Another four-star defensive tackle is officially off the board for Michigan State.
While the writing was on the wall when he cancelled his visit to East Lansing on June 5 and replaced the Spartans with Nebraska, Michigan State was still in the final three for Nehemiah Ombati.
On Wednesday, he announced his decision to commit to Nebraska during a ceremony at his high school. He picked the Cornhuskers over Michigan State and Missouri right before he was supposed to take his trip to Columbia to check out the Tigers. Ombati also spurned in-state Big Ten program Minnesota for the Cornhuskers.
Matt Rhule is recruiting like his job’s on the line — which it always is in college football. He’s landed several four-stars in the 2027 class and his quarterback commit was just bumped up to a five-star.
Michigan State, on the other hand, has just one four-star commit in the 2027 class and that’s defensive lineman Ohimai Ozolua. Missing on Ombati hurts, but was expected.
Ombati is the No. 379 recruit and No. 43 defensive lineman in the 2027 class.
He’s also just one of a handful of four-star defensive linemen to either commit elsewhere or cancel their visit to Michigan State. Ombati is now going to haunt Michigan State in the Big Ten for years to come much like his four-star counterpart and former Spartan target Reinaldo Perez who committed to Indiana shortly after his East Lansing visit.
Defense will be the name of the game under Pat Fitzgerald
While offense was seemingly the focus under Mel Tucker and that leaked into the Jonathan Smith era, defense is what made Michigan State football great under Mark Dantonio. The best Michigan State teams in program history have all had defensive toughness.
Michigan State of recent has gotten away from that and the Spartans have lost their identity in the process. Pat Fitzgerald is going to return that defensive identity.
It’s going to take a little time, but Fitzgerald has already laid the foundation for a solid defensive team and he has the right staff in place to turn things around. Missing on some of these top four-star targets hurts, but once the Spartans start winning, top recruits will have a tough time saying no.
Fitzgerald is a defensive-minded head coach and the last time that the Spartans had one of those, he won 10-plus games regularly and had the Spartans in the playoff conversation for years.
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