, 73-69, to earn their biggest win of the season in their first g…

What will Chip Kelly bring to Ohio State’s offense? We called in our X’s and O’s expert to help us break it down. Eleven Warriors football scheme analyst Kyle Jones joins us on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays for an in-depth conversation on what Ohio State’s offense could look like with Kelly calling the plays as the Buckeyes’ new offens…

A lot has happened in Ohio State football over the last five weeks, and Ryan Day still has to hire at least one more coach for the 2024 season. Ohio State reporters had their first chance to ask Day about everything that’s happened as he held his first press conference since the Cotton Bowl on Wednesday, giving us a lot to talk about on this week’s…

We begin this week’s episode by talking about the big news of the week up in Ann Arbor, where Sherrone Moore is now the head coach following Jim Harbaugh’s departure. While we agree that Moore was the right choice to succeed Harbaugh, we foresee a challenging season ahead for the defending national champions as they replace their head coach, severa…

Ohio State’s big start to the offseason got even bigger over the past week. The Buckeyes added the best safety in the country to their roster with the transfer of former Alabama safety Caleb Downs. They added the top quarterback in the 2024 recruiting class with the transfer of former Alabama quarterback Julian Sayin. And they added an offensive co…

The Ohio State football team’s 2024 roster is loaded – especially on defense. With TreVeyon Henderson, Emeka Egbuka, Donovan Jackson, Jack Sawyer, JT Tuimoloau, Tyleik Williams, Denzel Burke, Jordan Hancock and Lathan Ransom all choosing to stay at Ohio State for another year rather than enter the 2024 NFL draft, Ohio State’s roster could be the be…

The past week has been full of both good and bad news for Ohio State. Michigan won the national championship on Monday, forcing Buckeye fans to watch their archrival celebrate college football’s biggest prize. On a better note for the Buckeyes, Ohio State added three key pieces via the transfer portal to its offense over the past week: Former Kansa…

Ohio State’s offensive performance in the Cotton Bowl was unlike any we had seen since Ryan Day came to Columbus. The Buckeyes’ three points and 203 yards of offense against Missouri were both by far the worst totals put up by an Ohio State offense in any game since OSU’s 2016 College Football Playoff semifinal loss to Clemson. That game, in which …

Ohio State’s 2023 season finale has arrived. While the Buckeyes aren’t playing for a national championship as hoped, they still have an intriguing matchup to wrap up the year as they take on No. 9 Missouri in the Cotton Bowl on Friday. While the game might mean more to Missouri than it does to Ohio State, the Buckeyes are still plenty motivated to …

A crazy National Signing Day meant we had to re-record Real Pod Wednesdays. Ohio State signed all but one player it was supposed to – that is, assuming Jeremiah Smith ultimately submits his National Letter of Intent, which he hadn‘t yet as of Wednesday night – but the twists and turns of the day, which unfolded amid Ryan Day’s press conference, wer…

With one week to go until National Signing Day and two weeks to go until the Cotton Bowl, Ohio State is simultaneously preparing to play its final game of the 2023 season and working to fill holes on its 2024 roster. We start this week‘s episode with some Cotton Bowl-related conversation after speaking with 11 Ohio State players on Tuesday. We talk…

Now that Kyle McCord is in the transfer portal, the biggest question surrounding Buckeye football is who will replace him as Ohio State’s starting quarterback. Plan A might be bringing in a transfer quarterback – and we see Washington State’s Cam Ward as Option A – but we also think Devin Brown and Lincoln Kienholz are both viable candidates to sta…

It’s not quite as easy to pinpoint what went wrong against Michigan this time around. In 2021, Ohio State lost because it couldn’t run the ball or stop the run. In 2022, Ohio State lost because it gave up five touchdowns of 45 yards or more. This year, the Buckeyes needed to be just a little bit better across the board. Unfortunately for Ryan Day a…

It’s all about The Game on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays. Typically, we start each week’s episode of RPW by breaking down the previous week’s game before previewing the next opponent. This week, however, we jump right into previewing Ohio State’s season-defining rivalry game with Michigan, weaving in a few takeaways from the Buckeyes’ …

Ohio State still has to beat Minnesota this week, but we’re already looking ahead to The Game. While the Buckeyes are keeping their focus on the task at hand of beating the Golden Gophers, we aren’t expecting Ohio State to face much resistance from Minnesota in the final home game of the season. Next week’s game at Michigan, however, will make or b…

