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2025 Season: Are You Ready For Some Football?

Good analysis by Ramzy Nasralla for 11W of what went wrong in 2025:

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Four Reasons Why

The NFL Combine was a healthy dose of confirmation bias.

Everything that transpired in Indy over the weekend simply reinforced what you've either heard, read or said yourself for weeks. How did the Buckeyes lose back-to-back games to end its season with these guys on the team?

This is the type of angst that can consume you forever, like all of those other seasons piled up in Ohio State's reviled Squandered Season cabinet that leak out every offseason. So let's bury 2025. A righteous cleansing, because lot of you (not you, reader) are way into your feelings too often.

We'll start with the hardest lesson in 136 years of Ohio State football, which is that even if the lessons of 2025 are learned and retained, college football is now changing at a velocity which may render them artifacts rather than principles in short order. Planning to build something meaningful in two or three seasons is a wasted effort. Win now is every program's mandate.

The Buckeyes are not going to solve how last season collapsed in winter so that 2026 turns out differently, because it's a whole new team, which will have a seasoned OC calling plays and an actual proven coordinator for the third unit, which has been an anchor on the program since the pandemic. Those NFL Combine highlight machines will be wearing different helmets.

The head coach, several faces and all of the expectations remain the same. It's time to cleanse ourselves of 2025 - here are the four reasons the Buckeyes didn't go back-to-back as CFP champions:
  • Special Teams [Field Goals, punting, a just-get-off-the-field mentality creating a huge deficit of hidden yards and costly penalties - a mediocre dynamic now as entrenched in the program as Wide Receiver U]
    • Remedy: Robbie Discher hired. First qualified hire for that role since Matt Barnes in 2019.
  • Offensive Philosophy & Execution [failing to accommodate for an inexperienced QB against talent-equated opponents, chronic Red Zone inefficiencies not involving the aforementioned Field Goal kicker, sticking with long-developing routes while OL was in shambles, dialing up a critical 3rd down conversion for TE4 while benching WRs, sticking with a silent count vs. Miami, lack of game control agility vis a vis When It's Time to Turn Up the Gas, We Will]
    • Remedy: Arthur Smith hired, Cortez Hankton hired.
  • Talent Evaluation [critical misses, notably Ethan Onianwa as the program's biggest whiff in the portal era, inflated impression of TE room's capabilities, RB4 was RB1 to start the season, a walk-on was WR4 at WRU to end the season]
    • Remedy: A work in progress, always.
  • Personnel Decisions[allowing a first-time play-caller to run the offense, which had negative effects on his position group and the offense, his departure the week of the B1G championship, hiring an OL coach who is more specialized in other elements of the offense than OL coaching]
    • Remedy: Prepare for uninvited chaos.
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Congressional Medal Of Honor

Trump awards Medal of Honor to 3 soldiers

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President Donald Trump awarded the Medal of Honor to three soldiers Monday, recognizing a service member from World War II, Vietnam and Afghanistan, respectively.

On Thursday, the White House announced that Master Sgt. Roderick “Roddie” Edmonds, retired Command Sgt. Maj. Terry Richardson and Staff Sgt. Michael Ollis would receive the award for the nation’s highest military award for valor.
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2027 SC DB Joshua Dobson (Verbal Offer)

Lane Kiffin and the LSU Tigers predicted to land elite 5-star recruit over some of college football’s top programs​

The LSU Tigers may be on the verge of getting some good recruiting news.

Lane Kiffin and the LSU Tigers may be on the verge of winning a huge recruiting battle.

On3’s Steve Wiltfong, Adam Gorney, Sam Spiegelman, and Chad Simmons all predicted this week that LSU will land 2027 five-star cornerback Joshua Dobson.

“Dobson is one of the best cornerbacks in the class and the development at LSU over the years has stood out so much, along with his relationship with Corey Raymond,” noted Gorney.
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tOSU Sports Information Director Will Pantages

Ohio State Hires Will Pantages As Next Football Communications Director​

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Ohio State has found its next football communications director.

Following Jerry Emig’s retirement on Friday, Ohio State announced Monday that it has hired Wake Forest’s Will Pantages to oversee the Buckeyes’ football media and public relations efforts, along with their creative media and branding teams.

“It is a privilege to join The Ohio State University,” Pantages said in an OSU press release. “I’m excited to collaborate with an outstanding team to highlight all the accomplishments of our student-athletes and continue advancing one of the most respected brands in college athletics.”

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A native of Akron, Pantages played baseball for four years at Baldwin Wallace — the alma mater of Ohio State legend Jim Tressel — while earning a degree in communications and economics.

After graduating, Pantages joined SMU’s athletic communications office in 2013. He moved to the University of Florida the following year and became the football program’s primary day-to-day media contact in 2016. Pantages arrived at Wake Forest in 2019 and spent the past six years as the school’s associate athletic director for communications and content.

While in Winston-Salem, Pantages oversaw communications, creative services, fan experience and campus partnerships for all 18 of Wake Forest’s varsity sports. He also served as the primary contact for the Demon Deacons’ football team.

“We are excited to add Will to our Buckeye team,” said Chris Park, Ohio State’s executive associate athletic director for external affairs and chief communications officer. “He has tremendous passion, enthusiasm and vision for his work in the communications and creative space and his experience as a high-level thoughtful leader within college football will be valuable in this new role centered around our Ohio State Football program.”

Ohio State’s release also detailed a new athletic communications structure. Park will lead the department’s external communications strategy, marketing, brand engagement and media relations, while Gary Petit will oversee the communications unit and all non-football-related strategies.

Mike Basford, who assisted Emig with football media relations for the past nine years, will remain in his current role.

Paul Keels (Voice of the Buckeyes)

Paul Keels to Be Inducted Into the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame

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The “Voice of the Buckeyes” will be inducted into the Ohio Basketball Hall of Fame this June.

Paul Keels is one of 14 men and women in the 2026 induction class, a group comprising former players, coaches, officials, and administrators. He is the lone broadcaster in the group.

Keels has called Ohio State football and men’s basketball games since 1998. While known more for his work alongside former Ohio State All-American offensive lineman Jim Lachey on fall Saturdays, Keels has been a staple of basketball broadcasts next to former Buckeye guard Ron Stokes for decades.
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