COLUMBUS, Ohio – It was learned on Tuesday that Ohio State running back Master Teague’s status is now listed as ‘unavailable’ for the time being as the Buckeyes have only recently opened spring football camp.

There is wild speculation as to the severity and length of any type of absence for Teague from the Buckeyes and it does open up a lot of questions in regard to what Ohio State’s plans at running back might be if Teague does in fact miss significant time.

Obviously, the Buckeyes are going to have to replace a 2,000-yard rusher with the departure of JK Dobbins and that is not an easy void to fill, even if the Buckeyes were to come into the season at full-strength.

That now is very much in question in light of any change in the health status of Teague and the question of when Marcus Crowley might be back at full-go, even if the Buckeyes are expecting him back for the start of the season.

Under the best of circumstances, the depth chart at running back was not going to be a deep one in 2020 after Ohio State went through a strange recruiting season where it appeared that they were set to land both Bijan Robinson and Jaylan Knighton, until they did not land either of them. Ohio State did land Miyan Williams, after flipping the in-state prospect from his Iowa State commitment but was unable to land a second back in the class as the scholarship math of 85 is a serious concern for the Buckeyes at this point.

Four is not really the number you want to be sitting at, even under the best of circumstances where all four are getting a full off-season of work in and ready to compete for the grueling 13-plus game schedule that college football has now become.

What we do know is that Crowley is definitely unavailable after a knee injury last season and has a target date of being ready before the start of the season. Add Teague to the unavailable list, and while we don’t know if this is a six-day or six-month type of situation, for the sake of this piece, we are going to assume that it will be of the longer variety.