How Dawand Jones 'clicked' for Buckeyes, pushed into starting mix

COLUMBUS — Dawand Jones never loved football before he came to Ohio State.

Jones arrived on campus three years ago as a former basketball player with plenty of promise on the football field. But he didn’t love the gridiron; he was married to the hardwood.

Now three years into his Buckeyes career, Jones has finally fallen in love with the game — and it’s starting to show. He’s working harder, becoming better in the film room and growing into his position at tackle.

He’s becoming such a good tackle that basketball has entirely taken a back seat, and he has the Ohio State coaching staff rethinking its approach to finding the best five offensive linemen for the fall.

“I would say it grew on me, for sure,” Jones said. “It had to. I mean, I told coaches on [recruiting] visits, I’m not going to disclose the name, but coaches, they wanted me to say I love football. But I couldn’t tell them that because I would be lying. And I mean, at the time, I didn’t love football as a freshman going into college. It grew on me.

“And it just became my life now.”

The new-found love for football has never been as evident as it is now a full week into training camp.

The Buckeyes thought the top two returning tackles in the country — Nicholas Petit-Frere and Thayer Munford — would both remain there, and the shuffle of offensive linemen would come at guard and center.

Jones and his massive 6-foot-8 frame had other plans. After shedding weight this offseason and staying on the underwater treadmill, Jones is down to 360 pounds and can move as well as any tackle on the roster. And he’s playing at such a high level, offensive line coach Greg Studrawa was forced to find a spot in the starting five for Jones.

“A guy that’s that big and athletic and physical and coming on?” Studrawa said. “How do you not find a place for that guy to play?”

That’s not a question Ohio State assumed it would need to answer this fall. But Jones has made that into a great problem for Studrawa and the staff.

Only one thing changed from the spring, when Studrawa ruled out moving his two returning tackles off their anchor posts on the outside: Dawand Jones.

“Nothing changed except Dawand’s development, his summer of dedication, how he’s worked, how he’s moving and what he’s done out here,” Studrawa said. “I mean it, when he sets in pass pro, believe me, there’s nobody going around him. And they’re not going through. We have the best pass rushers in America that we go against every day. That’s how I judge it. If we’re sitting there and we’re blocking those guys, I’m not worried about any game we play. And Dawand, right now, has been dominant as a pass protector on that edge.”

Now Munford, the anchor left tackle for the last three seasons, is at left guard. Petit-Frere is at left tackle, clearing the path for Jones to become a lethal blocker for the Buckeyes this fall.

“I will say [the progress is] just consistency, and just staying on my grind,” Jones said. “I worked with [strength] Coach [Mickey Marotti] all spring and summer. And I feel like that was a big priority going into this fall camp getting my body right. Getting my conditioning, being strong enough and just being able to do the same thing over and over and over again. …

“I feel like it was just time, right? It just clicked. I was just like: ‘I just can’t keep sitting around and just keep waiting.’ I just have to go get it and attack every day like it’s my last day.”

Jones has the right mindset to become a starter. But he hasn’t always thought that way.

It took years of growth and maturity to reach that point. Now there, however, Jones is breaking out as a potential star and tone-setter for the Buckeyes.

“So that’s physical, mental, spiritual growth, honestly,” said fellow third-year offensive lineman Enokk Vimahi, Jones’ roommate for the first two years at Ohio State. “He’s grown from a young man into a man, just taking in a lot of the coaching especially from Coach Stud and [assistant] Kennedy [Cook]. It’s been cool for me to be with him along the journey. And he makes me better, I make him better. …

“He’s coming out with that swagger. I don’t know if any of you were able to look at practice [Tuesday]. But he comes out with the ferocity, he comes out with energy. He really is the Energizer Bunny for our unit. And that’s something I’m grateful for, having him around. Because when he first came, he wasn’t like that. Me and him were young freshmen trying to find our way. And now I can say we both grown up and his energy really radiates along the unit. So I’m grateful for that.”

With a massive offseason and a push into the Ohio State starting lineup, Jones has climbed to the top of the depth chart through two weeks of training camp.

It’s a spot even he may not have expected to get to this season. But once the work ethic and maturity caught up with his huge frame, everything came together for Jones.

He has a budding love for football to thank.

“I had Big Ten football offers and MAC offers in basketball,” Jones said. “That was an easy choice to me. And I feel like I’m going to compete all day, every day. If you compete, you can’t get better than that. That’s all Coach Stud asks us to do is compete. Go out there and compete. You may mess up on a rep or a play, but just go out there and compete. I’m a great competitor. I don’t like losing. So for me to lose and lose a rep, I take that personally.

“And so when you do that same rep every day for three years, you begin to love this sport.”

Dawand Jones is in a fully committed relationship with football. And it shows.