Washington: “I arrived on campus and spent some time with Coach Holtmann. They had an alumni dinner that night. I got to meet Greg Oden and before I even took my official visit I had met Mike Conley Jr. out here at my high school. We talked about Ohio State and how great the atmosphere was and everything with the program.
“On Friday night, I got to hang out with the guys. We had to get to bed because they had conditioning bright and early the next morning. They had practice with an hour on the court. After that, I got to run with the guys. That was great. I got to see how it could be there. I played pretty well and I think I fit in really well with the guys.
“Then we went to the football game (against Army). That was really intense. We walked from The Schott to St. John Arena for the pep rally. Everybody was shouting, ‘O-H … I-O!’ and ‘Go to Ohio State!’ They were giving us high fives. We went to the tailgate and ate some great food, some chicken wings.
“It was very family oriented. That was one of the big reasons why I committed. Coach Holtmann brought his daughter and his wife with him. Coach Pedon brought his son Maddox and his wife with him. Jae’Sean Tate brought his dog with him, Chubbs. He is a French bulldog. I’ve got to get one of those now. I was thinking about it the whole day.
“We made the walk to the Horseshoe. We walked through a bunch of fans. It hit me when Coach Pedon said, ‘Yo, Duane, yell O-H!’ He said, ‘Trust me, just yell it.’ I waited until the right time in front of a lot of people. I said, ‘O-H!’ and everybody yelled, ‘I-O!’
“I got goose bumps and my heart started beating fast. I’ve never felt that way about a school, kind of like you feel like you’ve never felt that way about a girl. It was the same feeling. It was in the heart. It hit me in the spot that this might be it.
“I was getting tired, so we left the game early and went home. I took a shower, I took a nap. My mom does hair, so she gave me a nice fresh cut. We were just relaxing after that. I was at (Tate’s) house again.
“Sunday, we had an early breakfast. We talked to Coach and everything was perfect. Everything about it was so amazing. It was second to none. The opportunity that presented itself … I had complete trust in Coach Holtmann and he had complete trust in me.”
continued...