Jack Sawyer, Cody Simon, Emeka Egbuka and TreVeyon Henderson are among the senior leaders who could be in the running to be Ohio State’s captains this season.
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NINE CANDIDATES TO BE OHIO STATE CAPTAINS IN 2024
Ohio State has plenty of candidates to be team leaders in 2024.
Thanks to the decisions of many of its upperclassmen to stay in Columbus for another year rather than enter the NFL draft, Ohio State will have no lack of senior leadership this season. The Buckeyes have 24 players on scholarship who are in either their fourth or fifth year of college football, including 16 of its projected starters this season.
As such, Ohio State will face tough choices when deciding who should be its team captains this year.
Ohio State could make that decision earlier by naming a large group of captains. There’s plenty of recent precedent for that, as the Buckeyes named at least six captains every year from 2013 to 2022. Last year, however, Ryan Day made captaincy more selective as the Buckeyes selected just three players for the honor: Tommy Eichenberg, Cade Stover and Xavier Johnson.
How many captains Ohio State names this year could depend on how the voting plays out when the players submit their captaincy votes during preseason camp in August.
“I think every team is different,” Day said last August. “If you don't have one, two or three guys that you feel really strongly about, then sometimes you spread it, four or five. And that usually is indicated by the way it's voted on. This year, there was a pretty strong gap in there.”
With so many seniors who are expected to be team leaders this year, there might not be a clearly defined gap between the top three vote-getters and everyone else like Day said there was last year. It would come as a surprise if Day names as many captains as some of Urban Meyer’s teams had – Ohio State had nine captains in 2017 – but the Buckeyes will have plenty of options to choose from whether they decide to anoint a smaller or larger group of official team leaders for 2024.
Each of the following nine players is likely to be among those who garner consideration. All of them are seniors who have spent their entire careers at Ohio State, who could have moved on after last season but chose to stay at OSU for what they hope will be a championship chase, who are expected to play major roles for the Buckeyes this season and who are regarded as leaders in their respective position groups and across the team as a whole.
JACK SAWYER, DE
CODY SIMON, LB
EMEKA EGBUKA, WR
TREVEYON HENDERSON, RB
DENZEL BURKE, CB
JT TUIMOLOAU, DE
GEE SCOTT JR., TE
LATHAN RANSOM, S
DONOVAN JACKSON, LG
