It sure feels like the recruiting news has been sour as of late for the defending College Football Playoff national champion Ohio State Buckeyes. Oh sure, OSU still has a very, very good recruiting class with the verbal pledges it has, and there’s a good chance it still finishes somewhere around or in the top ten, but it’s been a very long time since the Buckeyes won a highly visible recruiting battle.
That held true again on Thursday when the No. 1 safety in the 2026 class, Bralan Womack, spurned Ohio State to give his verbal pledge to the Auburn Tigers. Unlike most others lately, in which it started to become clear that OSU wouldn’t be able to keep up with the money being thrown around by other programs, thus cooling off some on other prospects’ recruiting, this one seemed like one that could go in the Buckeyes’ favor.
In the end, though, Womack chose the Auburn Tigers over OSU, Florida, and Texas A&M. Money most assuredly played a part again, but there are also some family connections at Auburn, so there’s at least that.
With the news, Ohio State’s commitment haul stands at 21 commits and ranks as the No. 9 class in the country according to the 247Sports Composite Team Rankings. Look for the Buckeyes to still add a couple of players before it’s all done, but the priority targets are beginning to fade, so it’ll be interesting to see how things finish down the stretch.
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