\n Ohio State\u2019s secondary continues to take shape this spring through competition, growth and new leadership dynamics following key departures. <\/p>\n
\n\tFrom a cornerback unit pushing for consistency and star potential to a safety group working to replace Caleb Downs with a collective approach, the Buckeyes are emphasizing development, communication and day-to-day accountability.\n<\/p>\n
\n\tSecondary coach Tim Walton, safeties coach Matt Guerrieri and several defensive backs \u2014 including Devin Sanchez, Earl Little Jr., Jaylen McClain and Leroy Roker III \u2014 met with the media to discuss the unit\u2019s progress this spring. Below are some of the top notes and quotes from those interviews.\n<\/p>\n
\tSecondary Coach, Co-Defensive Coordinator\u00a0Tim Walton<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cHe has to become a dominant player for us. He\u2019s going into his second year, has the talent. He has to take the next step of being dominant, being lockdown, that\u2019s the expectation.\u201d\u2013 Tim Walton on what he wants to see from Devin Sanchez\n<\/p>\n
\t\tOn his impressions of the cornerback room so far this spring: \u201cWe\u2019re growing. They\u2019re competing, just learning. We\u2019ve got a new group of guys, just trying to put them in different spots and see how they\u2019re doing. We\u2019ve been having fun, been flying around.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tJermaine Mathews Jr. has been working to correct the mistakes he made at the tail end of the 2025 season, Walton said. \u201cHe didn’t play the way he wanted to toward the end. So now we’ve got to go out, correct the little things, attention to details. He’s been trying to get that part fixed because, like I said, he’s the leader of the room. He’s been trying to get that part fixed because, like I said, he’s the leader of the room. He’s the guy that’s been there the longest. He’s the most experienced, so he has to handle the heavy lifting.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn what stands out about Dominick Kelly: \u201cConsistency. Discipline, consistency, that’s what you got to have in this game. You know what I mean? We got to know what we’re getting every day, and he’s been level-headed. He’s been a smooth operator with things.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn Earl Little Jr.: \u201cOutstanding. He’s a fireball, man.\u00a0Plays with great energy, great passion, great toughness. He plays the game the way you want to play it. He’s embracing the culture here. He’s been a great addition.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tSafeties Coach Matt Guerrieri<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cNo one guy has to take on that role. They know that. They\u2019ve heard that from me. What we do have is we have depth and experience. We have smart players. We have guys who can make plays in a bunch of different ways. Our job is to design, to put those guys in position and be able to split roles amongst those guys.\u201d\u2013 Matt Guerrieri on replacing Caleb Downs\n<\/p>\n
\t\tOn Earl Little Jr.: \u201cThere\u2019s immediate energy when he\u2019s in the building, so he brings that to the team. Highly, highly, highly competitive, which to me is a trait required for a great player. He\u2019s done an awesome job learning the schematics of what we\u2019re doing here. And has jelled great with the guys.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn Leroy Roker III: \u201cLeroy is a guy who has developed tremendously over the last couple of years. He has all the skills to be a very, very, very good safety. He\u2019s an awesome person. The sky is the limit for him.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tGuerrieri said he\u2019s had a relationship with Terry Moore since Moore was a recruit, as Guerrieri was Duke\u2019s co-defensive coordinator and safeties coach before joining Ohio State\u2019s staff in 2022. \u201cHe\u2019s an awesome dude, awesome family. He\u2019s grown tremendously throughout his college career. He\u2019s experienced. \u2026 He\u2019s had high-level production in his last year playing at Duke, and then he\u2019s got a chip on his shoulder, because he missed the whole last year.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tS Earl Little Jr.<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cJust the level of competition, day in and day out. At Alabama, we didn\u2019t compete in the weight room how we do here. With everything you\u2019re doing at Ohio State, you\u2019re gonna compete and you have to be at your best every single day.\u201d \u2013 Earl Little Jr. on competition at Alabama and Ohio State\n<\/p>\n
\t\tLittle said Matt Patricia has a \u201cpro approach\u201d to his coaching and system. \u201cI love the way he teaches the defense. He teaches conceptually, so it\u2019s kind of easy for us to break down and consume the defense. And it just allows us to go out there and play fast at a high level.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tLittle said Ohio State\u2019s competition level has blown him away so far. \u201cThe competition, day in and day out, literally. We\u2019re competing in a weight room with different exercises, literally. I\u2019ve never been a part of something like that, competing in the weight room. And so it\u2019s the level of competition, day in and day out, it\u2019s second to none, and that\u2019s definitely a separating factor.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tLittle said he talked to Caleb Downs before transferring to Ohio State. \u201cIt\u2019s a great brotherhood. It\u2019s a special place to be. Playing under (Matt Patricia), that was one of the best decisions Caleb made, and playing for (Matt Guerrieri) as well. Those two guys, they love ball, they\u2019re all about ball, and they\u2019re great teachers, so that\u2019s something I wanted to be a part of.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tWhen asked about his relationship with Jeremiah Smith, Little said he\u2019s known about the star wide receiver since both of them played high school football in South Florida. He called Smith a \u201cdifferent animal\u201d in the weight room which is \u201csomething I truly respect him for.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tS Jaylen McClain<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cLosing Caleb (Downs) and Sonny (Styles), they were the lead communicators on this team and on this defense. So (I\u2019m) working on being more vocal, making myself be heard on and off the field.\u201d\u2013 Jaylen McClain on how and why he needs to step up as a vocal leader in 2026\n<\/p>\n
