What We Learned from competitive Battle 7v7 event in New Orleans

NEW ORLEANS — Ohio State commitments, targets and potential targets were all over the field at Tad Gormley Stadium this weekend at the Battle.com 7-on-7 tournament in New Orleans.

These events are often chaotic with dozens of teams coming and going on the split-in-half football field and games starting as soon as the previous one ends. But one thing remains constant as with most all sporting events: Truly elite prospects are easy to spot.

And there were a lot of them hanging around this weekend, most with ties to the New Orleans area that the Buckeyes have not traditionally recruited. But it’s a spot that maybe — maybe — they should consider dipping their toes.

That’s where we’ll kick off this version of What We Learned on Lettermen Row.

The Boot could be opening up for Ohio State, others

Ohio State really doesn’t try to recruit places Louisiana, Alabama or Mississippi, because generally there’s very little return on the time investment for the players from this area. If a player from this part of the country doesn’t have ties to the Midwest or to Ohio, the odds are long that they’ll truly consider an Ohio State offer. Typically if a player from around Louisiana is good enough to land a Buckeyes offer, he’s also been offered by the SEC powers.

The last real battle by Ohio State in this state was for defensive tackle Rashard Lawrence in the Class of 2016. After leading for his commitment a significant portion of his recruitment, the Buckeyes lost out to LSU as signing day approached. Since then — and until 2022 commit Jyaire Brown — there’s been almost no presence by Ohio State in this area.

But there should be.

There’s just too much talent around here to skip the area entire completely, and with the public relations disasters — plural — that continue to occur around LSU, maybe there’s a chance now for the Buckeyes to make some noise. Young prospects like Baton Rouge sophomores Jaiden Ausberry and Shelton Sampson are likely to end up on the periphery of 5-star status. And even though Ausberry is an LSU legacy, the buzz in New Orleans was that he and his brother Austin — a 4-star 2022 defensive back — are looking to leave the area for college. Sampson is just learning to play receiver, and the team he plays with is sponsored by Jarvis Landry — but Landry is a former teammate of Brian Hartline. And, hey, relationships matter the most in the recruiting game.

The point? Social media and television have changed the way kids see their futures. While most of the region’s top prospects believe that the SEC is the place for them to play football, schools like Ohio State and Clemson are considered one and the same. The fact that Ohio State offers so few players in this area may make the occasional offer even more of a head-turner. That’s why it’s puzzling that the Buckeyes haven’t at least offered athletes like 5-star safety Jacoby Mathews, a good friend of Jyaire Brown’s and someone who expressed very real interest in Ohio State almost a year ago.

Ohio State commitment Jaheim Singletary good as advertised

Tournaments like this one are hard to evaluate sometimes because a team’s success often has very little to do with anything but the quarterback position. So when a player like Jaheim Singletary is on the field, it’s difficult to know exactly what to look for. Teams rarely throw his way — reputations precede these kids, of course — so sometimes it may seem like he’s not really in the game.

But the fact that one side of the field becomes all but moot is pretty telling, and that’s what Singletary affords his teammates on the Burch Sports team. He was impactful in that way, and when he was moved over the offense his athleticism really was able to shine on a few seam routes that allowed his straight-line speed to be displayed. What I found most interesting about the 5-star cornerback, who told Lettermen Row he was “locked in” with his Buckeyes commitment, was the joy he played the game with even when his team was not faring well. This is a kid that loves to compete and has a good time doing it. He looks the way a future top-10 pick in the NFL Draft should look, and his passion for competing was evident in every snap he took.

Tucson Turf continues to set standard for 7-on-7 play

Again, getting too wrapped up in wins and losses in events like this is a bit of folly. But after seeing the Tucson Turf team run through the competition two weekends ago in Arizona and again on Saturday in New Orleans, it’s clear they’ve got a pretty good thing going.

That starts at quarterback, where 3-star Salpointe Catholic (Tucson, Ariz.) star Treyson Bourguet plays. He was by far the most accurate and on-time player at the position two weekends ago, and Bourguet picked up right where he left off this weekend. Yes, it helps he’s got an absolutely stacked group of receivers that includes Ohio State commit Kyion Grayes and a trio of 6-foot-4 plus pass-catchers complementing him in 2022 tight end Michael Masunas and sophomore receivers Kyler Kasper and Ja’Kobi Lane.

Grayes is the perfect 7-on-7 receiver because of his ability to create mismatches, and he was open all day on Saturday. But no player put on a show more than Kasper, whose father Kevin played wide receiver at Iowa in the late 1990s and early 2000s. The young Kasper is 6-foot-5 and probably only 180 pounds, so he’s barely begun filling out his body. But when he does, he’s got the ability to be a big-time national recruit. Whether that’s as a wide receiver or as a tight end depends on where his body goes, but he’s got major potential.

Lane is the son of former Arizona Wildcats coach Kevin Sumlin and is just 14-years-old, but he’s another prospect with major potential in Arizona, a state that the Buckeyes have become very comfortable recruiting lately.

The challenge for the Turf team gets daunting on Sunday because both Grayes and Kasper will miss the action with injuries suffered on Saturday. Both will be back in action within a couple of weeks.

Two young stars to know about on the national front

There were a lot of kids to watch this weekend, but a few other names that emerged that stood out were cornerback Ethan Nation from Roswell (Ga.), athlete Elijah Rushing, also from Salpointe Catholic in Arizona, and Louisiana defensive back David Jones. Nation and Jones are in the 2023 class while Rushing in the Class of 2024.

Nation, offered by Alabama last week, played with the Louisiana Bootleggers team that features Jacoby Mathews, LaTerrance Welch, Jyaire Brown, Bryce Anderson, Jordan Allen and a host of other Division I defensive backs. He didn’t seem out of place. He’s a 2023 prospect and he’s slight right now at 6-foot, 170 pounds, but he’s got good length and was excellent when it came to turning and running with receivers down the field and in drag routes across the middle, using his hands well and staying in position to make plays.

I was also impressed with David Jones from Madison Prep in Baton Rouge. He has no offers yet, but at 5-foot-11 and 175 pounds, Jones looked like the type of kid who has big-time potential. He ran very well and played physical and aggressive in coverage and definitely has the right swagger for the position. He’s one I’ll be watching moving forward.

Lastly, Elijah Rushing from Arizona didn’t play with the Tucson Turf Elite team that Grayes, Xavier Nwankpa and the aforementioned offensive stars did. But seeing him walking around the facility at an honest-to-goodness 6-foot-5 and 210 pounds, he has the frame to become a national name very quickly at either defensive end or tight end, depending on how he gets used. Salpointe Catholic is the program that produced Ohio State safety Lathan Ransom and Texas star running back Bijan Robinson.