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Ohio State Recruiting Insider: Buckeyes Chasing Top Overall Recruits In 2025 and 2026 · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Welcome to buck Eyes tomorrow morning. For Wednesday May I'm your host Tom Moore.
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  The Akron game in one hundred and fifteen days, the game against Michigan
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  in two hundred and six days. We have another update from the Southern Swing,
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  just in case you're running what the Southern Swing is if you haven't listened
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  to a couple of the shows earlier this week were late last week, Mark
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  Kivler and Kevin Noon traveling all around the South, meet with some of the
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  very best high school football players in the country, talk to them, their
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  coaches, their families, whoever else, get insight on them as players,
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  them as prospects, and where things might stand between them and Ohio State.
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  So why do they go all over the South, Well, that is where
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  some of the very very best players in the country live. And they have
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  already met with one of the guys considered the number one player in the class
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  of twenty twenty five, one of the guys considered the number one overall player
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  in the class of twenty twenty six, both potentially future buck Eyes. We're
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  going to be talking about both of those guys, as well as maybe another
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  guy or two on the show. We're going to be doing that with Mark
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  Givler. Mark, first of all, how are you in enjoying all of
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  the time in the car with Kevin noon and all of the fast food stops
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  and all of the good stuff that comes with being on the road for weeks
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  at a time. Oh, Tom, we're living the dream right now.
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  Actually, we had a subscriber take us out to a minor league baseball game
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  in Charlotte, so that was actually very nice. So shout out to him,
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  Dave, for putting us up in a suite at the Triple A game
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  and letting us, you know, kind of relax for an evening before we
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  hit back on the road. But yeah, it's I'm used to it by
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  now. We do this. I've done this every spring for probably ten,
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  ten eleven years now, and it's we've got it down to kind of a
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  science. So the difficult stuff is kind of ahead of us. Now.
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  We've kind of made the easy kind of wound our way down to Georgia,
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  and now it's going to get Now, it's gonna get all sorts of fun.
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  Well, there are a lot of very time the players in Georgia.
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  There are a lot of very talented players in Florida, where you're gonna be
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  going as well. But first we got to talk about a couple of guys
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  from North Carolina. One of them David Sanders, offensive tackle, ranked the
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  number one player overall in the class of twenty twenty five by some sources.
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  He made a surprise visit to Ohio State last week, and then you made
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  a somewhat surprise visit to his high school this week. Got a chance to
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  talk to him some of the folks around him. I know, you've put
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  more information on our board than we generally are going to be sharing here,
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  so people want a little more detail on a lot of this stuff we're going.
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  You can remember buckeyehuddle dot com. But let people know just sort of
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  broadly where things are standing with David Sanders and the Buckeyes right now. I
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  mean six months ago, and maybe probably argue about two or three months ago,
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  this was kind of a no chance situation for Ohio State. They were
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  kind of way down his top list of schools. I really didn't give him
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  much a chance at all. I think that has changed a lot here in
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  the last few weeks. This is this was his second visit to Ohio State
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  in about a month, maybe a month and a half, and you know,
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  that first visit the spring kind of brought him back for this last one,
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  he said. He just the communication has been fantastic there with Ohio State,
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  so we will see. I'm getting the sense now that I've always felt
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  Clemson was going to be very strong in this and I still think they are.
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  And I think, you know, but I think Ohio State has moved
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  from that kind of tier two back of the pack among his top six schools
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  to I think that tier one, top two or three schools list, and
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  you know, I think Tennessee and Ohio State have probably got the most momentum
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  right now. I'm a little bit surprised that Georgia doesn't have much momentum right
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  now, and that could change in the blink of an eye. He is
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  going to make an official visit there in June. But yeah, it's it's
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  a heated, heated battle right now, and he's a special talent, so
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  no one's going to give up on this one. Well, the Buckeyes do
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  not yet have the number one player overall in the class of twenty twenty five.
