Dan Hope and Andy Anders of Eleven Warriors bring you inside the Ohio State beat every Wednesday with a podcast covering everything you need to know about the Buckeyes.
Drafting Head-to-Head Lineups from Ohio State’s 2025 Roster
In our annual Ohio State football team draft, Eleven Warriors’ Dan Hope and Andy Anders went head-to-head to draft dueling lineups from OSU’s 2025 roster for a hypothetical game of Buckeyes vs. Buckeyes.
Each beat writer drafted 22 players – 11 on offense and 11 on defense – with the goal of building a lineup that would defeat the other writer’s team in a head-to-head game. Each player could only be drafted once. Each writer was required to draft one quarterback, five offensive linemen and five skill-position players (running backs, wide receivers or tight ends) on offense, and at least three defensive linemen, two linebackers and four defensive backs with two flexible positions on defense.
There was little suspense around who the first two picks would be, but things got interesting from there as Dan and Andy attempted to strategically outmaneuver each other to give their teams advantages at specific positions. Dan ultimately chose to go to mirror Ohio State’s base formations, drafting three wide receivers on offense and five defensive backs on defense, while Andy opted to go old-school by drafting two tight ends and three linebackers.
Dan won the coin toss for our snake draft and chose to take the No. 1 overall pick, after which Andy and Dan alternated selections two at a time until both teams had 22 players for a total of 44 selections.
You can read our full explanations for every pick and vote for whose team should win here: https://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2025/08/157238/2025-ohio-state-football-team-draft-picking-head-to-head-lineups-for-a-matchup-of-buckeyes-vs-buckeyes
30 Jul 2025
Preview of Ohio State’s Top Position Battles Entering Preseason Camp
We’re less than 24 hours away from the start of preseason camp at Ohio State.
As the Buckeyes prepare to start their 25-practice preseason slate on Thursday, we’re previewing all of Ohio State’s top position battles entering camp on a Real Pod Wednesdays-style episode of Press Coverage.
We start by sharing our thoughts on the headlining competition of camp, Julian Sayin vs. Lincoln Kienholz for the starting quarterback job, before continuing with our pre-camp thoughts on the ongoing battle at strong safety, competition along the defensive and offensive lines and challenges for Ohio State’s incumbent starters at kicker and punter.
The full rundown for our Preseason Camp Preview show, which you can watch in the video at the top of the page:
0:00 Julian Sayin vs. Lincoln Kienholz Headlines Ohio State’s Preseason Camp Competitions
11:51 Malik Hartford vs. Jaylen McClain is Buckeyes’ Top Defensive Position Battle
16:33 Kenyatta Jackson Jr. Leads Five-Man Battle for Playing Time at Defensive End
23:06 Backup Defensive Tackles, Led by Will Smith Jr., Must Step Up in Preseason Camp
30:36 We Can Pencil In Ohio State’s Starting Offensive Line, But Competition Remains
38:02 Incumbent Starters Face Competition at Kicker and Punter
14 May 2025
2025 Kickoff Times Predictions with Ohio State vs. Texas Likely Set for Noon Start
Even we beat writers who typically prefer noon games believe Ohio State vs. Texas should be a night game.
With how spectacular the atmosphere was for Ohio State’s home night College Football Playoff game against Tennessee, we want to see another primetime showcase for the Buckeyes’ season opener against the Longhorns. That doesn’t seem to be in the cards, however – unsurprisingly – with FOX set to broadcast the Cotton Bowl rematch, likely at noon.
As such, Ohio State finds itself facing the possibility of playing most of its big regular-season games at noon once again this year, though we do believe Ohio State vs. Penn State is a prime candidate for the marquee home night game Ohio State and its fans covet. But we’d love to see more transparency with the Big Ten television networks’ game selection process – which could be easily achieved by televising the networks’ game draft during a time on the calendar when sickos like us are starved for more college football content.
Eleven Warriors’ Dan Hope, Chase Brown and Garrick Hodge share their thoughts on the season opener’s likely noon destiny, our kickoff time predictions for the rest of the season and how the networks could bring fans into the game selection process on a new episode of Press Coverage, which is also available on the Real Pod Wednesdays feed for this episode.
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Podcast Authority Score: 87 / 100
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100
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YouTube
93
Engagement
92
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