Lamarcus Joyner-Future Buckeye?In the fifth edition of the Kirk Herbstreit Varsity Football Series, Herbie went for all the marbles and brought the #1 team in the country to the Horseshoe, as St. Thomas Aquinas (Ft. Lauderdale, FL) took on Upper Arlington in Ohio Stadium today.
Upper Arlington was 10-2 overall and 7-0 in their division last year, but the Golden Bears were no match for the Raiders, as Aquinas's star-studded line-up took care of UA by a score of 52-7. The Raiders have about 15 players expected to play Division I football, including a handful of players the Buckeyes are looking at for their 2010 class.
St. Thomas Aquinas was 15-0 last season, en route to a Florida State Championship and brings back 10 starters from last year's team. Cris Carter is the team's wide receiver coach and current Buckeye Duron Carter was a big part of last year's championship team. Carter, Terrelle Pryor, Etienne Sabino, DeVier Posey, Travis Howard, and Orhian Johnson were among a group of OSU players that were in attendance to witness the nation's best team dominate the school located just down Lane Ave. from campus. The players were interacting with fans all day and signing autographs throughout the game, seeming to enjoy their celebrity status.
Aquinas's list of stars includes players such as OL Brandon Linder, DB Lamarcus Joyner, DB Keion Payne, DB Cody Riggs, RB James White, DB Brian Robinson, LB Vincent Mauro, DB Reynaldo Kirton, RB Gio Bernard, and K Michael Palardy. Linder, Joyner, and Payne are all top Buckeye targets, while Riggs is on the radar but does not have an offer yet. Bernard is drawing interest from Arkansas, Florida, Florida State, Miami, Nebraska, Tennessee, and Notre Dame amongst others, while Palardy has already committed to Tennessee. White is entertaining Clemson, Iowa, USF, Wisconsin, MSU, and Purdue, Robinson has offers from Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and West Virginia, Mauro is interested in Navy, Vanderbilt, Rutgers, and Wisconsin, and Kirton is coming off an injury and drawing some Division I interest as well.
Lamarcus Joyner, rated as the #1 CB in the nation by ESPN, was impressive on both offense and defense, and caught a touchdown in the third quarter to put an exclamation point on the game. One guy who really caught my eye was Brandon Linder. Playing a little nicked up, Linder effortlessly moved Upper Arlington defenders all day and showed tremendous strength to go along with his 6-5, 270 frame. Linder can play all of the offensive line positions, but excels at center where he plays for STA and could eventually replace Michael Brewster there if he chooses to come to Ohio State. Payne looked good as well, intercepting a pass in the first half to halt the Golden Bears' hope of scoring a late half touchdown.
The event was certainly a good event for both schools as Upper Arlington got a chance to test themselves against the nation's best and St. Thomas Aquinas got to bring some of their top prospects to one of the nation's most storied football venues. It was good for the Ohio State staff to get players like Linder, Joyner, and Payne up here for an unofficial visit and they got a chance to take a closer look at some players who could be lining up for good in Ohio Stadium come next fall.
Comments
Some final stats:
Joyner 2 rec 35 yards and 1 TD; 1 car 9 yds
Payne: 1 INT
Bernard: 12 car 119 yds 2 TD
White: 8 car 71 yds 1 TD;1 rec. 22 yds
Palardy: 6 kickoffs-3 touchbacks, 1-1 FG (22 yards), 7-7 XP
Mauro: 5 tackles (3 solo)
Riggs: 2 tackles (2 solo)
Robinson: 6 tackles (2 solo)
Kirton: 2 tackles (1 solo)
also, for all wondering:
lots of UA fans, small amount of STA fans, and a decent crowd of neutral fans....
Joyner likes Columbus alot says he wants to get to know players and talk to Coach Haynes and Tressel more....will play safety or corner, but most schools looking at him at CB...FSU, UF, and OSU top his list said all pretty even....may visit USC and UGA....
post this after thie victory over Navy.....
tOSU v. U$C epic preview
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
Somehow the SEC "fans" will take credit for this one too.
yeah well the match-up was very poor....upper arlington was 10-2 and 7-0 in a weak division and against a weak slate last year...i saw them play in person and was never impressed so expected this one to go as it did
UA just didn't have any elite athletes. No one could break a big play. I wish one of the top schools from Cleveland or Cincy could have played instead. On a completely unrelated note (snort) I wonder if any of the St. Aquinas recruits liked what they saw in Columbus.