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  They do, however, have their quarterback in twenty twenty five that is
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  Tavian Saint Clair. Of course, a five star prospect. He is already
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  locked in in the class and is about as solidly committed as you possibly can
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  be without having officially signed those that letter of intent that will happen in November
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  or sorry, December. However, they do not yet have their quarterback for
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  the class at twenty twenty six. And we've talked about a bunch of different
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  names there all over the place, all over the nation, Guys in Ohio,
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  guys all over the South. And now you've got a chance to talk
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  this week with the number one player, according to some sources in the classe
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  at twenty twenty six. This Faison Brandon. He is a quarterback out of
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  Greensboro, North Carolina. That is not a name we've talked about a lot,
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  or maybe at all on this show before. Let people know a little
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  bit about him. Yeah, they actually just offered him last week. Chip
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  Kelly was by the school and watched him work out and was oppressed and offered
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  him to talk to him on the phone later that day. And he is
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  a he is unique. He is six four, two hundred pounds. He's
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  still only fifteen years old, so he really shouldn't be a twenty twenty seven
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  kid. A lot of the guys he's competing with are are at least a
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  year older. And for example, a guy we talked a lot about before
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  he committed to Georgia, Jared Curtis is seventeen, so you know there's a
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  there's an age gap there. Yet he is extremely productive thirty six touchdowns,
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  three interceptions as a as a sophomore as a fifteen year old sophomore and added
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  almost six hundred yards and nine touchdowns on the ground. He's a dual threat.
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  He is a you know, Jaden Daniels comes to mind kind of watching
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  his film, but even like physically, like that's a kid that could look
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  a whole lot like Vince Young in two years. He is a specimen and
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  a great kid, very mature and humble, so that was good to see.
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  He did visit Ohio State early, like as a freshman for like a
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  p Obviously a lot's changed since then. He's going to trying it back up
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  this summer. He and his family have been talking with the Hive State coaches
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  about that either June or July, and we'll see where it goes. But
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  there's some genuine interest there. And this would be a guy you know,
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  ohig SATs still kind of figuring out their twenty twenty six quarterback board. This
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  is a guy I think we'll be pretty high up there. Yeah, well,
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  when the two comps you're throwing out, you are not generally one to
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  get real hyperbolic with com So if the two comps you're throwing out both won
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  the Heisman Trophy, like that feels that feels pretty like there's probably a little
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  bit of a ceiling there. And I do want to make a point about
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  the age here, because this is something that you hear about, like Major
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  League Baseball teams don't necessarily want to draft over age guys, guys who are
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  graduating high school at nineteen something like that. If you're a year younger,
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  if you are, or if you're a twenty one year old playing triple A,
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  that's you know, what you're doing there is much more impressive than the
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  twenty four year old doing the same thing. So a fifteen year old who
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  is kind of getting stacked up against ten year olds in high school, there's
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  a lot more room for growth physically, mentally, dirty wise, all of
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  that stuff. You're way ahead of the curve if you're matching up with people
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  who are a couple of years older. So yeah, I just wanted to
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  make sure people understood are the context behind behind that? So that is a
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  Faison Brandon twenty twenty six quarterback. Last guy. I wanted to talk to
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  you about someone who I guess Faison Brandon could throw the ball to at some
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  point in the future, and David Sanders could be blocking to allow faise On
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  Brandon time to throw the ball to. Brodie Keef top one hundred wide receiver
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  Mark. I just sort of assume if Ohio State's in and a wide receiver,
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  it's like fifty to fifty that they're going to get him. So is
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  where do things stand with Brodie Keef and Brian Hartline? And is magical recruiting
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  magical recruiting touch fifty fifty might be interesting. So I think right now a
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  Hive State and Tennessee orre his top two. I think he's going to go
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  to end up with one of those two programs. You know, there's some
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  other schools involved. Course, there's going to be George is offered. There's
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  a few other schools going to be looking at. But he told me he's
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  gonna get start to get serious about that probably in the fall in terms of
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  narrowing his list. But he's already been up to Ohio State three times in
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  the past year. He's gonna be back the summer, is gonna be back
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  in the fall. Just loves Brian Hartline. And again they are they're selling
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  him on being part of the legacy they've built here at Ohio State wide Receivers,
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  so and he's listening. So those are the two schools I think are
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  probably in the best shape right now. An interesting kind of dynamic here,
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  and this probably even goes more to Faison Brandon than it does Brody Keith is
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  Chris Henry, Ohio Chris Henry, junior, Ohio State's five star wide receiver
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  committed twenty twenty six. Grew up in Charlotte, so he at some point
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  Ohio State's gonna get those guys together and let let them kind of bond because
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  that would be I think a great tool, especially with Faison Brandon of like,
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  hey, five star receiver for you to throw to. Oh By the
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  way, he's also from North Carolina originally before he moved to Ohio and California.
