Sam Williams-Dixon will leave Columbus after one championship-winning season.
Despite clinching the College Football Playoff National Championship Game, Ohio State will still see several players depart for the transfer portal. Freshman running back Sam Williams-Dixon was the first to leave the program, doing so the day after the Buckeyes’ significant victory.
According to 247 Sports, Williams-Dixon officially entered the portal on Tuesday. This decision had been expected for weeks, as he had indicated during Ohio State’s CFP journey that he planned to enter the portal after the season, although he chose to stay with the team throughout the postseason.
In 2024, he participated in only three games, totaling seven carries for 53 rushing yards. He achieved a personal best of 40 yards on just three carries in Week 2 against Western Michigan. Throughout the year, he found himself overshadowed on the running back depth chart by the standout duo of TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins.
A former three-star recruit from Pickerington North High School in Columbus, Ohio, Williams-Dixon chose the Buckeyes over offers from schools like Indiana, Michigan State, Tennessee, Boston College, and Kentucky. As a transfer, he is likely to attract interest from many of those same programs.
Due to his late entry into the transfer portal, Williams-Dixon is now among the top available running backs. However, he faces competition from several other prominent players still looking for new teams, including John Randle Jr., TJ Harden, Trey Cooley, Emeka Megwa, Sam Adams II, and others.
Ohio State football aims to revamp its running back lineup in 2025.
Williams-Dixon’s upcoming transfer could pose a significant setback for Ryan Day in 2025. While he will lose several key players from his 2024 roster, the impact will be particularly felt in the running back position.
Both Judkins and Henderson, who rank among the team’s top three offensive talents, are anticipated to declare for the 2025 NFL Draft. Although Judkins has one year of eligibility remaining, he is likely to be a highly sought-after prospect. If he decides to declare, as many expect, freshman James Peoples will become Day’s top returning back.
Peoples, who served as the third-string running back in 2024, registered only 197 rushing yards on 49 carries during his freshman season and caught just one pass. However, he was a higher-rated recruit than Williams-Dixon, having come to Columbus as a four-star prospect and a consensus top-10 running back in his class.
With Judkins and Henderson likely gone in 2025, Peoples and Williams-Dixon were expected to be the primary candidates to lead the backfield. Day will now need to take a more proactive approach to find a replacement for this star duo in the running game.
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