Tahj Gray will not be able to visit the college football game between Ohio State and Illinois. The television broadcast schedule will cost the Buckeyes an opportunity to sell one of the top recruits in the country.
And it may not be specific to only one prospect.
This kind of thing continues to happen in college football. Teams that host early kickoffs often miss out on the chance to host recruits because of scheduling issues.
Who is Tahj Gray?
As a native of Montvale, New Jersey, Tahj Gray is rated as a five-star prospect in the recruiting Class of 2028. He is ranked as the No. 1 or No. 2 player at his position and a top-25 recruit overall as a junior at St. Joseph Regional High School.
Although Gray plays both ways, his future is likely at linebacker. At 6-foot-3.5, 233 pounds, he made 102 total tackles in 2025 with 10.5 tackles for loss, four sacks, four pass breakups and one forced fumble.
His sophomore season is off to an equally as strong start. Gray made 31 total tackles with 3.5 tackles for loss and one sack through the first four games of the season. He scored a pick-six. St. Joseph lost a hard-fought game at Mount Carmel in Illinois in Week 1, lost to Georgia powerhouse Creekside in Week 2, and defeated Delbarton and DePaul to begin the year at 2-2.
🏈St. Joe’s (Mont.) Brings It On Both Sides In Dominant Win Over DePaul!🏈
— Jersey Sports Zone (@JSZ_Sports) September 19, 2026
No. 4 St. Joe’s (Mont.) is back to .500, and with authority! The Green Knights won their second game in a row on Friday, defeating No. 7 DePaul 42-7. Freshman QB William Mitchell continued to shine with… pic.twitter.com/yMfgjBCZcA
Gray holds ~50 scholarship offers from schools all over the country on all different levels. His list of offers includes UConn, Liberty, East Carolina and Southern Miss, as well as Oregon, Indiana, Miami, Penn State, Nebraska, Texas Georgia, Florida, Oklahoma, Alabama, Tennessee, LSU and Michigan, among others. Ohio State is obviously among those others.
As things currently stand, Gray has no less than 14 months to decide on where he wants to play college football. He took a visit to Auburn last weekend and saw the Tigers lose at home to the Florida Gators. He was supposed to visit Columbus this weekend.
Ohio State cannot host a top recruit because of the Big Noon Kickoff television schedule.
According to Letterman Row, Tahj Gray won’t be able to make Saturday’s game between Ohio State and Illinois after all. The timing doesn’t work.
St. Joseph Regional will play one of its biggest high school football games of the year at Don Bosco Prep on Friday night at 7:00 p.m. ET. The Buckeyes will kickoff against the Illini on Saturday at 12:00 p.m. ET. It is too short of a turnaround.
Juniors in high school cannot take official visits until the spring of their junior year. Therefore, Gray would’ve had to pay his own way to Columbus this weekend. To drive eight hours from New Jersey to Ohio is not possible unless the family leaves right after the game and drives through the night. To get on a flight from LaGuardia, Westchester County or Teterboro on Saturday morning would not get him there in time for all of the pregame festivities, or even kickoff. The math does not math.
As a result, Gray will not be in attendance. Ohio State will miss out on the opportunity to sell one of its top targets. He is not expected to make his return trip until the game against Michigan in the last week of the regular season. That gives other programs nearly two full months to close the gap in recruiting. They can try and get him on campus before the Buckeyes.
This continues to happen.
Ohio State, by nature of its ranking, is often featured in the marquee matchup for Fox’s Big Noon Kickoff. The early kickoff often creates scheduling issues for recruits who play their high school football games on Friday nights. If Saturday’s game was a night game, Gray would be there. It’s not, so he’s not.