COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio State earned the commitment of three-star, 2026 offensive tackle Aaron Thomas last week, as the Buckeyes’ run on the offensive line has continued.
The 6-foot-7, 300-pound lineman is the No. 439 overall prospect and No. 36 tackle in the 247Sports composite rankings. He attends Mountain Pointe High School in Phoenix, Arizona, and chose the Buckeyes over Texas A&M, Florida State and Washington.
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As a player, Thomas has the ability and length the offensive line coach Tyler Bowen is clearly searching for. He’s good upside with his athleticism and physicality, and has college football in his family lineage — his father, Eric, played at Florida State in the late 1990s.
While there are parts of Thomas’ game that could use fine-tuning, the building blocks are there for a high-level tackle at Ohio State.
“If I were an offensive lineman, I would want to go to a school that would develop me the best,” his coach, Jon Roberts, told Cleveland.com before his decision. “Aaron has elite measurables, and he wants to go somewhere where he has the opportunity to play. A good kid like Aaron has focused (on schools) where he has the chance to develop bonds with coaches.”
That size and athleticism should be a nice addition to the Buckeyes’ 2026 class, which includes pledges from four-stars Maxwell Riley and Sam Greer, as well as three-star (and fellow Arizona product) Tucker Smith.
Riley is listed at 6-foot-5 and 280 pounds, Greer is listed at 6-foot-8 and 315 pounds while Smith is listed at 6-foot-5 and 280 pounds. There’s a clear direction that Bowen is headed along the offensive line, and Thomas fits right into that group.
Now, Ohio State has two tackles in its class with Thomas and Greer, and four total pledges in a 19-man class. While Smith and Riley likely figure to be interior players, the Buckeyes have some flexibility in where they want to move for their fifth, or potentially sixth, offensive lineman in the class.
Ohio State has a few other prospects left on the board including Da’Ron Parks, Darius Gray and J.B. Shabazz. The first two are interior prospects, while Shabazz is a tackle.
But Thomas has added some cost certainty in the class, in that Ohio State now has the freedom to go with whatever offensive lineman it wants next. Adding three offensive tackles to a room that is already loaded with a bevy of interior prospects isn’t a negative by any means.
And with four pledges in the 2026 class, Ohio State already has more commitments than the 2025 class did (three). That’s good work from Bowen and Ohio State’s staff to build a balanced, complete line class.