Ohio State WR Jeremiah Smith Having a Carmelo Anthony Breakout Moment in CFP

The freshman phenom has racked up nearly 300 receiving yards and four touchdowns on the biggest stage heading into a semifinal matchup against Texas.

Ohio State freshman wide receiver Jeremiah Smith runs with the ball against Oregon in the Rose Bowl. / Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

Twenty-two years ago, a tall, young freshman went from a growing regional legend into a full-blown household name across the country. 

Catapulted into superstardom thanks to a multi-round tournament run, he not only delivered a sports-mad program their first national championship, but made it fashionable to wear a headband on the court.

You may have heard of him, one Carmelo Anthony, delivering one of the all-time March Madness runs with the Syracuse Orange. Most of a certain age can recall how enthralling it was at the time.

A freshman? Doing all that? It may not have actually been a new phenomenon in sports, or the NCAA men’s basketball tournament in particular, but even casual sports fans took notice.

Despite spending just one season in central New York on his way to a lengthy NBA career, Anthony will forever be remembered for three weekends in the spring of 2003—changing the narratives around one-and-dones plus the difficulty of making the leap from high school to major college basketball. When he enters the Basketball Hall of Fame, possibly as soon as this year, the first thing that will get brought up is not the New York Knicks or an Olympic gold medal, but those three consecutive double doubles in the tourney to will his Orange to a title.

Two decades later, we may be witnessing something similar in college football. 

A highly touted freshman, whispered about by recruiting junkies like a unicorn, leading his team to tournament success by looking like a professional among amateurs? 

That’s certainly a good descriptor of Ohio State Buckeyes wide receiver Jeremiah Smith, who has used the first two rounds of the new 12-team College Football Playoff to make himself a phenomenon well beyond being just a playmaker. 

Smith, honestly, might be one case where the numbers do lie and fail to underscore the dominance that has transpired heading into the semifinal matchup with the Texas Longhorns on Friday night in the Cotton Bowl.

One hundred and three yards on six catches and two touchdowns in a rout of the Tennessee Volunteers. Seven catches for an even more unfathomable 187 yards and two touchdowns against the No. 1 seed Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl. 

If either game hadn’t gotten so out of hand so early, perhaps Smith would have even greater stats.

“The kid is very special,” Longhorns safety Andrew Mukuba said. “I’ve seen him on film do some crazy things—run past people, jump over people, those sorts of things. I can tell he put in the time, and he’s done what he’s supposed to do, and you can tell by how he’s playing with a lot of confidence, and that’s going to carry on for him, I know that. He’s a good player for sure.”

Good is being modest. He’s been great whether you’re judging him as a true freshman or not, undisputedly the player to have emerged from the CFP with an "it" factor. 

Smith leaps for a catch against the Ducks in the Rose Bowl. / Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

It was not unlike his basketball analogue flashing tons of talent early in the regular season before making the postseason his own by taking things to another level. 

Anthony’s debut came at the famed Madison Square Garden, where he dropped 27 points in his first game to send a message there would be no easing into things on the college level. For Smith, his initial impression was equally eye-opening, making several one-handed catches at The Horseshoe in the team’s opener against the Akron Zips on national television. He scored Ohio State’s first touchdown of the season (he finished with two) and led the team in catches (six) and yards (92).

Then there’s Anthony’s signature performance, coincidentally against Texas. All he did was pour in a game-high 33 points at New Orleans’s Superdome, notch 14 rebounds and grab three more steals. If you had not seen him play like a superstar before then—back when the hoops tourney was limited to being only on CBS—you quickly came around as Anthony became (at the time) just the third freshman to be named the Final Four Most Outstanding Player. 

Smith is on a similar trajectory after two playoff games in which he bossed the competition to a perhaps greater level. 

“It is pretty easy to see the talent that he has and the blessings that God has put on his plate,” OSU safety Caleb Downs said. “It’s always a challenge going against Jeremiah and other receivers.”

The cross-sport comparison between Smith and Anthony feels even more natural than the one most would leap to—given it’s not exactly out of the norm for a star freshman in Columbus, Ohio, to lead the team. 

