Monday January 6, 2014
www.thelantern.com @TheLantern weather high 11 low -8 wind
thelantern the student voice of The Ohio State University
year: 134 No. 1
Shazier out, Miller to stay
‘Extreme’ weather conditions prompt Ohio State closures
kristen mitchell / Editor-in-chief
Snow covers campus Jan. 3. OSU Columbus campus and all branch campus are set to be closed Jan. 6.
liz Young Campus editor young.1693@osu.edu All Ohio State campuses are set to be closed Monday to various degrees because of “extreme cold conditions” and “extreme temperatures.” An OSU athletics HR director said in an email OSU has made the decision to close the main campus based on the severe temperatures and weather expected. The Lantern obtained a copy of the email, which was received by a student involved in the athletic department at about 8:20 p.m. As of Sunday evening, there was a predicted high of 11 degrees and a 20 percent chance of snow in Columbus for Monday, according to The Weather Channel. The OSU Twitter account, @OhioState, tweeted at about 9:30 p.m. that the Columbus campus would be closed Monday, but some dining halls and health services would be open. OSU Emergency Management also sent an email with similar information. It is the first time OSU’s main campus has closed because of weather conditions since February 2011. According to a university notice sent to The Lantern by OSU spokesman Gary Lewis, the university is set to be closed because “the safety of our students, faculty, staff and visitors is of the utmost importance.” “The closing of the Columbus campus is to minimize the amount of time faculty, staff and students are outside because extremely low temperatures and wind chill can cause frostbite and hypothermia. The university strongly urges all faculty, staff and students to take proactive measures to protect themselves and others from the cold, including not going outside unless it is absolutely necessary,” the statement said. All recreational sports facilities, including the RPAC, Jesse Owens North and Jesse Owens South are set to be closed Monday, as well as the Ohio Union, Younkin Success Center and Counseling and Consultation Service.
continued as Snow on 3A
8A
What to leave behind in 2013
6A
Ke$ha spurs image talk
4A
‘Good football players, even better people’ Eric Seger Sports editor seger.25@osu.edu MIAMI GARDENS, Fla. — This wasn’t how it was supposed to end. As Clemson redshirt-senior quarterback Tajh Boyd took a knee to run out the clock in the 2014 Discover Orange Bowl — signaling his team’s 40-35 victory over the Ohio State Buckeyes (12-2, 8-1) — a harsh reality was setting in for OSU seniors. Despite winning 24 straight games under coach Urban Meyer, the 2013 senior class members have no postseason victories to their name, unless they redshirted during their Buckeye career and were thus a part of the team of 2010 Rose Bowl champions. Between a loss in the Orange Bowl this season, a bowl ban in 2012-13 season, falling short in the 2012 Gator Bowl and getting the 2011 Sugar Bowl win vacated, something will always be missing from a group that had championship expectations. “It’s always going to be hard. My college career did not end the way I thought it would or I wanted it to,” redshirt-senior left tackle Jack Mewhort said following the loss to the Tigers (11-2, 7-1). Regardless of the team’s postseason shortcomings in recent years, that’s not how Mewhort and company want to be remembered. “I think we’re very resilient. I think we’re hard workers, good people. Good football players, even better people,” Mewhort said. “I’d like to take that to be the legacy. Obviously we dropped a few tough ones here at the end. We would have liked to go out on top, but I think we set a standard for these younger guys.” From the depths of a 6-7 season in 2011 capped with the Gator Bowl loss to Florida, this year’s class of seniors will be remembered fondly by its head coach even though the group fell short in this season’s biggest games. “Senior class, we just said an emotional goodbye to them,” OSU coach Urban Meyer said after the Orange Bowl loss. “It’s not because they’re seniors, it’s because of what they’ve done. I tried to make that perfectly clear. Just because you stay some place for a couple years doesn’t mean you deserve that respect. It’s what you did, and how you did it.” The seniors on the offensive side of the ball turned in a record-setting season in their last year at OSU, setting school records for
shelby lum / Photo editor
OSU players return to the field after halftime in the Orange Bowl against Clemson at Sun Life Stadium Jan. 3. OSU lost 40-35. points (637), points per game (45.5), yards per game (512.0), passing touchdowns (38), first downs (361) and rushing yards (4,321). The Buckeyes had chances to win both the Big Ten Championship Game against No. 7 Michigan State in addition to the Orange Bowl late, but ultimately fell short. It is that unwillingness to give up that sets them apart, senior wide receiver Corey “Philly” Brown said after the loss to the Tigers. “(We have) great leadership, especially the senior class. It’s a tough football team. A team that will never give up,” Brown said. When Meyer’s reign began in 2012, a change in the culture came along with it, something Mewhort said was not an easy adjustment. “I know it looks like immediately the next season after going 6-7 we came back and go 12-0, but it was not immediate — at all,” Mewhort said. “It started at 5 a.m. in January of last year. Every day we came to work and we grinded hard.” Aside for junior linebacker Ryan Shazier — who declared for the NFL Draft Saturday — OSU will be leaning on juniors like
quarterback Braxton Miller, tight end Jeff Heuerman, defensive lineman Michael Bennett and wide receivers Devin Smith and Evan Spencer in 2014 to follow in the footsteps of a class that Meyer thinks has a bright future. “It will be great. A student-athlete at Ohio State University, (will) get a great degree and go on and build for the future,” Meyer said. “It’s going to sting for a while, probably a long while, because we just didn’t finish, and it was right there to finish. “This year’s senior class … When I looked around the room, every one of them could impact that play. And that’s the sign of a decent senior class.” No matter how it ended, Mewhort said being remembered for getting the program “back to where Ohio State should be” is the most important thing. “Talking about the last two games, obviously we would have liked to come out on top of those but I think our seniors did a good job of setting the template of how to come to work every day,” Mewhort said. “Do things the right way on and off the field. Hopefully we’ll be remembered for that.”
