2020 continued its push to be the worst year ever this past weekend as the annual rivalry game between Ohio State and Michigan was canceled.
It was a shame to be denied such sweet and certain victory. The Wolverines were sitting at 2-4 with wins over back-to-reality Minnesota and still-very-bad Rutgers (a triple-overtime thriller, at that) as the season's lone highlights. Michigan also fell to Rocky Lombardi and Michigan State in Week 2 before suffering decisive defeats to Indiana, Wisconsin and Penn State.
The Buckeyes were destined to put a bow on one of the worst seasons in Michigan football history until a COVID-19 outbreak cost the Wolverines their final two games of the regular season. They were spared a potential loss to Maryland and the drubbing of a lifetime in Columbus.
I think we can all agree — we could have used that to numb the pain of this cursed year.
But alas, Ohio State must turn its attention toward winning the Big Ten Championship Game for the fourth season in a row. But before we get to that, there's a fun, midweek victory over Michigan that Buckeye fans should celebrate on Wednesday, when the Buckeyes are expected to sign another top-ranked class on early signing day.
Although not as sweet as an actual, on-field victory, the gap between the two programs is set to expand.
Early Signing Day Spotlight
Ryan Day and the Ohio State coaching staff are putting together one of the most impressive recruiting classes in recent college football history.
With 21 verbal pledges, the Buckeyes are sitting in the No. 2 spot due to, uh... // gestures vaguely at Nick Saban wizardry // reasons. But that shouldn't diminish what the Buckeyes have built during the 2021 recruiting cycle.
Day has Ohio State on track to sign the program's highest-rated recruiting class since at least the turn of the century. The group includes five 5-star recruits with defensive end Jack Sawyer, wideout Emeka Egbuka, lineman Donovan Jackson, running back TreVeyon Henderson and quarterback Kyle McCord, with more potentially on the way.
But the class isn't just top-heavy. Going down the impressive list of prospects, the 16th-highest-rated Buckeye commit is still ranked in the top 200 nationally. The top 12 Ohio State commits are all ranked in the top 100 nationally. This is a staggering amount of talent for one team, and to put it in perspective, the rest of the Big Ten combined has just eight top-100 prospects.
That alone should highlight the gap that exists between Ohio State and the rest of the Big Ten, but we're focusing on Michigan specifically here.
And just like the blowout losses Michigan suffered in 2018 and '19, the recruiting scoreboard is looking just as bad.
The Wolverines currently boast what looks like a respectable ninth-ranked recruiting class, but it's a group that has as many sub-500 ranked recruits as Ohio State has 5-stars. The lowest-rated recruit, defensive end Dominick Giudice, is ranked 1,982nd, about 400 spots lower than the punter Michigan hauled in this year.
Unlike Ohio State, the Wolverines' class is top-heavy, which explains the No. 9 rating. The group is headlined by 5-star quarterback J.J. McCarthy, who is joined by three other top-100 players.
Stripping it all back, though, if you took away the specialists both Ohio State and Michigan signed and then aggregated the national ranking of each school's commits, the average for the Wolverines' class would be 399.
Ohio State's is 127.
That talent gap is enormous, and it accurately highlights the trajectories of each program.
Harbaugh was brought in to chase the Buckeyes down both on the field and the recruiting front, but all he's done in his six seasons is lose an enormous amount of ground.
