Ohio State football loses first player to transfer portal after winning title
01/21/2025 10:25 AM
Even after winning the College Football Playoff National Championship Game, Ohio State will still lose a handful of players to the transfer portal. Freshman running back Sam Williams-Dixon became the first player to leave the program the day after the Buckeyes’ statement victory.
Williams-Dixon officially entered the portal on Tuesday, per 247 Sports. The intended move has been widely known for several weeks, as Williams-Dixon confirmed during Ohio State’s CFP run that he would enter the portal after the season. However, he opted to remain with the team throughout the postseason.
He appeared in just three games in 2024, fielding seven carries for 53 rushing yards. In Week 2, he ran for a career-high 40 yards on just three carries against Western Michigan. He spent the entire year buried on Ohio State’s running back depth chart led by the star duo of TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins.
A former three-star recruit out of Pickerington North High School in Columbus, Ohio, Williams-Dixon committed to the Buckeyes over offers from Indiana, Michigan State, Tennessee, Boston College, Kentucky and others. He is expected to see similar interest as a transfer from many of those same schools.
Given his late entry, Williams-Dixon became one of the top available running backs in the transfer portal. However, several other big names are still on the market, including John Randle Jr., TJ Harden, Trey Cooley, Emeka Megwa, Sam Adams II and others.
Ohio State football to rebuild running back room in 2025
Williams-Dixon’s impending transfer will potentially be a big loss for Ryan Day in 2025. While he will lose several key contributors to his 2024 roster, arguably no positional group will be impacted more than his running backs.
Both Judkins and Henderson, two of the team’s three best offensive weapons, are expected to enter the 2025 NFL Draft. Judkins has one year of eligibility left but is expected to be a prioritized prospect of the draft. If he declares, as most expect him to, that leaves freshman James Peoples as Day’s top returning member of the backfield.
As a distant third string in 2024, Peoples recorded just 197 rushing yards on 49 carries in his freshman year. He only caught one pass on the year. He was a higher-rated recruit than Williams-Dixon, entering Columbus as a four-star prospect and a consensus top-10 running back of the incoming class.
Regardless, without Judkins and Henderson in 2025, Peoples and Williams-Dixon were the top candidates to lead the backfield. Day will now have to be more aggressive in his hunt for a replacement for his star backfield duo.
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