Free Orange Bowl trip for some at OSU $12M OSU apparel
deal quietly reopened KRISTEN MITCHELL Editor-in-chief mitchell.935@osu.edu
Kathleen Martini Lantern reporter martini.35@osu.edu Some Buckeyes watched the Ohio State football team fall to Clemson in the 2014 Discover Orange Bowl on the university’s dollar. The Athletic Council, a committee consisting of 15 students, faculty, staff and alumni, went to Florida to cheer on the Buckeyes all expenses paid, university spokesman Gary Lewis said in an email. “Athletic Council members traveling as part of the official party receive roundtrip airfare, hotel, game tickets, daily breakfast and events,” Lewis said. “The funds that cover these events are provided by the Big Ten as part of the Orange Bowl budget.” Though OSU’s Orange Bowl budget was not available as of Sunday night, the Big Ten Conference covers up to $2.15 million in travel expenses for the Orange Bowl, Scott Chipman, assistant commissioner for communications for Big Ten, said in an email. “The Big Ten covers travel costs up to a set limit for each Big Ten team traveling to a bowl game,” Chipman said. Face value price for a student ticket was $110, compared to $165 for the general public, senior director
Monday January 6, 2014
of ticketing and preferred seats Brett Scarbrough told The Lantern in an email last month. OSU was required to purchase 17,500 tickets for the game against Clemson, and as of Dec. 26, there were “approximately 7,500 committed,” according to the email. According to the email, the Orange Bowl distributes any unsold inventory to military personnel and youth groups in South Florida, and OSU had already given back 9,000 tickets from its allotment at the time for that purpose. The Athletic Council is a sector of the University Senate that makes decisions regarding intercollegiate athletics, but does not act as an administrative body, according to university rules. Members “develop, subject to the general authority of the president and the Board of Trustees, policies governing intercollegiate athletics, as the agent of the senate,” according to the Athletic Council rules. The council helps with matters including deciding schedules for season and post-season games, providing financial aid for athletes and helping with public relations of the athletics program. Of the 15 members of the Athletics Council, eight are regular tenure-track faculty, and of those, four faculty members are selected by the University Senate and four faculty members are selected by the president, alumni
continued as Orange Bowl on 3A
Ohio State announced an exclusive apparel contract with two private companies more than a year ago, but the university only completed a deal with one firm and has been quietly considering other vendors for the other. It was announced in November 2012 that OSU had entered a 10-year, $97 million agreement with two apparel and retail businesses, J. America Sportswear and Fanatics Inc., to exclusively produce and sell university apparel. According to a Dec. 31 email from OSU spokesman Gary Lewis, however, “no agreement has been finalized” with Fanatics Inc. Lewis also said “over the past six months, other vendors have been considered to fill this role and it remains pending.” The names of the considered vendors however, were not disclosed. Representatives from J. America Sportswear and Fanatics Inc. did not return multiple requests for comment. “We continue to work towards finalizing the terms of the contract and as in past practices, upon its completion those potential bidders who expressed an interest will be disclosed at that time,” Lewis said. Lewis also said a separate license agreement was signed with J. America in December and had an effective date of Jan. 1. The J. America contract is valued at $85 million which Lewis said “is consistent with the previous announcement” of $97 million for the two companies. The 10-year time frame originally announced is still being finalized, Lewis said, but is consistent with the November 2012 announcement as well. Fanatics opened a distribution center in Frazeysburg, Ohio, in 2013 that, according to previous Lantern articles, would employ about 300 full-time workers and more seasonal employees.
In November 2012, OSU announced a 10-year, $97M agreement with J. America Sportswear and Fanatics Inc. Over the past six months other vendors have been considered for part of the apparel contract valued at $12M. According to a November 2012 press release, Jeff Kaplan, former senior vice president and executive officer to the president at OSU, said the university chose J. America, which is based out of Webberville, Mich., and Fanatics, a Jacksonville, Fla.-based company, from three finalists and about 40 bids, according to previous Lantern articles. Kaplan confirmed that Dallas Cowboys’ Silver Star Merchandising, which has come under fire in the past from organizations like United Students Against Sweatshops for mistreating employees, was also a finalist at that time. The deal with J. America is just one of the private contracts the university holds, which add up to more than $660 million altogether, including deals with Coca-Cola Co., Nike Inc., Huntington National Bank and QIC Global Infrastructure. Kaplan said in 2012 the apparel deal was expected to stabilize funding for hundreds of student scholarships, about 1,000 student organizations and invest in library collections. In 1998, OSU and Coca-Cola agreed to a more than $32 million, 10-year contract that made the company the university’s exclusive beverage vendor. The contract was renewed in 2008 for an additional 10
continued as Apparel on 3A 1A