The biggest question that may decide who wins Ohio State vs. Michigan football in 2024 (2024)

Ohio State Buckeyes running back TreVeyon Henderson (32) lines up as Michigan hosts Ohio State at Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor on Saturday, Nov. 25 2023.Jacob Hamilton | jhamilt3@mlive.com

COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio State and Michigan don’t have much in common regarding how each goes about building a college football championship contender.

The Buckeyes have routinely put together recruiting classes that are among the nation’s best, filled with five-stars and highly rated four-stars viewed by many as having NFL potential.

The Wolverines have chosen to invest in lower-rated players and develop them. Every so often they’ll add the occasional blue-chip recruit like former five-star quarterback J.J. McCarthy and cornerback Will Johnson, but top-100 recruits aren’t in high supply in Ann Arbor.

The different journeys are still expected to produce a similar result: Big Ten titles and national championships. But Michigan’s approach has proven to be superior of late, as the Wolverines won The Game three years in a row and captured the 2023 national championship.

Come November the rivals will line it up again fighting to prove that their way of life is better.

Those differences may never be more drastic than they will be in 2024, as one side enters a new era while the other has pushed all its chips into the middle of the table hoping to finally max out its potential.

A five-star gap

The transfer portal is closed to new entries, but teams can still add players who’ve already gone in after the spring. That means both sides could still be adding scholarship players to their 2024 rosters.

For now, the two rosters have a combined 13 players who graduated as five-star recruits in high school. All but one of them play for the Buckeyes.

Highlighting that group is true freshman receiver Jeremiah Smith, the nation’s top player in the 2024 class who has already made it clear that OSU needs to play him early and often. The question is: Can he join Chris Olave and Garrett Wilson as wide receivers who made a name for themselves as freshmen playing in The Game?

Joining Smith as five-stars at wide receiver are Emeka Egbuka — the top wide receiver in the 2021 class — Brandon Inniss and summer enrollee Mylan Graham.

Eddrick Houston, Jack Sawyer and J.T. Tuimoloau represent the defensive ends. Sawyer and Tuimoloau are also the two highest-rated defensive players in program history. Donovan Jackson is the lone five-star offensive lineman. C.J. Hicks and Sonny Styles are five-star linebackers, while Alabama transfer Caleb Downs gives safety a transfer. TreVeyon Henderson represents the running backs.

Then there’s quarterback Julin Sayin and cornerback Aaron Scott Jr. as freshmen who are the future for OSU, though Sayin could at least make things interesting this year.

Johnson stands alone for Michigan.

He’s a Wolverine legacy who’s now spent the first two years of his career beating Michigan’s rival. In November, his interception set up the touchdown that ended up being the difference in The Game.

The full picture

Here’s a look at what those projected starting lineups could look like and how they stack up against each other in terms of recruiting talent:

Ohio State’s offense

• Not all of these spots are set. Ohio State’s right guard could also be either Luke Montgomery or Tegra Tshabola, both four-star recruits in their respective classes.

• Howard’s low rating is offset by the fact that this is his fifth year of college football, after leading Kansas State to a Big 12 championship last season. He’s the leader in the OSU QB battle, but the other option is Devin Brown, a former top-60 recruit from the 2022 class entering his third year in the program.

• Inniss and Jayden Ballard — a former four-star recruit — deserve to be mentioned among a receiver group that could have a rotation as deep as five in 2024.

Michigan‘s offense

Ohio State’s defense

• All three levels have at least one five-star recruit for Ohio State’s defense, whether as a starter or reserve player, which is a testament to the talent built up over recent classes.

• The only major question about this group is what the Buckeyes will do at starting linebacker. The options are five-star, former top-10 recruit C.J. Hicks; or five-star, former top-10 recruit Sonny Styles. Styles spent last year as a safety before making the transition.

Michigan‘s defense

The Bottom Line

Stars haven’t mattered to Michigan, and the same will be true in 2024. This projected starting 22 features just one five-star, and only eight other players who were even considered among the top 200 players in their respective classes.

The Wolverines haven’t spent the last three years relying on the Jeremiah Smiths of the world, capable of having immediate impacts.

Instead, they’ve focused on building up lower-rated players over a longer period of time, something that has proven to be just as impactful.

Now they start that process from step one under new head coach Sherrone Moore.

Meanwhile, OSU coach Ryan Day has made sure to maintain the recruiting standard set by Urban Meyer, and in some ways even enhance it. As he enters Year 6, the first wave of talent has finally come of age, with many choosing to take one last shot at Michigan, a title and a better ending to their careers.

In six months, these two sides will collide once more. The consequences of a win or loss have changed, thanks to the new 12-team College Football Playoff, expanded Big Ten and new requirements to reach the conference championship game,

But the cultural impact remains the same — as does how each side goes about building a roster worthy of heading into battle.

We’ve seen OSU’s uber-talented rosters dominate this roster. We’ve also seen Michigan’s modest-rosters-turned-quality-veterans return the favor the last three years.

As the rivalry reaches an interesting tipping point, two opposites will once more try to prove which way is superior.

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