As it stands right now, the Ohio State football team has put together a very good recruiting class for the 2026 cycle, but if we’re being honest, it’s a little behind where we’ve seen in past years, especially considering the Buckeyes are coming off a College Football Playoff national championship.
And while many programs would love to have the class Ohio State has, there have been some pretty big misses as the program tries to figure out how name, image and likeness, and the House Settlement leading to direct revenue payments will work. The perception is that the Buckeyes have been conservative compared to other teams, and that has seemingly led to some misses on the high-priority targets.
But there’s another big one in play coming up with five-star running back Savion Hiter, who just announced his commitment date. According to the 247Sports Composite rankings, Hiter is ranked as the No. 1 running back and ninth overall prospect in the class. He will be making his college choice on August 19, according to an announcement on “X,” and he’ll be choosing among a final four of Ohio State, Georgia, Michigan, and Tennessee.
To be fair, OSU doesn’t seem to have the momentum in this race — though that hasn’t seemed to matter this year. Despite being on campus multiple times, the buzz is that it’ll come down to Michigan and Tennessee, both of whom have been much more aggressive with NIL money than Ohio State has been.
To date, the Buckeyes have just one running back commitment in the class of 2026, three-star Ohio product Favour Akih. It’s beginning to look like he’ll be the lone back in this class unless there’s a surprise with Hiter, or OSU pivots and tries to find a diamond in the rough to round out the class.
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