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Unfazed By Competition, Joe McGuire Worked to “Always Be Ready” for Opportunity to Punt at Ohio State
Joe McGuire wasn’t bothered when Ohio State brought in two new players to compete for the Buckeyes’ starting punter job this offseason.
When Jesse Mirco transferred to Vanderbilt for his final season of college football, McGuire initially looked like the clear choice to succeed Mirco as punter. As the only returning punter on Ohio State’s roster from last season, McGuire’s only competition for the punting job when spring began came from fellow walk-ons Hadi Jawad and Austin Snyder, neither of whom was viewed as a serious contender.
Ohio State held a three-way competition for the punting job in preseason camp, however, after signing Nick McLarty as a scholarship player and adding Anthony Venneri, the starting punter at Buffalo for the last two years, as a walk-on through the transfer portal. McGuire understood the decision to bring them in and approached the competition as an opportunity to get better.
“I was the only punter here at the time, really, so I was expecting it,” McGuire said. “And if that's what they think makes the team better, then great. Because at the end of the day, we just want to win. And if that's what they want to give us the best chance to win, then so be it. As they say here, iron sharpens iron. So having good competition is good for all three of us, I think.”
Going into the Buckeyes’ first game week of the season, it appeared as though McGuire had lost the punting job to McLarty, who was named Ohio State’s starting punter by Ryan Day just nine days before the season opener. But after McGuire had what Day described as a “much better week of practice” than McLarty leading up to last week’s season opener against Akron, Day called an audible and told McGuire that he would be the Buckeyes’ starting punter instead.
McGuire never stopped preparing for the possibility that he would be called upon to punt in the first game or any game, so it didn’t take him long to refocus himself on being the starter.
“I was pretty excited,” McGuire said Wednesday when asked how he reacted when he received the news from Day. “I mean, I've been training pretty hard so that no matter when my number's called, I'm ready. You never know what could happen in a game. So I work to always be ready for the occasion. So yeah, I was excited initially, and then I just sort of thought, ‘All right, I got to get myself ready and perform.’”
“I've been training pretty hard so that no matter when my number's called, I'm ready. You never know what could happen in a game. So I work to always be ready for the occasion.”– Joe McGuire on his preparation to punt
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