\t\tVocal leadership isn\u2019t something that comes naturally to McClain, but he knows it\u2019s necessary. \u201cIt\u2019s been something I had to work on. All the coaches and the staff, they\u2019ve challenged me to work on that, get better.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn what he learned from playing with Caleb Downs: \u201cI just watched how he approached every day. In the film room, on the field, how he took care of his body and just taking pieces and parts of that and just being able to put it in my game.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn what made him successful as a pass defender in 2025, given his great coverage numbers: \u201cReps every day in practice. Coach allows us to be in those situations a lot.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tOn Earl Little Jr.: \u201cHe\u2019s very exciting to watch, like I said. High motor. He plays with his hair on fire and I like to see that.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tS Leroy Roker III<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cComing in with a bunch of 4- and 5-stars, highly recruited, it did put a chip on my shoulder. But I knew I could be able to compete with them.\u201d\u2013 Leroy Roker III on coming to Ohio State as a three-star recruit\n<\/p>\n
\t\tRoker said he isn\u2019t surprised that he\u2019s getting reps with the starters this spring. He feels he\u2019s put the work in to earn that, starting with his play on special teams over the last two years.<\/p>\n
\t\tOn being compared to Malik Hooker by Ohio State general manager Mark Pantoni: \u201cThat means a lot. Malik Hooker is a very good player, and to be able to be compared to him, it\u2019s good for me.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tRoker says he\u2019s been playing all three safety spots in Ohio State\u2019s defense.<\/p>\n
\t\tRoker believes his biggest strength is his range. He says the biggest thing he\u2019s been working on this spring is communication.<\/p>\n
\tCB Devin Sanchez<\/p>\n
\n\t\u201cI want to be a Thorpe finalist. I want to win a Thorpe, for sure. I want to be an All-American. I want to be Big Ten DB of the Year. It\u2019s a lot of things I have on the table that I want to accomplish.\u201d\u2013 Devin Sanchez on his goals entering his sophomore year\n<\/p>\n
\t\tSanchez said he feels more comfortable and confident in himself entering his second season. \u201cLast year, coming in the door, I was a little nervous, a little timid. But I feel like this year I\u2019m taking that next step in the role that I got to step up in.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tSanchez said he\u2019s already taken freshman Jay Timmons under his wing and helped him handle the expectations placed upon him during his first season. \u201cJust telling him, \u2018Just go out there and play. Be yourself. Be comfortable.\u2019 Because last year, I didn\u2019t have the confidence. I feel like this year, if what I went through last year, I can tell him to go out there, have fun and be confident.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tWhen asked who has stepped up to replace Caleb Downs, Sanchez answered Jaylen McClain and Earl Little Jr.. \u201cJaylen has been real vocal out there. He\u2019s talking. He\u2019s leading the secondary. If somebody messes up on the coverage, he makes them right. I feel like it\u2019s definitely Jaylen McClain, but Earl Little is definitely that, too. He comes down. He sets the tone. He\u2019ll go smack a running back right in the face. He\u2019ll just come back and talk and he\u2019ll let you hear it. I feel like it\u2019s both safeties.\u201d<\/p>\n
\t\tSanchez said he and Jeremiah Smith compete \u201cback-and-forth\u201d during practice. He called Smith the best player in college football, which means guarding him in practice helps him grow. \u201cHe\u2019s the best player in the country. Coach Walt tells us all the time, if he falls in the draft, he\u2019ll go two. I feel like you can\u2019t wish for nothing better than that. I feel like it goes back and forth. I win something, he wins something.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Ohio State\u2019s secondary continues to take shape this spring through competition, growth and new leadership dynamics following key…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":861433,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[5],"tags":[7,49,48],"class_list":{"0":"post-861432","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-ncaa-football","8":"tag-football","9":"tag-ncaa","10":"tag-ncaa-football"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/channels.im\/@nfl\/116370685465668354","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/861432","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=861432"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/861432\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/861433"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=861432"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=861432"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.rawchili.com\/nfl\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=861432"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}