Jay Timmons has spent nine months turning a spring curiosity into a real possibility, and now Ohio State’s true freshman is on the doorstep of something the program under Ryan Day has rarely seen.
Since Day took over in 2019, only two true freshmen have won Day 1 starting jobs. One was Denzel Burke in 2021, a surprise starter at cornerback in the Buckeyes’ 45-31 win over Minnesota.
The other was Jeremiah Smith in 2024, the can’t-miss receiver who arrived with enough hype that the only question was how fast he’d prove it on the field. Timmons now sits somewhere between those two examples: a five-star talent who wasn’t penciled in as a starter, then kept forcing his way into the conversation.
At the start of the spring, the Buckeyes’ secondary looked like it might settle into Devin Sanchez and Jermaine Mathews at cornerback, with Jaylen McClain, Earl Little Jr. and Terry Moore at safety. Even after spring, that was still the most obvious path. Timmons was not the obvious answer.
Then he kept flashing.
“(I noticed it as) soon as he came in,” Florida State transfer Earl Little said. “We do a lot of competitive stuff in the weight room as well as on the field.
Just seeing his whole mindset and the tenacity he brings is crazy. I’ve never seen that from a freshman.”
“He has a pro-style mindset already at a young age. Just the aggressiveness he plays with and his passion for the game.” That sets him apart from a lot of people.
“His willingness to come up and tackle and thump you. He’s also a great cover corner as well.
He has all the tangibles to play. For a freshman, your mindset has to be there, especially at a prestigious school like Ohio State.
The mindset has to be at the top every single day.”
By summer, the idea of Timmons having a meaningful role had started to feel more realistic, maybe even similar to the kind of package role Sanchez had in 2025. But fall camp pushed him further than that. He kept showing up, and the staff kept noticing.
“He’s just relentless,” Mathews said. “He makes a lot of plays. He don’t back down from nothing.”
McClain said Timmons has also started to sharpen the mental side of the job.
“Jay Timmons has been making a lot of plays,” McClain said. “He’s been getting smarter, and he’s been understanding the responsibility he has.”
That blend of production and trust is the key piece. Ryan Day made it clear that freshman mistakes are part of the process, but the same mistake over and over becomes a problem.
“We always say veterans are remembering and young guys are learning. And the faster they learn the better,” head coach Ryan Day said.
“If they make a mistake, OK. If they make the same mistake again, there’s a problem.
There’s gonna be mistakes made early on when they go out there. As long as they’re making them at full speed and they don’t continue to repeat those, then that’s a good thing.
“We’ve all seen that when you have young players out there, you have to work through some of those things hand the guys that deserve to have that opportunity, through what they’ve done in terms of earning trust with their teammates and with their coaches and earn the opportunity to do that, are gonna do that. We’ll watch their performance on the field and see if they have earned the reps. There will be some guys that certainly I see that happening with them.”
Timmons’ rise also traces back to something he reportedly told Devin Sanchez when he was being recruited: that he was coming to Ohio State to win a starting job as a freshman.
Now that possibility is real enough that it no longer feels like a bold prediction. It feels like the next step.
If Timmons does lock down the job, he would become the third true freshman since Day arrived to start right away, a list that includes both a total surprise and a blue-chip star who arrived ready to take over. Timmons has made his case by flashing, then flashing again, until the Buckeyes had to take him seriously.
“Obviously not a lot of freshmen around the country have the type of opportunity that he has,” McClain said. “He’s not taking it lightly at all.
He’s growing every day, getting 1% better. He’s one of the better playmakers we have on this team.”
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