After Ohio State quarterback Julian Sayin, wide receiver Jeremiah Smith and the rest of the Buckeyes constructed a 39-point lead less than three quarters into a season-opening romp of Ball State on Sept. 5, all that was left for the scarlet and gray faithful to watch was Sayin’s heir, Tavien St. Clair.
Or so they thought.
Advertisement
St. Clair, a sophomore and a former five-star recruit who was the Rivals industry ranking’s No. 3 QB prospect in the 2025 class, wasn’t the first Ohio State signal-caller in for mop-up duty.
That was Luke Fahey, a 5-foot-11 freshman who earned only three stars as a prospect in Mission Viejo, California, two fewer than the prototypical and local St. Clair. That was an early, but incredibly telling, sign about the Buckeyes’ quarterback room.
The position group’s pecking order was thrust into the national spotlight more than a month later when Sayin, a Heisman Trophy finalist last season, suffered a serious injury to his throwing arm in a top-five showdown versus Indiana.
Fahey, who had maintained his hold on the backup spot, once again took over, this time with many more eyeballs on him. He wasn’t asked to do much as the Buckeyes gripped to their lead and eked out the win over the reigning national champion Hoosiers.
Advertisement
On Saturday at USC, though, Fahey is QB1 for the No. 2 team in the nation. Now, with Sayin out indefinitely — seemingly for the rest of the 2026 campaign — the fate of Ohio State’s season rests in the hands of a first-year college quarterback who wasn’t on most people’s radar until this month.
Ryan Day played his cards close to his chest ahead of trip to Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum
Fortunately for the Buckeyes, they had an off week following their nail-biter in Bloomington. That gave head coach Ryan Day time to reassess his quarterback situation, and for Fahey and St. Clair to get much-needed reps with the first-team offense.
On Oct. 20, amid that off week, Day publicly left the door open for St. Clair to challenge Fahey for the starting job.
Advertisement
“I think going into the last few games, Luke’s been ahead of Tavien in terms of what we’ve seen,” Day said at the time, via WBNS 10 TV.
“But now that we have a bye week, these guys are both going to get a lot of reps. … We’re going to play the guy that gives us the best chance to win.”
Day kept things vague this week as well. He told reporters that both Fahey and St. Clair would be prepared to go this weekend.
“I’m not going to,” Day said, when asked if he was going to name a starting quarterback. “But both guys had a good week of practice, and I think both will be ready to play. And I think guys on the team have confidence that, if both were put into the game, they can do their job. So we’ll keep preparing, and we’ll see how Saturday goes.”
Advertisement
While Ohio State’s still loaded offensively — most notably, Smith is a Heisman contender — starting a new, inexperienced quarterback midseason is never easy.
What’s more, the Buckeyes came into this week knowing they’d also be down running back Ja’Kobi Jackson, a Florida transfer who’s been leading the team with 6 yards per carry but now is reportedly recovering from foot surgery.
Fahey ‘has a moxie about him’
Prior to Saturday, the college football world hadn’t seen much of either Fahey or St. Clair. Fahey had four appearances under his belt, completing 9-of-13 passes across those outings for 203 yards, 2 touchdowns and 2 interceptions.
Advertisement
St. Clair — a 6-foot-4, 235-pound passer from nearby Bellefontaine, Ohio — had played in a pair of games, going a combined 5 of 7 for 52 yards with 1 touchdown and 1 pick to his name.
But those two have had substantially more time to prove themselves on the practice field, and Fahey’s seemed to win out in that environment.
“He’s an extremely hard worker. He puts a lot of hours in. He’s extremely competitive,” Day said of Fahey last week, via WBNS 10 TV. “He has a moxie about him. He has a competitiveness about him. We’re always looking for quarterbacks who are just obsessed with being great, and I think when you get around Luke, you can quickly see how important it is to him.
“He puts a lot of work in. You see when he’s there in the preseason or in the offseason, he’s in here early with the receivers and just going through the scripts. And you see him in the meeting rooms, putting in a lot of work, learning the plays. When he steps in the huddle, he’s got it. And the linemen feel that.”
The competitiveness of Fahey has been a talking point in Columbus this week, particularly after a clip of him giving an inspired speech during his Mission Viejo High School days circulated.
Mission Viejo High School, by the way, is about an hour drive from the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum, where Fahey made his first career start Saturday.
Advertisement
Fahey threw more than 7,000 yards in high school, including an average of 290.8 during his senior season. As a first-year starter his sophomore year, he guided Mission Viejo to the CIF State Division I-AA championship title.
While this week made for a homecoming, suiting up for the Buckeyes was a dream come true for Fahey. His grandparents met working as student employees at Ohio State’s main library in the 1950s, as reported by The Columbus Dispatch. Their affinity for the Buckeyes has stretched generations, with Fahey now at the center of a team he grew up envisioning himself playing for.
Comments
Advertisement