Gene Smith's Latest Comments On 12 Secondary Violations

Ohio State has released information regarding 12 secondary NCAA issues being processed by the athletic department’s compliance office. The release contained information that contradicted previous statements from the athletic department, and some OSU students don’t hold athletic director Gene Smith responsible for the pending violations either.

"Smith said there were 12 pending secondary violations during a Tuesday interview with The Lantern. OSU spokesman Dan Wallenberg later said in a Wednesday email that the actual number of violations was less than 12.

Wallenberg did confirm that the additional violations are being “processed,” although he said he did not “know the status of each situation” in regards to whether it was being processed by the university or the NCAA."

You would think after all that has happened, that Smith would be a little bit smarter in how he presented these types of situations.

"Smith told The Lantern Tuesday the athletic department has 12 pending NCAA violations.

“We’ve got 12 pending,” Smith said. “It may turn out to be secondary. It may not.”

Smith clarified in a Thursday morning phone call that the potential violations would either be secondary or nothing at all."

Now with all that, Gene Smith has tried to back track on what he has said following the amount of criticism coming from all directions of any Ohio State-related website, paper or blog.

"Contrary to reports attributed to me, Ohio State Athletics is not facing any major NCAA violations," Smith said. "There are several secondary violations being processed by our compliance office. These are similar to those released last week. Again, these are secondary in nature and consistent with our culture of self-reporting even the most minor and inadvertent violations.

"Again, to be clear, the Ohio State football program, its coaches and staff are not facing any [major] violations."

Big ups to Eleven Warriors for catching a statement that you might have missed.

Urban Meyer Introduces A New Tradition At Ohio State

At the Urban Meyer Student Town Hall Meeting held today in the Union, Urban unveiled what he hopes to be a new tradition to add to the many football traditions at Ohio State. 

"The staff calls them "quick cals" (quick calisthenics) which they use during warmups for practices (and games) to make sure the team and coaches are high energy and ready to go."

- via 11W's Forums

For home games starting this fall, after warming up, and before heading into the locker room for the final time before kickoff at home, the team will face the South Stands Student Section and together the players and the fans will do a set of "quick cals" to get the energy in the stadium and on the field up before kickoff. 

Here's some video so you too, can join in and learn the new quick cals. Think of it as a way to prepare yourself for the games in the 'Shoe. Meyer obviously has hope that this exercise can be an easy way of firing up the crowd to get the energy level very high. Home field advantage can help.

Tuesday's Buckeye Bits

Surprise, Buckeye fans! You've got me again today. We've got a good round of Bits coming your way this morning but I first just wanted you all to take notice of a new house on the market that looks pretty damn nice. If you want to buy me a present for all of my hard work, I would gladly take our coach's former house. Anyways, back on to the task at hand. Let's get on with today's Buckeye Bits!

You Thought That Was The Only House Today? Ramzy over at Eleven Warriors continues to dominate the writing game, this time with a piece on a different view of Ohio State and Michigan. Also, he continues the house-theme today, with Tom Brady's super mansion. Also, if you haven't seen the fight of the century, it's way better than anything Pacquiao and Mayweather could do.

"The reason that Michigan has been isolated instead of, say, Northwestern (most Wildcats, like Buckeyes, are Communications majors) is because with Rich Rodriguez no longer in Ann Arbor, Michigan is back to recruiting the same players as Ohio State once again. There simply is no offseason in college football's greatest rivalry.

The likely reverberation will be Michigan coaches having to explain, again, why so many of its players end up as General Studies majors. It's an extremely answerable question that passes the red-face test without any challenges. That's not really the intent, though. This is a simple, short-attention span rebuttal to Michigan's value proposition."

To echo Ramzy, this rivalry really doesn't have an offseason. Let the hate flow.

Monday's Buckeye Bits

Good morning Buckeye faithful, and Happy President's Day! Just like last week, our men's basketball team is coming off of a loss to a team from That State Up North.

This time around, it's THE team, and it might hurt a little worse, considering that our Buckeyes now have a 2-game losing streak against teams from Michigan. Hard to believe. Let's see if today's Bits can ease some of the pain away.

It Might Not Be Our Basement, But It's A Basement. While we're nowhere near super-size buckeye blog Eleven Warriors level, we all started our blogs with the same ideas: To share our thoughts and opinions on everything about our favorite scarlet and gray-clad team. That being said, to give you guys the latest and greatest news on OSU, it takes a lot of effort and time.

Sometimes that time is hard to come by when you're working or are in school. 11W is doing the best they can to try and bring Buckeye Nation a beat writer for their site so they can bring even more great coverage, and I suggest you head on over and do the right thing: Make a donation to their hard working site. If ten reasons aren't enough, here's the 11th: They're the best.

Monday's Buckeye Bits

Another week has arrived Buckeye fans, and the last bits of recruiting in the 2012 class have come to a close. Let's pretend that there wasn't a basketball game this weekend. As you know by now, Stefon Diggs chose Maryland over Ohio State, Florida, and Auburn. What's interesting is that he's the second top 10 receiver in this recruiting class to stay home over so many great other offers.

