Carnell Tate Says He Never Thought About Leaving Ohio State
A few days after Ohio State’s national title game win over Notre Dame on Jan. 20, a report from On3’s Pete Nakos suggested Ohio State was working hard to keep its core returning players on the roster for 2025 by entering negotiations with the school’s top NIL collective The Foundation.
Among those players who Ohio State was reportedly trying to retain was sophomore wide receiver Carnell Tate, who — after emerging as one of the Buckeyes’ top pass catching targets this season with 52 catches for 733 yards and four touchdowns — was rumored to have been fielding offers of more than $1 million from other schools.
Around one month after these reports came out, Tate is still at Ohio State, and he told 10TV in an interview on Saturday that he never thought about leaving Columbus.
“The plan was never for me to leave,” Tate said at Lower.com Field after he served as the Columbus Crew’s match igniter for their season opener against the Chicago Fire. “I don’t know where that came from, where that started. I bleed Ohio State.”
Tate, a former four-star prospect out of Bradenton (Fla.) IMG Academy, will likely be the No. 2 wide receiver on the depth chart for Ohio State this season behind rising sophomore sensation Jeremiah Smith, although many people who follow college football believe Tate would be a sure-fire No. 1 option on many other teams that do not have a superstar like Smith on their roster.
Tate and Smith will look to showcase their skills and prove their worth as the two best targets for Ohio State’s new starting quarterback starting on March 17 when the Buckeyes begin spring camp at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center.