One year prior to Melo’s heroics, Maurice Clarett was tearing it up on the gridiron for Ohio State. He earned early headlines for becoming the first true freshman to start the opener at tailback for the Buckeyes and rushed for an impressive 1,237 yards. Most notably, he delivered the winning score in the Fiesta Bowl upset of the Miami Hurricanes. Clarett became one of the faces of the program in delivering the school its first national title in three decades. 

“I think we always want to draw comparisons because that’s what we do naturally. I think whether it’s players or coaches it’s easy for everyone to say, well, he’s this person and—not quite put him in a box but sort of categorize them based on somebody who has come before,” Ohio State coach Ryan Day said after the Rose Bowl. “Jeremiah is his own person. And I think the way that he’s come in from the get-go, he had a look in his eye he wanted to make an impact as a freshman. I think his teammates would tell you the same thing. 

“And remember, he’s a freshman. So for him to be playing his best football late in the season speaks to his maturity.”

Clarett, who had a tumultuous time after his first year on campus turned him into a star, has notably returned from exile around Ohio State to become a mentor for the team. Perhaps that’s serendipity. 

Smith is certainly on a different level than his Buckeye predecessor because of the far different media environment. 

In 2024, Ohio State played in four regular-season games that drew over nine million viewers, according to Sports Media Watch, plus had nine of their 12 games air on broadcast television. Millions more have watched Smith during the far more crowded fall schedule. The Buckeyes’ first-round win over the Volunteers averaged nearly 15 million viewers and was the highest-rated of the four first-round CFP contests.

Smith does a postgame interview with ESPN’s Holly Rowe after the Rose Bowl. / Erick W. Rasco/Sports Illustrated

Then there’s the Rose Bowl, which was the most-watched college football game of the season, and multiple social media platforms pumping out highlights and conversations about Smith.

To wit, Anthony’s NCAA tournament came almost two years prior to the creation of YouTube. So yeah, things are different. 

“He’s very level-headed,” fellow receiver Brandon Inniss said. “He knows his goals and what he wants to get done in life, and this is just one step of the way for him.”

Inniss understands that better than most, having known Smith since they were young wideouts in South Florida before taking the same path to Columbus a year prior as a former five-star recruit. He vividly recalled this week when the two were teammates in grade school, playing football and getting constantly hounded by opposing parents and coaches who wanted ID checks on Smith to determine how old he was.

“I’m not surprised at anything he does now,” Inniss said. “I’ve seen him since we were 9 years old. So anything he does, any one-handed catch, I’ve seen. I’m not surprised with anything he does.”

That seems to also include a growing number of opponents. 

Oregon Ducks coach Dan Lanning thought Smith was capable of turning pro already. You’d be hard-pressed to keep counting the number of times anybody involved in the playoff has labeled him some variation of special. 

“Everything that he offers is just incredible. He’s a guy that looks like he’s NFL-ready already on tape. He’s going up and getting the ball over two, three defenders,” Texas safety Michael Taaffe said. “He’s very talented. There’s no way that he’s actually 18. He’s a dog, and I’m ready to go compete against him.”

“That’s going to be an amazing opportunity to go against him,” said corner Jahdae Barron, the Jim Thorpe Award winner as the top defensive back in college football. “That kid can ball. He can ball. He’s a big baller. Strong, strong ability. He’s a deep threat. And they love to get him the ball, and they love to create opportunities to get him the ball.”

That’s been the game plan for Ohio State—especially given the disastrous results in the loss against the rival Michigan Wolverines when they steered away from chucking it up to Smith.

Consider it a lesson learned as no matter what the Buckeyes want to do as part of their overall offensive strategy, making sure quarterback Will Howard finds his top target is going to be option A, B, C and probably D the rest of January. 

“You guys see his ability, but to me it’s the work ethic every day,” Day said. “He comes in. He’s serious. He doesn’t say a whole lot. But when he does, people listen. His maturity, physically, emotionally and mentally has allowed him to play like this.”

That might actually be the biggest—and scariest—difference for Smith compared to Anthony. 

Smith, with a far more stoic exterior approach, is playing at a high level and still has two more seasons in college before he’s able to burn NFL defensive backs with the same rigor.

Until then, the young receiver can keep growing his legend in the playoff and making sure the rest of the country knows what they’re witnessing.