Trey Sermon never committed to Ohio State, publicly or otherwise. He was heavily recruited out of Marietta (Ga.) Sprayberry High School in the Class of 2017, as is expected for the country’s No. 12-ranked running back. The Buckeyes picked up an earlier commitment from a Texas tailback named J.K. Dobbins, then Sermon picked the Sooners in April of 2016 after a pair of visits to Columbus in the year prior. He was a key part in Oklahoma’s big win at Ohio Stadium as a freshman. That was when he and Tony Alford reconnected for the first time after his recruitment.
“I remember after we played them, we talked a little bit after the game,” Sermon said. “He was checking in with me, seeing how I was doing.”
That sounds generic, and maybe it was. But it reinforced what Sermon had come to know about his current running backs coach, and it was validated again when he decided to enter the transfer portal following his junior year at Oklahoma.
“Once we got to this point, it just kind of picked up where we left off,” Sermon said. “It was just unique because Coach Alford is such a genuine guy. All the players he comes in contact with, he really cares about them. I feel that was the thing that stuck out the most.
“I definitely feel like that’s unique with him. You just don’t find that too often.”
Recruiting is about relationships, and they don’t need to end just because a player or a school go different directions. True connections happen and persist even after a Letter of Intent is signed, and time creates the distance between the two parties. That doesn’t mean the end of a recruitment has to signal the end of a relationship. When Sermon needed to once again be recruited, it was a simple matter of remembering where the relationships were before.
“It’s kind of like: ‘Well, I know what that guy is over there, and I know what these people are over here,'” Alford said. “That was a relationship that was a positive one — it ended on a positive note with us going one way and him going the other — and so it was an easy transition as far as getting to know each other. It wasn’t like we had to re-establish this deal and figure out what went wrong because nothing went wrong,
“Everybody understands that there’s a business side to this, too. If things are done properly and the relationships are real and transparent, they’re unconditional relationships. Meaning just because you don’t do what I want you to, it doesn’t mean I think you’re a bad guy. If those relationships are unconditional they have a way of coming back to you later if the situation presents itself, and that’s kind of what happened with Trey.”