The other, Dorial Green-Beckham, chose Missouri over many different schools including Alabama, Arkansas, Auburn, and Florida. I guess I can't say I'm surprised about these top receivers staying close to home, but it is a bit curious as to why they wouldn't want to take their talents to an even bigger school. Oh well, let's get on with the Bits!

Time For 2013. The 2012 recruiting class ended with 25 members, with 6 of them being enrolled. Urban was really able to turn this class around with only a couple of months to do it. Now, 2013 will solely be Urban's recruits. He's started off very well, with two commits that both come from the Buckeye state in 5-star QB/ATH Jalin Marshall and 4-star cornerback Cameron Burrows.

Urban is upping the ante as he's already proved in 2012, but is continuing to do so in the 2013 class. Often times, Jim Tressel and Jim Bollman would not get too ahead of themselves when it came down to offering athletes in future classes, but Meyer has already started with 55 total offers as it stands.

Tuesday's Buckeye Bits

Happy Tuesday Buckeye fans! Glad to see you made it through another Monday. I know it’s still the dead of winter but we’re another week closer to Buckeye Football. Sure, we’re still closer to the last game of the 2011 season than the first game of next season but this is my column so leave me alone!

I’m sorry for yelling. As a token of good faith, I give you this. No need to thank me. The increased page views for ITS will suffice. I figured I already crossed into the “creepy old guy” zone last week with my comments about Urban’s daughter so might as well go all in right? Right. OK, enough of that. Let’s get to the bit’s baby!

Wismar: Recruiting Wizard. I often think about attempting to write a recruiting column but the sheer volume of research and pure insanity needed to do it right scares me off every time. The recruiting world is a dark and murky place where obsessive dudes hover over their laptops while perusing YouTube for the latest bits of shaky high school footage. I just can’t be one of those guys. Don’t get me wrong, I love those guys. I just can’t become one if I want to stay married.

There are many good bloggers out there with their finger on the pulse of this niche area of college football but none better than Dan Wismar over at The Cleveland Fan. The guy wrote a great piece the other day detailing the amazing turn around for the 2012 recruiting class. His writing is succinct, easy to read and has loads of information. If you can get past the serial killer profile picture (I kid Dan, I kid), I recommend you check out his stuff on a regular basis.

Blog Update, and Some Thanks

For those of you that have been around since the beginning of this blog, you know we've always had a couple goals. One of those was to become the Buckeye SB Nation blog. Unfortunately, we didn't get the job, instead going to Along The Olentangy, who has done a great job over there. Last year, we also applied for the Blogpoll for the first time. While we were close to getting it, we came short once again, but instead of giving up, it's time to try again.

The last thing we had in mind when we started this blog was to become a great community, and of course, be known as one of the best blogs around. The last goal really does come with time, but I hope we've been able to provide you with the coverage that Buckeye fans crave. We also enjoy working with our fellow bloggers, especially on "projects". That's why, tomorrow, ITS will have written a post for Off Tackle Empire, an outstanding Big Ten site. The article will also be posted here, but we will surely link to their site, as they have been kind enough to let us share our thoughts with the Big Ten community.

All in all, we here at ITS just wanted to let you all know how much it means to us that you keep telling us to write. Much thanks to Eleven Warriors, for inspiring me to start my own blog, and also hosting some of my better stories on the "fan-blogs". Also, I would like to thank The Buckeye Battle Cry, for giving me some excellent advice, and of course being the coolest guys around. Jeff, Mali, Eric, Joe, and Jim. Thanks. Off Tackle Empire deserves some love of course. I have constantly put up Fanposts on their site, and I was always given real responses to our articles, never taking them down, or belittling them.

The teary-eyed heart-felt dramatic is over now people, don't worry. We'll continue to bring you the best coverage we can. Go Bucks!

What Did We Learn: Fickell's Press Conference

I'm a little nervous

Perhaps one of the biggest thing people noticed was that Luke Fickell, in his first press conference as the Buckeyes head coach, was nervous. You can certainly not blame him for being a little sweaty and shaken, as Tressel wasn't supposed to leave any time soon, and now he's been thrusted into a spot he has little to no experience in.


Like Tressel, Fickell stressed Ohio State's tradition, saying the school is bigger than one coach, one player or one situation - such as the ongoing NCAA investigation that led to Tressel's resignation.


"I can't tell you how humbled and honored I am to stand here as the head coach at THE Ohio State University," Fickell said in front of a packed room that included many OSU officials, about half the coaching staff and several of his former teammates. "I want to thank (president) Gordon Gee and (athletic director) Mr. (Gene) Smith for this opportunity to lead a program that I know, love and respect as much as anything in my life."


It's obvious that Tressel's firm stand on traditions stayed home with Fickell, and that's good news for fans of the Buckeye team. 

Carter and Wells gone.

The rumors are true ladies and gentlemen. Duron Carter is ineligible to play for the Buckeyes this year because of grades, and is withdrawing to go to Coffeyville Community College. If he gets good grades, and keeps his nose clean, he will ask to transfer to a Division I school, most likely Ohio State. Once there, he will have 3 more years. So it will be like he never left, almost. Carter has played 1 year and in that year he had caught 13 passes for 179 yards, with 1 TD.