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  Then Brody Keef's aware of Chris obviously, and they've had they've I think
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  they've changed some. I think they've overlapped on a visitor too, So there
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  is, you know, a surface level knowledge there of each other. And
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  again two Charlotte guys there, So that could be maybe a secret weapon for
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  the Buckeyes here as they try and get into North Carolina in twenty twenty six.
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  And guys we we have updated on on the site that we may not
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  be talking about in this episode, Guys like Thomas Davis Junior. Thomas Davis
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  Junior was trying to claim Chris Henry for North Carolina when we talked to Thomas
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  the other day. So Chris actually knows a lot of those guys in twenty
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  twenty six North Carolina that they've offered, So that could be something to watch.
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  I'm it's not gonna like, it's not necessarily the pied piper for those
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  guys. There's gonna come you run into them, but it could add an
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  extra layer of comfortability for the Bluck guys as they try and land something well.
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  And as Mark mentioned, they have talked to plenty of other guys in
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  addition to the ones we're talking about here. You can find some of those
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  interviews on our YouTube channel YouTube dot com slash bucke Huddle. But you can
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  find all of the information, lots of stories about these guys, lots of
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  insider nuggets and all that on our huddle board presented by Jeff Ruby Steakhouse.
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  Lots of interesting insight analysis there on all of this. And of course we
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  are right now in the middle of our annual subscription sale. You want to
• 10:28
  get access to all that great insider information, well this is a great time
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  to do it. You can say about forty percent on your annual subscription by
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  signing up right now, and that goes for whether you're currently a annual member,
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  you can extend your membership. If you're a monthly member, you can
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  convert to an annual. If you're not a member at all, well you
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  can. You can finally get a peek behind the curtain at all the good
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  stuff at bucke huddle dot com by signing up today. Mark, I know
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  you have been through West Virginia and the Carolinas. Now right now you are
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  south of Atlanta, as according to your travelogue on the board. Where are
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  your next where your next few days going to be. Yeah. So we
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  made it all the way to Columbus, Georgia from Charlotte last night. So
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  we are going to be obviously in Georgia here for a few days. And
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  we have a new state. I'll dive into that here. We have driven
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  through Alabama before. We have never stopped at a high school during Southern Swing
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  in Alabama. I've covered a high school game in the fall in Alabama.
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  I have never stopped at a high school for Southern Swing in Alabama. That
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  will change today. We have a couple stops lined up in Alabama today and
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  then again it'll be off to uh be back across the border into Georgia for
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  a bunch of Georgia content the next few days. Well, a lot of
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  that stuff coming up all this week at buckeheddle dot com. So again,
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  make sure you sign up today. We've always tell you this is a great,
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  great way to support us and the work we do on YouTube and on
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  our podcast and all that kind of stuff. Also great way to get even
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  more great content in volming the Buckeyes, recruiting and all that good stuff all
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  at buckeyehuddle dot com. That will do it for today. Thank you.
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  Guys all for joining us, have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.