SOUTH BEND — For Notre Dame, facing Ohio State in the Fiesta Bowl is as plush a postseason landing spot as there is outside of the College Football Playoff. It’s a top-10 matchup on a revered national stage between two of the sport’s most powerful brands. The Irish can secure their second season of at least 11 wins under head coach Brian Kelly, snap a 22-year major bowl victory drought and gain bragging rights against one of their fiercest competitors for high school talent in the Midwest. And for quarterback DeShone Kizer of Toledo, Ohio, there’s an extra, personal layer of contempt for the Buckeyes having been discarded by the in-state behemoth during the recruiting process. “I’ve never been a fan of Ohio State,” Kizer said. “It is my home state, big school, and I do believe that they play really good football and the tradition there is very strong. But at the same time, they’re our opponent coming up and it’s going to be just an opportunity for me as an Ohioan and for them as a school from Ohio to represent our state.” Rivals.com gave Kizer a four-star rating as a Class of 2014 prospect coming out of Toledo Central Catholic, a school mostly split by allegiances to the Buckeyes and Notre Dame, he said. Within an hour of the Fiesta Bowl pairing announcement, Kizer said he already had received “dozens and dozens” of text messages from friends, some of which were torn between rooting for Kizer and their favorite team. He also knows a handful of current Ohio State players personally. The annual Ohio State-Michigan rivalry helped draw Kizer to college football, the one game he was sure to watch growing up. And he always rooted for “the team up north,” which is Buckeye lingo for Michigan…
Continue Reading: NOTRE DAME FOOTBALL: Kizer, Ohio State have complicated history
