Scarlet Sunrise: Braxton Miller to be inducted into Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame

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Braxton Miller to be inducted into Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame

Close to nine years after Braxton Miller played his last game in an Ohio State uniform, the former Buckeyes star announced that he will be inducted into the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame this year.

“Blessed to be selected for the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame Class of 2024,” Miller wrote in a post to X late Thursday night. “Buckeye Nation, I’ll love y’all forever.”

Ohio State Athletics has yet to reveal the other members of its 2024 Hall of Fame class, but the Ohio State football account reposted Miller’s announcement Saturday morning.

Blessed to be selected for the Ohio State Athletics Hall of Fame Class of 2024.. Buckeye Nation, I'll love ya'll forever.. #GoBucks @OhioStateFB pic.twitter.com/eDPGyR4DyR

— BRAXTON MILLER (@BraxtonMiller5) May 31, 2024

Miller hails from Springfield, Ohio, where he emerged as a can’t-miss playmaker at Wayne High School. He stayed in-state and committed to Ohio State.

Then he hit the ground running as a true freshman, even starting 10 games. That year, he threw for 13 touchdowns and only four interceptions while piling up 1,159 yards through the air and an additional 715 yards on the ground, not to mention his seven rushing scores. But that was during the 2011 season, Ohio State’s most recent losing season, a year in which then-co-defensive coordinator and linebackers coach Luke Fickell served as interim head coach after longtime program frontman Jim Tressel stepped down in the wake of the “Tatoogate” scandal.

Also as a result of that scandal, the Buckeyes faced NCAA sanctions, which barred them from the postseason in 2012, Urban Meyer’s first year as head coach. There’s a big “what if” because a Miller-led Ohio State under Meyer went 12-0 that season. It was the first of two straight Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year campaigns for the dual-threat Buckeyes quarterback, who posted 2,039 passing yards, a 15:6 touchdown-to-interception ratio, 1,271 rushing yards and 13 rushing touchdowns.

Ohio State went 12-2 the following year, and Miller completed a career-high 63.5% of his passes while tossing a career-high 24 touchdowns and just seven interceptions. Once again topping the 2,000-yard mark through the air and the 1,000-yard mark on the ground, Miller rounded out his junior season with 3,162 scrimmage yards and 36 total touchdowns.

The problem was, Miller injured his shoulder in the Orange Bowl that season — amid a 40-35 loss to Clemson — and ended up having surgery to repair his torn labrum. Miller sat out the subsequent spring season but still was a trendy offseason pick to win the 2014 Heisman Trophy. That preseason, however, Miller re-injured his labrum while throwing a short, run-of-the-mill pass.

Miller had another operation on his dominant shoulder and missed the 2014 season. J.T. Barrett, and then Cardale Jones, led the Buckeyes to a national championship while Miller was sidelined.

Miller’s shoulder recovery didn’t go to plan, and he wasn’t in a position to play quarterback in 2015, his final season of college football. Jones and Barrett had proved themselves as viable starting candidates under center, anyway. Miller could have transferred. But he stuck around in Columbus and made the switch to wide receiver.

Miller recorded 601 all-purpose yards and four touchdowns in 2015, a season he started with a highlight-reel spin move at Virginia Tech. The Houston Texans wound up taking Miller in the third round of the 2016 NFL Draft. He played for the Texans two seasons, catching a combined 34 passes for 261 yards and two scores in that span. Miller’s short NFL career ended with him spending some practice squad time with the Philadelphia Eagles in 2018 and with the Carolina Panthers in 2019.

He made his mark at Ohio State, though — first as a dual-threat quarterback, then as a do-it-all playmaker. Now he’s going to be part of the Buckeyes’ Hall of Fame.

Revisiting top running back duos in Ohio State history

With Lettermen Row “Running Backs Week” in full swing — and with stars TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins in the fold for Ohio State this year — we took a look back at the top running back duos in Buckeyes history.

Although Ohio State has had several star running backs over the years, not all of them were part of a “true” running back duo. For instance, Ezekiel Elliott ran for north of 1,800 yards back-to-back years in 2014 and 2015, but he dominated the carry share among Ohio State running backs both of those seasons. Go back further, and it was a similar story during Eddie George’s Heisman Trophy campaign in 1995. While George flirted with the 2,000-yard mark, he piled up more than 300 totes. No one else on the team that year had even 100 rushing attempts.

So for this exercise, only true running back duos were considered, meaning Buckeyes pairings who were either a 1A/1B tandem or made up a No. 1 and No. 2 dynamic where each played prominent roles in the offense.

Check out who made the cut here.

RELATED

• Lettermen Row member mailbag: Running Back Week questions answered
• Three bold predictions for Buckeyes running back room

Ohio State ends May with top-ranked 2025 recruiting class

Ohio State ended the month of May with the top-ranked 2025 recruiting class, according to the On3 Industry Team Recruiting Rankings.

The Buckeyes have 12 commits so far: Three of them are five-star prospects, and seven of them are four-star prospects, per the On3 Industry Ranking.

Lettermen Row provided an overview of the class now that May is in the books and now that the Buckeyes are kicking off a critical June full of official visit weekends and recruiting camps.

Get that rundown here.

Counting Down

Buckeyes vs. Akron: 91 days
Buckeyes vs. Michigan: 182 days

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