Scarlet Sunrise: Ohio State set to punch ticket to Rose Bowl

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Ohio State set to punch ticket to Rose Bowl

Ohio State didn’t reach its goal of playing for a Big Ten title for the first time since 2016. It won’t go to the College Football Playoff this season.

But after a 10-2 campaign, the Buckeyes are expecting to head to Pasadena for the Rose Bowl. They are expecting to take on PAC-12 champion Utah after the Utes beat Oregon on Friday night.

With Michigan’s dominant win over Iowa on Saturday, the Wolverines are going to the CFP as the Big Ten champions, leaving a Rose Bowl berth for Ohio State.

The Buckeyes won’t have a chance to play for a national title this bowl season. But a trip to the Rose Bowl for the first time since the 2018 season is quite the consolation prize for Ryan Day and Ohio State.

Buckeyes linebacker Craig Young enters transfer portal

Craig Young worked his way on the field in a limited role this season for Ohio State. He’s now searching for a new home to find a more expansive role in a defense.

The defensive hybrid weapon entered the transfer portal Saturday, the third Ohio State player to do so in the last week. Young will have three years of eligibility remaining wherever he decides to continue his collegiate career.

Young’s traits made him an enticing recruit bursting with potential, and the Buckeyes were working to find ways to best utilize his skillset. He appeared in eight games this season, and he was in on certain packages in big moments for the Buckeyes defense at key times late in the season.

He finishes his Ohio State career with 23 total tackles, 0.5 tackles for loss and two interceptions, one of which was returned for a touchdown.

How does Quinn Ewers transfer impact Buckeyes?

After reclassifying to the Class of 2021, Quinn Ewers, the former five-star quarterback – ranked at one time as one of just six players all-time to be rated with a perfect 1.000 recruiting score – brought with him generational arm talent, a ton of hype and a ceiling as high as any that the Buckeyes have brought in at the position.

And like that, he’s gone.

C.J. Stroud, this season’s Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year, will return as the incumbent starter with a strong stranglehold on winning the QB1 title once again. Kyle McCord, himself a former five-star prospect, has the makings of being the next great Ohio State quarterback. And Devin Brown, ranked as the No. 6 quarterback in the Class of 2022, committed to the Buckeyes on Wednesday.

So despite the transfer of Quinn Ewers, there are still plenty of high-caliber options for Buckeyes coach Ryan Day to turn to in order to lead his program – both for the 2022 college football season and beyond.

Lettermen Row’s Austin Ward, Jeremy Birmingham and Spencer Holbrook break down all of that and more as they analyze the Quinn Ewers transfer and what it means for Ohio State’s program and what it means for its quarterback position moving forward.

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