Buckeyes' New Rival Indiana Makes Major Splash on Friday, Steals Top Recruit
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Figuring out Curt Cignetti and the Indiana Hoosiers is like solving a very complex puzzle.
After winning the National Championship last year and completing a perfect season with a bunch of misfit transfers, Cignetti appeared to have doubled down on building his roster from the transfer portal.
His 2027 class had just 16 recruits, six four-stars and 10 three-star players. It appeared as though Cignetti wasn't even wasting his time recruiting high school kids as he proved out his model to win.
And then on Friday, he dropped a bomb on college football. It was announced that the Hoosiers landed their top football recruit ever. Wide receiver Monshun Sales is a five-star-plus recruit and is a guy who continues to change the perception of Indiana nationally.
For Ohio State, this is a hit on two fronts. The Buckeyes were in the final decision for Sales as he was selecting between Indiana, Ohio State, Alabama, Texas, and LSU.
Sales is a 6'5" receiver that has superstar, Jeremiah Smith-like potential. That is not to say that he will be that guy, but it is the potential that he has within him.
It really is a decently surprising result that they were unable to convince Sales to come to Columbus. The truth about Ohio State is that it is a wide receiver university, and the path to the NFL goes through Columbus.
It is rare that they lose a recruiting battle like this, but this one just didn't go their way.
Now, all of that is to say that by no means is this a signal that Ohio State is in trouble or that the cupboard looks bare in Ohio State's wide receiver room. It is more so a sign that Indiana's success isn't just a flash in the pan and that it is here to stay.
The Buckeyes are going to be just fine from a receiver perspective. They still have their very own five-star receiver coming in the 2027 class and a buttress of two of the top-5 wide receivers in the 2028 class coming.
They will be fine, but now that rivalry against Indiana is officially here to stay. It isn't going anywhere, and the Hoosiers are going to be a force to be reckoned with in the Big Ten for many years to come.
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