Micah Parsons is considered one of the best high school football players in the country. The defensive end is ranked as the seventh-best overall prospect by ESPN and fourth overall by 24/7, and before today, he was considering joining Ohio State. However, Ohio State has agreed to stop recruiting Parsons after self-reporting recruiting violations that took place during Parsons’s official visit to Columbus on Sept. 9, according to documents obtained by The Lantern.
According to Ohio State’s report to the NCAA, Parsons’s parents asked to check out the College GameDay set while on a campus visit with OSU assistant Ed Terwilliger, who obliged and introduced Parsons to Kirk Herbsteit, Eddie George (who was that week’s celebrity guest picker), and Lee Corso. Parsons took photos with the cast during a commercial break before leaving the set to resume his tour of Ohio State’s academic facilities.
Per the arcane bylaws of NCAA recruiting, Parsons can hang out with former players like Herbstreit. But because Parsons met Herbstreit and George while they were working as members of the media, this was a violation. Here are the confusing rules that OSU broke:
As such, a violation of NCAA Bylaws 13.10.1 and 13.10.2.4 occurred, as members of the media may not be present during an institution’s recruiting contact with a prospect and a prospect may not participate in team activities that would make the public or media aware of the prospect’s visit to the institution.
This is somehow a serious enough violation that it could cost OSU their best recruit. Terwilliger was also suspended for a game and OSU agreed to keep all recruits away from any future GameDay sets, lest something this serious and obviously damaging happen again. This is also the second OSU recruiting foible Herbstreit’s been involved in this year. Given how that one went, maybe they should keep players away for a bit.