Jeremiah Smith Is Already College Football’s Best. Now He’s Learning How to Get Better

Jeremiah Smith has spent two seasons making difficult football look strangely simple. The Ohio State wide receiver can overpower defensive backs, race past coverage, win contested catches, and turn routine passes into major gains. At only 20, he has already produced numbers that most college receivers never reach.

Still, Smith enters the 2026 season with something important left to learn. The challenge is not catching the football or proving that he belongs among college football’s elite. He is learning exactly why his techniques work, which could make an already dominant receiver even harder to stop.

Smith has 163 catches for 2,558 yards and 27 receiving touchdowns through his first two Ohio State seasons. He also owns a national championship ring from the Buckeyes’ 2024 title run. Those numbers explain why CBS Sports ranked him as the No. 1 player in college football entering 2026.

His production becomes even more impressive when the competition gets stronger. Smith has recorded 34 catches for 682 yards and six touchdowns across six postseason games. Every one of those games came against a top 10 opponent, so his biggest performances have hardly been built against weak competition.

Brian Hartline Taught Jeremiah Smith to Understand His Talent

Smith / IG / At 6 foot 4 and roughly 220 pounds, Jeremiah combines a large frame with speed, strong hands, body control, and impressive movement after the catch.

Those traits helped him dominate before he fully understood every technical reason behind his success.

That created an unusual coaching challenge for Brian Hartline, Smith’s former position coach at Ohio State. Hartline did not simply want Smith to run a great route or beat a defensive back. He wanted the young receiver to explain why the route worked and understand the details that created the advantage.

Smith sometimes relied on natural ability because that approach had always worked. Hartline pushed him to think about leverage, positioning, timing, body movement, and his role within the quarterback’s progression. Knowing those details could help Smith repeat successful plays against defenders who are just as athletic.

The goal was bigger than correcting individual mistakes. Hartline wanted Smith to become capable of coaching himself. That skill matters because coaches change jobs, offensive systems evolve, and NFL defenders punish small technical errors that college opponents might not exploit.

Hartline has since left Ohio State to become the head coach at South Florida. His departure gives Smith an immediate chance to prove that those lessons stuck. Cortez Hankton now coaches Ohio State’s receivers, while former Atlanta Falcons head coach Arthur Smith has joined Ryan Day’s staff as offensive coordinator.

Smith has already shown that he can adjust to changing circumstances. He caught 76 passes for 1,315 yards and 15 touchdowns as a freshman in 2024. He followed that season with 87 receptions for 1,243 yards and 12 touchdowns in 2025, showing that his production was no freshman surprise.

Ohio State’s Biggest Star is Becoming a Leader

Smith / IG / Ohio State selected Jeremiah as a team captain for the 2026 season, giving the junior a new responsibility inside a locker room filled with championship expectations.

The honor caught Smith by surprise and made him emotional. He has never built his reputation around giving long speeches or demanding attention. Ryan Day has noted that Smith does not speak constantly, but teammates pay attention when he decides something needs to be said.

Smith has acknowledged that becoming more vocal does not come naturally to him. He started working on that part of his personality during the summer. Younger Ohio State receivers now look toward him for guidance, putting him in a role that once belonged to older teammates around him.

The aspiring athlete also had a chance to leave Ohio State for an extraordinary amount of money. He told CBS Sports that transferring could have brought him more than $10 million. Few college football players could command anything close to that figure on the open market.

He chose to stay in Columbus instead. Smith pointed toward Ohio State’s quarterback situation, offensive line, and coaching as major reasons for his decision. Moving somewhere else for one season would have meant learning another system just before his expected jump to the NFL.