Five freshmen who will make an impact for Ohio State football in 2026

Apr 18, 2026; Columbus, OH, USA; Ohio State wide receiver Chris Henry Jr. (15) sprints out of the rain storms following the second half as part of the annual spring game at Ohio Stadium. Mandatory Credit: Joseph Maiorana-Imagn Images | Joseph Maiorana-Imagn Images We have made it to May, which means we are four months away from the start of the college football season for Ohio State.

Spring practices wrapped up a couple weeks ago for Ryan Day’s team, so for now all is quiet for Buckeye Nation. Hopefully it will stay that way since in the past May has been rocky at times. Most notably the school parting ways with Jim Tressel because of the “Tatgate” scandal happened at the end of May.

With it being a slower time of the year, I’m going to really lean into May being the fifth month of the year. What better way to do that then by highlighting some different categories in groups of five? With a team with so much returning talent, a bunch of exciting transfers, promising freshmen, and rich traditions it shouldn’t be too hard to find some fun topics to help this month fly by and work our way even closer to Ohio State’s first game of the season.

To start things off we are going to look at Ohio State’s true freshmen who could make an impact in 2026. It used to be teams and their fanbases lived and died by the recruiting classes that were put together for high school prospects. The transfer portal has taken away some of the importance of identifying talent before they sign their LOI.