Ohio State might be making a habit of winning ugly, but it still covered the spread in Piscataway. The Buckeyes had their most competitive game ever against Rutgers this year but still came away with a 35-16 win, and we felt there was more good than bad to take away from Ohio State’s performance – even if it wasn’t the most prolific day for the Buc…

Ohio State football is the No. 1 team in the country as it enters the final month of the regular season while Ohio State basketball season begins next week. We talk about both sports on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays, though our discussion mostly centers around the football Buckeyes, who earned the top spot in the initial College Footba…

Ohio State’s defense keeps getting better. The Buckeyes had their most impressive defensive performance of the season yet as they held Penn State to just one touchdown and one third-down conversion in a 20-12 victory that was good for Ohio State’s second top-10 win of the season. We begin this week’s episode by discussing what impressed us most in …

Ohio State played one of its most complete games of the season against Purdue, but a much bigger test awaits this week against Penn State. We spend the first half of this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays breaking down what impressed us most from Ohio State’s 41-7 rout of Purdue, including the performance of Dallan Hayden (and why Ohio State sh…

Ohio State has a defensive-driven team for the first time in Ryan Day’s tenure. Five games into the 2023 season, it’s become increasingly clear that the Buckeyes’ defense is their strength this year. The Buckeyes currently rank in the top 10 nationally in points allowed per game (3rd), yards allowed per play (4th) and yards allowed per game (8th), …

Maryland is better than all but one team Ohio State has played so far this season, but are the Terrapins good enough to actually challenge the Buckeyes for a win? The Buckeyes don’t have any easy games in October, and that starts this week with Maryland, who has won its first five games of the season. We’re not sure the Terrapins are as good as the…

We’ve never seen Ryan Day as fired up as he was after Ohio State’s win over Notre Dame on Saturday. Usually calmer and more reserved, Day used both his postgame interview with NBC and his postgame press conference to fire back at Lou Holtz for comments the former Notre Dame coach made one day before the game, in which Holtz predicted that Notre Dam…

Ohio State’s first big game of the season has arrived, and the Buckeyes look to be hitting their stride at the right time. The Buckeyes face a big step up in competition this week against Notre Dame, which will serve as this year’s first real test of how good Ohio State actually is. That said, the Buckeyes are entering the game with momentum on the…

Ohio State’s quarterback competition is now complete, but the pressure is increasing for the Buckeyes to find their A-game. Tuesday’s press conference at Ohio State brought the expected news that Kyle McCord would remain the Buckeyes’ starting quarterback going forward, bringing an end to the competition between McCord and Devin Brown that extended…

Ohio State’s first game of the 2023 season gave us plenty to talk about. While the Buckeyes were never in danger of losing and came back from Indiana with a 1-0 record and a Big Ten road win, Ohio State and its fans were left generally unsatisfied with the team’s performance on offense after the Buckeyes scored just two touchdowns in a 23-3 win. Th…

Ohio State finally has a starting quarterback and the 2023 season is about to begin. That gives us plenty of topics for conversation on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays. We start today’s show by evaluating Ohio State’s decision to name Kyle McCord the starting quarterback and how likely he is to be the starter all year long. We also asses…

Ohio State’s first game of the 2023 season is 10 days away, but the Buckeyes still don’t have a quarterback. With it now appearing likely that Ohio State’s quarterback competition will continue into the start of the season, we start this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays by weighing what we make of the Buckeyes still not picking a starter, when…

While Ohio State hasn’t yet named a new starting quarterback, Real Pod Wednesdays has named a new co-host. In his first episode sharing co-hosting duties with Dan, we introduce you to new Eleven Warriors reporter Andy Anders, who outlines his journey from posting in the 11W forums to becoming a full-time member of the staff. Then, we get into our u…

Ohio State is nearly one week into preseason camp and two more teams are leaving the Pac-12 for the Big Ten. That gives us plenty to talk about on this week’s episode of Real Pod Wednesdays as Chase Brown joins Dan Hope to discuss the most notable things we’ve seen and heard during the first six days of preseason camp and weigh the pros and cons of…

Ohio State’s current football players are about to return to the practice field while there’s been no shortage of happenings – both good and bad – impacting the Buckeyes on the recruiting trail over the past month. With all of that to talk about as well as a new wave of conference realignment starting, Garrick Hodge returns to Real Pod Wednesdays t…