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Michigan Football has a (largely) finalized coaching staff for the upcoming 2024 season and today marks the closing of the transfer portal window that began when Jim Harbaugh exited to the NFL. Changes may continue to rosters after spring ball, but today marks the point at which Michigan joins the rest of college football in terms of staff and roster stability, the dust settling on the changes of the winter period. That reality allows us to turn our attention to the rest of college football to see what's been going on elsewhere in the B1G, as we did last offseason. Just like last year's series, over the course of the next three pieces (we now have 17 teams to cover!) I will recap what transfer portal and NFL declarations have wrought upon Michigan's conference foes, in addition to any staff turnover. Today we are covering the six teams in what used to be the B1G East: Ohio State EXITS Ohio State lost a handful of impact players, but as a whole came out relatively unscathed from NFL Draft season (apparently due to an ambitious NIL effort to retain the roster). Elder statesmen like the LBs Tommy Eichenberg and Steele Chambers, as well as longtime S Josh Proctor, WR Xavier Johnson, OG Matthew Jones, RB Miyan Williams, and TE Cade Stover are out the door for a mix of eligibility exhaustion and NFL Draft reasons. These were players who'd been around a long time and ultimately felt it was time (or were forced) to move on, none of them being terribly surprising. Relatively few underclassmen took off, the only three notable names being QB Kyle McCord, whose transfer to Syracuse was well-publicized, and then DT Michael Hall Jr. and WR Marvin Harrison Jr.. The loss of Harrison cannot be understated because he was an exceptional player, but that was mostly priced in given MHJ's supreme draft position. Hall was the best pure pass rusher on OSU's DL (or at least the best get-off) in your author's opinion, but still had room to sharpen up as a run defender. Alas, it seems he will be rounding out his form at the next level, where an NFL team will have the chance to inject some legitimate pass rush skill into the middle of their defense. Hmm [Patrick Barron] ACQUISITIONS The upshot of shelling out massively to bring the talented junior class back for one more crack at it is Ohio State had relatively few holes to fill in the portal. Most of their moves came on the offensive side of the ball, making one of the oddest transfer portal pickups in scooping up Alabama C Seth McLaughlin, quite possibly the worst snapper your author has ever seen. Maybe McLaughlin can succeed as a guard where he's not asked to snap the ball, but putting his bad snaps aside, McLaughlin was one of the weakest members of Alabama's OL as a blocker too. Strange. The skill position talent changed some, with OSU outsourcing its TE spot by raiding the in-state Ohio Bobcats for Will Kacmarek. He seems middling, PFF grades in the low 60s as a MAC TE. The bigger get was star RB Quinshon Judkins from Ole Miss, who bailed on the Rebels even as Ole Miss was doing their own version of crazy dropping bags on portal targets. Judkins, paired with TreVeyon Henderson, ought to give the Bucks an elite RB combo for the 2024 season. The key to it all on offense is new QB Will Howard, though we should mention 5* Julian Sayin, who "transferred" from Alabama after Nick Saban's retirement (Sayin had just barely enrolled at Bama). Sayin is a massive get for the future, but it is likely Howard who holds the keys to whether this all-in season ends with the ultimate prize. Howard was a solid starter at Kansas State, but whether he can win a national championship is very much to be determined. Another name we should get on the record is Chip Kelly, the new offensive coordinator. Bill O'Brien was originally hired to fulfill this role, but BO'B bailed before he ever really got started, taking the Boston College head coaching job when that opened up. Kelly then quit on coaching UCLA (where he was seemingly on the verge of being fired) to take this one. Kelly should add new flavor to the Ohio State offense and seems better fit than Ryan Day to take advantage of the mobile Will Howard's skillset. Finally on defense the Buckeyes picked up Alabama star S Caleb Downs, finishing off their massive offseason of spending to build this roster. Downs is a very good player and rounds out what may be college football's best defense in 2024. [AFTER THE JUMP: all the other teams]
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