On the flip side, OSU has confirmed DE Keith Wells is no longer with the program. It has been said he has been looking to transfer to another school. This has been confirmed by and email from OSU. Big ups to 11W to breaking the story.

Braxton Miller chooses Ohio State.

Video via Eleven Warriors.



Later that day, we got to ask some questions and listen to some answers from Bill at Scout.com, and here's some interesting stuff he said about Braxton Miller and so on.

• Braxton will enroll early
• Is making an impact on other recruits, as to coming to Ohio State.
• Cardale Jones will most likely head to West Virgina, and not get offered from OSU.
• Taylor Graham will most likely redshirt next season.
• 2012 commits won't have any QB's because of Miller.
• Jaamal Berry will be fine, and Tressel loves him, and will be very good and play a lot this year.
• It was always Ohio State for Braxton.
• Jaamal Berry will be third on depth chart - I said the same thing in the Spring Finals.
• Luke Fickell might take a MAC job and then come head coach OSU if he does good in the MAC.
• Braxton looks up to Terrelle, talks with/about him a lot.

We'll keep you up to date on anything else we pick up.

A day of Links.

There is nothing to say about to today, so let's give our friends over at the other blogs up help. (not that they really need it)

• Fear The Sword is currently going over the previous Boston-Cleveland match-ups in the playoffs. They also have the latest on Lebron's elbow.
• Eleven Warriors "sends" a letter to Duron Carter
• The Buckeye Battle Cry continue to beat down on Michigan. Eh, why not.
• The Rivalry, Esq. is having their "Northwestern" week, currently going over the MVP for them last year.
• Cincy Jungle is covering all you need to know about the Bengals, and are right now covering free agents and waivers etc.

Inside The Shoe is still looking for two writers. One basketball, and one football writer. If your interested, please leave a comment, or email us at insidetheshoe2009@hotmail.com. The requirements can be found here. We hope to be talking to you soon!

Spring Football Notes.

The days are starting to become numbered for the 2010 Spring Game, and every Buckeye fan across the nation is holding their breath to see the talent start to unfold in front of their eyes.

Practice is beginning to become more competitive as players earn spots on the Spring depth chart, as they get ready for the big game on the 24th. The Buckeyes came out in full pads again, and were burning it at every angle, trying to get better. The reason I know for a fact, is because Dane Sanzenbacher himself told us.

The Great Dane, getting ready.

For Terrelle Pryor, there is no doubt in any-one's mind that all eyes are going to be on him this year. He started off the spring with surgery on his knee, but is back to almost 100%, looking good yesterday in the drills. Something that caught a lot of people's eyes (and the media's praise) was that he seemed to be throwing the ball hard, pretty effortlessly, and got it where it needed to be, even in double coverage.

I think Mike Adams has a lock down on the left tackle spot, but Heacock obviously wants to use, or try to use all his resources because Andy Miller was in his spot today with the first team. There is a fierce battle going on for the back-up center spot. I know, that's good news for us as a team, right? Brewster is the starter, and for right now, Mewhort is the immediate back-up. The fight is between him and Scott Sika. Eleven Warriors tells us that although Jack may have the spot for now, Sika is making his moves to try and get in there.

Jermil Martin ran some reps with the first team for the running backs, and did pretty well. Don't go thinking that he can win a job though, even if injuries are still affecting the team. My guess would be that Tressel (the older one) will move Martin to fullback competing alongside Zach Boren. It's not a bad idea, since Martin seems to have that body of a fullback.

Nate Oliver is also competing at the Star position, which we saw last week, and is still impressing the coaches. Jermale Hines mostly played the Star last season, but with his move to strong safety, Oliver and Moeller will be fighting for the spot.

Oliver (14) looking for that STAR spot.

Sabino is fighting off the underclassman as he hold down his spot at the SAM position, and something tells me he's starting to get the hang of this thing. Although I'm not a huge fan of his, I would like to see him do well.

The last spot is Receivers. If you want some real competition, excluding the running back spot, this is the place to be. Behind Posey and Sanz, there is a WW2 like scene taking place. Taurian Washington is doing his best to hold that 3 spot, but surprisingly, Grant Schwartz, is making some noise with the coaches, as even Darrell Hazel said that this will keep going through fall camp. Duron Carter was no where to be seen, although 11W did spot him shooting some hoops with his dad. If he wants to earn a spot at the third position, he's going to have to work harder than ever in his life to get that spot.

Finally, Tate Forcier, for Michigan, has suffered a "slightly" sprained ankle. Buckeye fans have to be happy with the Silly Goose. He's making RR's job so much harder than it needs to be. Although it's hard enough as it is, seeing as the NCAA has their magnifying glass pointed right at him. To put it simply, it's great to be a Buckeye.

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Inside The Shoe is still looking for two writers. One basketball, and one football writer. If your interested, please leave a comment, or email us at insidetheshoe2009@hotmail.com. The requirements can be found here. We hope to be talking to you soon!