COLUMBUS, Ohio -- TreVeyon Henderson never got a chance to work with Ohio State running backs coach Tony Alford before showing up as a freshman, but he’ll never forget that first day of practice.
He quickly learned that Alford he met while on the recruiting trail isn’t the same person that shows up on a football field every day. The recruiter gave off the vibe of a father figure that cared just as much about your personal development as your football talents.
“My first impression (of him) was how much he cared for me,” Henderson said. “Not just for me but for my family (and) my mental. He was always making sure I was doing good (and) my family’s doing great. I don’t just like him as a coach. I like him as a person. He’s a great person.”
Evan Pryor met that same guy during the recruiting process, too. He even got a chance to come to a June camp after his sophomore year. He got to know the side of Alford that was nice, personable and open to talk about literally anything. On the other side of him, not so much.
“It was completely different,” Pryor told cleveland.com. “As a camper, he’s trying to see what you’re about, but first practice here, he was ripping my ass. Way more intense, but he’s really smart in his coaching technique. He’s trying to create chaos for us.”
There’s a reason Alford approaches things that way. Yes, recruiting is about building relationships, but it’s also about explaining to a top recruit exactly how you plan to turn him into an NFL Draft pick. There’s only one way to do that in Alford’s mind.
“He’s always trying to kill me,” Henderson said. “If I would’ve come here as a recruit and worked out with him, I probably would’ve had to sit out for a little bit. But I love the way he pushes me to keep going and be the best version of me. I definitely need his hard coaching.”
Whether it’s a one-on-one workout with a recruit in June, a spring practice in March or a Tuesday practice during the season. The idea is to throw the kitchen sink at a kid without holding back and see how he responds. It’s the best way to determine if a recruit is for you and whether the players on your team are ready for a Saturday night primetime game against a ranked opponent.
It’s the only way to find what Alford’s looking for, and it hasn’t failed him since he got here in 2015.
“(I want a) tough guy,” Alford told cleveland.com. “A mentally and physically tough guy that’s not gonna be broken.”
Alford is aware that it takes a special person to sign up to be part of that. The difficult workouts in the middle of June under the hot sun have brought even the most special of running back talents to their knees, even if they didn’t want to show it.
Five-star Alabama 2023 commit Richard Young was out of breath and drenched in sweat halfway through when he went through it in 2021. Then he told 2024 target Stacy Gage about it. Gage got through the workout but still admitted that it took everything for him to keep it together. Donovan Johnson — a 2025 target — was one of the first people to get through it without feeling total exhaustion.
“The work he puts the recruits through, that’s the same work we get now,” Henderson said. “He just wants to see how you respond. He’s gonna push you to your limits. I definitely need that. When he puts you through that, it pushes you to be great. He’s just trying to make you a better running back and a better person.”
There’s a purpose to this madness. You want to identify the best fit for your roster, but you also want to make sure a player’s ready for the physical abuse that can come with playing at Ohio State. That’s a concept that’s even more emphasized in 2022 when Henderson, Pryor and Miyan Williams will face Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Penn State and Michigan.
You can’t break down in games where the Buckeyes’ ability to run the ball can mean the difference between winning and losing. A lesson learned the hard way last season against Oregon and the Wolverines.
“How much work are you willing to put into this thing?” Alford said. “The first thing that goes is people’s minds. When people get tired, their mind goes, so I’m gonna get you tired. I’m gonna wear you out to see how far you can go. I’m gonna try to break you.”
Having gone through a season, Henderson and Pryor understand the method behind the madness. Henderson found out just how hard things can get halfway through last year when the big-time runs weren’t coming so easily anymore. Some of that is because he spent the back half of the year dealing with a knee injury, but he also saw an uptick in competition.
Pryor wasn’t physically ready to contribute last season and needed to go through a year of development. But he watched Henderson’s high and low moments learning from them on the sidelines.
Now both come into Year 2 more prepared for what life as a running back in the Big Ten is like. They understand that nothing will be harder than what Alford puts you through during the week. If you can get through that, you can easily handle what happens on Saturdays.
That’s an important factor, especially for a team dealing with toughness questions all offseason.
“We keep getting all these physical questions about these different teams, but they don’t understand we practice against one of the best defenses in the country,” Henderson said. “Our practices are physical. Going into the games, I already took them hits months ago. I’m taking those hits every week.”
Alford wants to push you to the point of no return to see how you react. He does it to recruits to see if they’re capable of playing up to the standard expected from Ohio State running backs. It’s a good way for recruits to answer the question: are you sure this is what you really want?
For the guys on the roster, it’s the best way to prepare them for what happens in the fall when it’s third-and-1 in the fourth quarter of a close game, and you absolutely need to get the first down. He’s trying to kill you in practice. That way, next time the Buckeyes try to run the ball to open up the second half against Michigan, you won’t get stuff at the line of scrimmage on three straight carries.
“At some point, you’ve gotta put your hand in the ground, and you’ve gotta go fight,” Alford said. “You’ve gotta go choke the guy across from you.
“This is a long season and can be mentally exhausting if you allow it to be. The intentionality of how you go to work every day’s gotta be elite.”
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