Tunmise Adeleye is committed, ready to help Ohio State win national titles

Ohio State football recruiting can be a wild ride full of twists and turns as recruits from all over the country maneuver their way to signing day. Lettermen Row is here to help navigate the tumultuous roads by getting to the heart of the matter with the young football players themselves. Birminology shows who the young men being recruited by Ohio State truly are — by talking to them. Today, we’re speaking with Tunmise Adeleye, who committed to the Buckeyes on April 15.

The plan for 4-star defensive lineman Tunmise Adeleye seemed simple. He’d make a couple of college visits this spring, using those trips to confirm feelings he had about top programs he was considering and then, eventually, make a decision on August 1, a decision that would allow him to concentrate on his final season of high school football.

Like everyone else in the world of sports, Adeleye’s plans were changed in the last month as the Covid-19 pandemic shut down college recruiting visits across the country. When that happened, the 6-foot-3, 260-pound lineman made it clear that he was unhappy, but the frustration he felt wasn’t aimed at one school or another, just the knowledge that a major part of his process had been taken from him.

That process though, was much further along than the country’s No. 4-ranked strongside defensive end ever led on. Ohio State, where he’d visited last summer, had maintained its position in his recruitment despite the love other programs were giving, and getting, on social media. The Buckeyes approach was always the same with Adeleye, and it always involved Larry Johnson.

The plan for Tunmise Adeleye always seemed to include the Buckeyes, and he says that began years ago when he watched Ohio State topple Oregon for the 2015 national title game. That, he says, is when he knew he’d wanted to suit up for the Buckeyes.

So why wait? That’s the question Adeleye, who is set to play his final season of prep football at the IMG Academy in Florida, asked himself and every time he did, he came back to one answer: there was no reason to wait.

Now that he’s committed, Adeleye says he’ll be a relentless — but pressure free — recruiter for Ohio State and he talked about that, the worry about decommitments, how social media has impacted people’s opinion of him and his recruitment, his relationship with Larry Johnson and much more.

Check out the latest edition of Birminology on Lettermen Row with Tunmise Adeleye, brought to you by Lettermen Row.