The Hurry-Up: Five-star 2025 CB Devin Sanchez Will Commit on Jan. 6, Ohio State Offers 2024 Four-Star Safety Koi Perich, Gabe VanSickle Will Take an Official Visit to OSU This Weekend

By Garrick Hodge on November 8, 2023 at 5:30 pm
Devin Sanchez
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Ohio State’s top cornerback target in the 2025 class has set a decision date.

Five-star Texas prospect Devin Sanchez announced Monday he’ll make his college decision on Jan. 6 during NBC’s live broadcast of the All-American Bowl in his home state. 

About two months ahead of the decision, Sanchez has trimmed down the finalists to Ohio State, Alabama and Texas A&M. Of those three, the Buckeyes look like the favorite to land the No. 6 player and No. 1 prospect in the country. 

“It’s a lot about Ohio State that I like,” Sanchez told 247Sports this week. “Coach (Perry) Eliano the safety coach, coach (Tim) Walton the secondary coach, coach (Ryan) Day and just the fanbase. Loving people, they’re going to welcome you. They want you. Coach Day ever since I’ve been there, I’ve been there three or four times. It felt like home all the times I went. The relationship I have with Coach Walton is different from all the coaches. We talk about football, we talk about life, there are certain things other coaches don’t talk about. I can see myself in that fit and see myself under coach Walton and coach Walton getting me to the next level.”

Sanchez visited OSU for the Penn State game in October and watched the Buckeyes shut down the Nittany Lions in the win, while he also camped with Ohio State over the summer for the opportunity to work with Walton and Eliano.

“An Ohio State cornerback, he’s good at everything,” Sanchez told reporters after the camp. “You can press, play off, that’s what they like to do. If you can do all of that and be great at it, you’ve got a chance to be on that cornerback wall and you’ve got a chance to be DBU here. There’s not that many schools where you can call it DBU, but Ohio State’s probably the No. 1 school. Just look at the guys in the league. It speaks for itself.”

If Sanchez picks OSU, the Buckeyes’ secondary could have the makings of a truly elite corps, with top-100 prospect Blake Woodby already committed to the Buckeyes in the 2025 class.

Buckeyes offer 2024 safety Koi Perich

Ohio State isn’t done trying to add safeties in the current recruiting class. On Monday, OSU safeties coach Perry Eliano extended an offer to Minnesota safety Koi Perich with intentions of making him the third safety commit in 2024 along with Jaylen McClain and Leroy Roker. 

Perich, a Minnesota commit, is considered the 142nd-ranked prospect and the 11th-ranked safety in 247Sports’ composite rankings for the current cycle. He committed to his hometown Gophers on April 11 and has 13 Division I offers in total. 

He’ll likely visit OSU sometime before National Signing Day on Dec. 20, but it likely won’t be for one of the final two remaining home games this year because Perich’s prep season is still ongoing. 

The Buckeyes aren’t the only ones trying to flip Perich from Minnesota, though, as USC and Florida State have also offered the 6-foot-1, 195-pound product. It wouldn’t be surprising if he took additional visits to one or either of those two schools as well. 

Perich is a multi-sport athlete who is also a standout basketball player and track and field athlete for Lincoln Secondary High School (Esko, Minnesota). The Minnesota prospect is a two-way player on the gridiron, as he ran for 813 yards and 11 rushing touchdowns on 60 carries in his junior season while also hauling in 17 receptions for 353 receiving yards and nine receiving touchdowns. Defensively, he had 75 tackles, two sacks, four forced fumbles, and three interceptions while recording five special teams touchdowns as a kick and punt returner.

Gabe VanSickle to make official visit this weekend

In Monday’s Hurry-Up, we wrote about Ohio State offering 2024 three-star offensive lineman Gabe VanSickle and mentioned the Buckeyes had strong interest in flipping the Michigan product from Northwestern. VanSickle said he planned on taking an official visit to OSU, but wasn’t sure when that would be at the time.

On Tuesday, VanSickle told Eleven Warriors he’ll be in attendance for the Buckeyes’ game against Michigan State on Saturday for an official visit, as he joins a visitor list that’s not short on intrigue. OSU’s chances of flipping the Michigan product will likely be contingent on how the visit goes this weekend. Ohio State offensive line coach Justin Frye will have a full weekend on his hands as he puts on a full-court press for both VanSickle and five-star offensive tackle Jordan Seaton, who is also scheduled to take an official visit to Columbus this weekend.

Delane, Bell, Alford, Winston, Griffin will visit Saturday

On Friday, we’ll have a full preview of Ohio State’s expected recruiting visitors for the weekend matchup with Michigan State. In the meantime, five high-priority targets have already announced they’ll be in attendance at Ohio Stadium. 

From the 2025 class, four-star safety Faheem Delane, four-star wide receiver Phillip Bell, four-star linebacker Tarvos Alford and four-star tight end Emaree Winston have all declared on their social media they’ll be at OSU Saturday. Each of those prospects will be making their first game visit of the season to Ohio State.

In the 2026 class, four-star quarterback Will Griffin will make his first trip to campus since camping with the Buckeyes in June, which led to him receiving his offer to play for the Buckeyes.

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