Spring Ball Updates | Ohio State, Clemson, and USC
Notre Dame is just over a couple of weeks away from the Blue-Gold game that will conclude their spring practices. Their top opponents are in the thick of spring ball as well so now feels like as good of a time as any to check in with how things are going at Ohio State, Clemson, and USC.
Buckeyes DL and WRs are going to be a problem
Jim Knowles came over from Oklahoma State and to run Ohio State’s defense. He inherited a ton of talent to work with, especially up front. Knowles raved about the defensive line and the pressure they are able to put on the quarterback after Ohio State’s open practice this past weekend. They are loaded with talented edge rushers.
Zach Harrison, who will be playing on Sundays, is not starting at the moment because former top-10 recruits Jack Sawyer and JT Tuimoloau are slotted there. They project to be breakout stars in their second seasons on campus. Mitchell Melton made the move from linebacker and he was a player that the Notre Dame staff coveted as a future edge rusher. It sounds like he is making an impact this spring too.
They have questions at linebacker, but they are transitioning to a 4-2-5 under Knowles with Steele Chambers and Tommy Eichenberg running with the ones at the moment. Cody Simon is not healthy this spring or else he might be there as well. The backers might not have to be that good with what they are working with up front.
Notre Dame’s O-line is going to have a stiff test in the first game of the season. It sounds like the only way the defense can slow down their passing game is with the pass rush, which gives Notre Dame a roadmap of what they will have to do in the season opener.
We know CJ Stroud is going to be great at quarterback and Jaxon Smith-Njigba should be a frontrunner to win the Biletnikoff Award, but all reports indicate that Marvin Harrison Jr. already looks like he is ready to be a star.
Irish fans would love to read more negative news coming out of Columbus, but the reality is that Ohio State should be as good as advertised.
Clemson having a rough spring with injuries
The good news for Clemson is that Dabo Swinney is excited about the progress DJ Uiagalelei has made after a rough sophomore season. How much of that is Dabo being Dabo with his notoriously positive attitude is tough to say, but we’ll find out just how true that is well before Clemson travels to South Bend in November.
The bad news for Dabo is that Clemson has had bad injury luck this spring. The Irish have a handful of key contributors who have been banged up, but Clemson has had over a dozen. Early enrollee wide receiver Adam Randall, a player ranked in the ISD Fab 50, is just the latest after tearing his ACL. He’s out for the season. It sounds like most of the other injuries aren’t the kind that will keep players from returning to action this fall.
That doesn’t help them at the moment, especially with so much coaching turnover. After the way the offensive line struggled last season, they could have used the entire spring to get on the right track, but they have had a few Injuries up front and starting right tackle Walker Parks is out with an illness.
Dabo has said they are looking for more help on the offensive line through the transfer portal and that’s not something he has openly embraced before. That shows how potentially desperate the situation is and the offensive line may continue to be an issue for an offense that greatly underachieved in 2021.
USC has a long way to go
The main thing coming out of spring ball for USC is how open the coaching staff has been about how much talent they need to add. Lincoln Riley is on the record saying they want to add double digits to the roster before the start of the season, which pretty much says it all about where things stand.
They are at 76 scholarships right now and have already taken over a dozen transfer players. It’s likely they will lose a few more after the spring is over due to regular attrition.
The Trojans might be the most intriguing experiment in the country this season. It’s probably not an experiment that is going to go well, but this should be more about a stop-gap year on the way to getting the roster to where Riley wants it to be rather than USC being very good in 2022.