Ohio State Football: Big day for Buckeyes landing Stroud, others

The Ohio State football team had a huge first day of the Early Signing Period on Wednesday. There’s one more big fish for the Buckeyes to catch though.

Head coach Ryan Day and recruiting director Mark Pantoni had a great signing day for the Ohio State football team. The signing of 24 names today was a huge get for the Scarlet and Gray. The Buckeyes got every one of their main targets except for two.

Clark Phillips III, the nations fourth-ranked cornerback according to 247Sports, will announce his choice between Ohio State and Utah tomorrow. It was always Phillips’ plan to announce on Thursday and not necessarily a correlation between co-defensive coordinator Jeff Hafley making the leap to Boston College.

Cameron Martinez, the four-star athlete from Michigan, announced Tuesday that he would be waiting to make his final decision until the February signing date. He said this to Letterman Row:

"“It’s been tough this past week with Jeff Hafley leaving, so I just have to think some things through with my family,” he said. “With Hafley’s departure — and he’s someone that I was really close with — I just want to think about this more and hear other schools out and wait to see who Ohio State hires.”"

The big news of the day was the signing of four-star quarterback CJ Stroud from Rancho Cucamonga, California. It came down to the Buckeyes and the Georgia Bulldogs. Ultimately it was having the opportunity to be coached up by Ryan Day that swayed Stroud to the Buckeyes.

Stroud signing says a lot about the job that Day is doing developing quarterbacks, and pulling down two four-star quarterbacks says a lot about how Ohio State is viewed nationally in terms of quarterback play.

Day had this to say on signing two quarterbacks, via tweets from Dan Hope of Eleven Warriors:

"“That’s huge … We felt like we had to try to get more depth in that room.”  Day said,  “If you’re a high school quarterback right now with an opportunity to come play at Ohio State, there’s a lot of people that would want to do that.”"

247Sports has Ohio State ranked as the third-best class in the nation only behind Alabama and Clemson. Here is the complete list of the 24 names:

-Three-star offensive guard Jakob James
-Three-star offensive tackle Trey Leroux
-Four-star cornerback Lejond Cavazos
-Four-star defensive tackle Jacolbe Cowan
-Five-star receiver Julian Fleming
-Five-star offensive tackle Paris Johnson Jr.
-Four-star linebacker Cody Simon
-Three-star offensive tackle Grant Toutant
-Four-star center Luke Wypler
-Three-star tight end Joe Royer
-Three-star defensive tackle Ty Hamilton
-Three-star linebacker Mitchell Melton
-Three-star kicker Jake Seibert
-Three-star running back Miyan Williams
-Three-star offensive guard Josh Fryar
-Four-star receiver Jaxon Smith-Njigba
-Four-star receiver Mookie Cooper
-Four-star defensive tackle Darrion Henry-Young
-Four-star safety Lathan Ransom
-Four-star cornerback Ryan Watts III
-Four-star quarterback Jack Miller
-Four-star receiver Gee Scott Jr.
-Four-star linebacker Kourt Williams
-Four-star quarterback C.J. Stroud

Plenty of commits who have chances to have big time careers at Ohio State. Who are you most excited about?