They already have Pam. On CBSsports.com. On the Ohio State page.
It's cool that all those Aquinas guys were at the shoe, but that match up really sucked...
UA's a good local football team, but not a national powerhouse like Aquinas.
From an outside perspective, it may have looked like a Florida team marched into the Shoe and stomped all over Ohio high school football.
Are you kidding me? What losers
Check out this thread from ESPN titled "Another Florida domination of Ohio"
http://boards.espn.go.com/boar...
GlazedTurd fans are just complete shit.
What kills me is if that Team would've played the Likes of Elder or St. X or Colerain it really would've been a much different game. I don't know all of the great programs in Ohio, but I know every year one of those 3 is nationally ranked.
UA played in the game because they are a bunch of spoiled rich kids. Glad to see them get crushed. Stick to Golf and soccer.
Yeah, thats a total cash grab. What a way to take a dump on your kids confidence.
St.X or St. Ignatius wouldnt have let that happen, although they pretty much owned Elder last year in Cincy, and they were our state runner up.
Adam Cole from Pick. Central is a beast. 6'2 300, and owning this o-line from Cali. Oh yeah, he's a sophmore.
Anyone know anything on this kid? I looked, but pretty much came up with nothing.
Picktown rep the 614.
It's not just the SEC guys, people are giving me shit about this game here in Big 12 country too. Whoever green lighted that matchup didn't think this through about what it would do to Ohio football's image ( and OSU's ) in the rest of the country if they didn't pick a school that could complete. It was a no brainer that UA is not top 10 USA talented, so why invite them to such a high profile matchup.
Everyone not from Ohio just sees, Oh here is an Ohio team getting owned by a Florida team...Ohio football really sucks compared to Florida....Exactly what we DON'T need
It was a bonehead move.
Sorry, but I hate to have to take shit over Upper Arlington football when I hated them growing up, and when I live in freaking Kansas!
Seriously, I didn't mind seeing UA get their asses kicked. I could probably walk down the street in full dress uniform with medals and the police would still kick my ass because of my skin color. Sorry, been in many cities and countries all over, the only places worse than UA where Poland and Germany as far as racism. Oh, and that time in Orange County, CA sucked too. Thank God for my Navy ID card.
Seriously, I live in Johnson county Kansas, which is not exactly an integration mecca, and there are NO lily white football teams here AT ALL. like UA displayed. ( I am probably wrong, but I watched 15 min of that abomimation and did not see a black UA player )
Did!
I want to say something, but I can't, so I will say that minorities in UA are probably still few and far between.
They did
ohio high school football has been overrated for years. Any of the top teams in Florida, Alabama or Georgia would crush Ohio's State Champ.
Unfortunately, this is exactly what Herbstreit wants. Don't ask me why. It's complete bullshit. He takes the best team in Florida, last year it was also ST. Thomas, and pits them against some unknown, over-matched team from Ohio, then goes on to say how much better the Florida athletes are and how Ohio just can't match the speed of Florida.
I have no idea what his agenda is, but there certainly is one and I don't like it. I like Herbstreit less and less each year. Hey Herbstreit, why not match St. Thomas against someone like Cleveland St. Ignatius, Glenville or even Massillon or McKinnley?
This game wasn't even close and Herby had to know they couldn't possibly match up. St. Thomas runs a triple option, UA a traditionaly OFF. St. Thomas completed maybe 2 passes on their way to 4 straight 1st quarter TD's. Meanwhile, they put 7 or 8 in the box, brought blitz after blitz and UA had no answers. It's ridiculous and it pisses me off. Explain yourself Herbstreit.
And that is the way they like it.
I 0nly know a lot about Cincinnati football teams because I live around the Cincinnati area, but I remember 2 years ago when Colerain and St. X were way up there they both knocked off some big teams, Elder and Moeller almost knocked off a couple of top 10 teams too, a couple of the games were in the Herbstreet challenge too. So to say Ohio's Champ can't compete against Florida, Bama, Texas Cali, is not correct. It's when you match the number 1 team in America against a team that isn't even heard of outside of their city that the problems arise.
Matt, he can't ....since Herbie has completely forgot where he is from, doing shit like this, why doesn't everyone show up at "College Gameday" and boo the crap out of him..."Herbie Sucks", and boo Cowherd as well. Make a scene!!!! I feel like burning his jersey now.