Lettermen Row Recruiting Notebook: Recapping recent Ohio State basketball recruiting activity
COLUMBUS – June has been a busy month for the Ohio State basketball program and first-year head coach Jake Diebler.
On top of the current Ohio State team starting summer workouts, Diebler and his coaching staff have been busy on the recruiting trail. Since June 1, Ohio State has hosted a two-day high school camp, had several top 2025 and 2026 targets on campus and was out on the road for the first scholastic live period of the summer. The coaching staff has even started scheduling official visits for the fall.
Lettermen Row has been keeping tabs on all of the recent recruiting activity by the Ohio State basketball program and recaps it all in this recruiting notebook.
TOP 2025 AND 2026 TARGETS VISIT
Earlier this month Ohio State had dozens of basketball alums, including Los Angeles Lakers guard D’Angelo Russell, back in Columbus to spend a week around the current team. The week was capped off with a scrimmage between the alumni and current team.
Ohio State used the scrimmage as an opportunity to get several recruiting targets on campus to spend time with the coaching staff, current players and some of the alumni. Lettermen Row has confirmed five prospects that were in Columbus for the scrimmage.
2025:
– Four-star Georgetown (Kent.) Great Crossing center Malachi Moreno
– Three-star Toledo (Ohio) Whitmer shooting guard Antione West
2026:
– Four-star Cleveland (Ohio) Garfield Heights point guard and Ohio State commit Marcus Johnson
– Four-star Cleveland (Ohio) Lutheran East small forward TJ Crumble
– Upper Arlington (Ohio) small forward Alex Smith
Lettermen Row spoke with Ohio State commit Marcus Johnson after his visit. He enjoyed seeing the Ohio State alums back on campus.
“It was good. The vets came up. People like D’Angelo Russell played against the O-State team,” Johnson told Lettermen Row.
– Another top target to visit Ohio State earlier this month was four-star Western Reserve academy (Ohio) small forward Anthony Thompson, who took an unofficial visit on June 20. Lettermen Row spoke with Thompson briefly after his visit.
“It was great! Went there for practice and I thought it went well,” Thompson told Lettermen Row.
RECAPPING THE FIRST SCHOLASTIC LIVE PERIOD
A scholastic live period is a three-day window in which college coaches can watch prospects play in-person with their high school teams in June. There are two scholastic live periods this year and the first one was last weekend from June 21-23. Ohio State hit the road and saw several top targets with their high school teams.
– Ohio State associate head coach Joel Justus was busy during the first scholastic live period in June. Per a source, Justus started in Washington D.C. on Friday, June 21, then made the trip to North Carolina on Saturday and wrapped his weekend in Kentucky on Sunday, per a source.
Justus was watching Four-star Potomac (Md.) The Bullis School center Eric Reibe in Washington D.C., three-star Davidson (N.C.) Day School point guard Isaiah Denis in North Carolina and four-star Georgetown (Kent.) Great Crossing center Malachi Moreno in Kentucky. Justus helps coach Ohio State’s big men so that explains why he watched Reibe and Moreno. As for Denis, the two have a close relationship dating back to Justus’ time at North Carolina State.
– Assistant coach Jamall Walker spent the weekend in Indianapolis at the historic Charlie Hughes Shootout, per a source. Four-star Greenfield (Ind.) Central School four-star shooting guard Braylon Mullins, who visited Columbus on June 27, was the primary prospect that Walker was watching in Indianapolis.
FALL OFFICIAL VISITS STARTING TO COME TOGETHER
Over the course of the next few weeks the Ohio State coaching staff will also start scheduling official visits for this fall with some of their top prospects in the 2025 class. On3 has confirmed two of those visits.
– Five-star Huntington Prep (W. Va.) shooting guard Darryn Petersen will take his second official visit to Ohio State from Aug. 1-3, per On3’s Joe Tipton. The 6-foot-5, 195-pound Peterson is the No. 3 overall prospect in the On3 Industry Rankings and No. 1 shooting guard. He is also a Canton, Ohio, native and attended Cuyahoga Valley Christian Academy for the first two years of high school.
– Ohio State offered three-star Davidson (N.C.) Day School point guard Isaiah Denis this spring. He has quickly become a top target for the Buckeyes. Denis, the No. 122 overall prospect and No. 19 point guard in the On3 Industry Rankings, has scheduled an official visit to Columbus from Sept. 7-9, per On3’s Jamie Shaw. He also has official visits scheduled to Pittsburgh and Michigan.
Lettermen Row beat report Andy Backstrom contributed to this report.
The post Lettermen Row Recruiting Notebook: Recapping recent Ohio State basketball recruiting activity appeared first on On3.
