April 30 sadly marked the second anniversary of the sudden and tragic death of Drushawn Humphrey. The Toledo Rogers prep star was surely destined for greatness and for a promising career on the gridiron for the Ohio State Buckeyes.

Two of Humphrey’s framed #6 jerseys that actually hang on the wall in the school’s gymnasium, one he wore for the Rams and one he would have worn for Ohio State, serve as perpetual reminders to friends and fans and former teammates of the young man who left such a strong and everlasting impression on those who had the privilege of knowing him.

“You see a lot of kids now walking around Rogers that will be wearing Ohio State #6 jerseys and a lot of them will have them printed up themselves with Humphrey on the back,” said Rogers head coach Rick Rios. “So the kids here still honor him and respect him.”

So much so that Fred Davis, Rogers’ current stud receiver who is being courted by colleges all over the country, has pledged to wear #6 in honor of Humphrey if he decides to attend Ohio State when his senior campaign as a Ram is concluded.

Rios couldn’t be happier about Davis’ intention to honor Humphrey, if it indeed transpires.

“Fred probably spends more time watching highlights of Drushawn than he does of himself,” Rios said. “He was a freshman when Drushawn was a junior and he passed away, and him and some of the guys will still spend a lot of time going down the cemetery, which is down the street, before games on Fridays.

“It kind of hit home when we talked about what number he would wear if he went to Ohio State because his #4 is already taken and we mentioned it could possibly be number #6. To me that just shows what kind of kid he is that he would honor somebody that he wasn’t great friends with, it’s just out of respect.”

It still doesn’t seem real to Rios (pictured) that someone so full of life and energy like Humphrey was, could be there one day and gone the next.

“I still, every once in a while, will look back at some of the clips and will look back at even some of the TV interviews that we did after he passed away and some of the things that they showed on him,” Rios said. “He’ll always be special to us.”

Humphrey was particularly special to his coach.

“I can’t imagine losing a child and losing Drushawn to me was as close as I’ll ever want to get to losing a child,” he said. “He didn’t have a father at home and kind of adopted me more than I him and we grew that relationship together.”

At 6-3, 240 pounds, Humphrey was a gentle giant in the eyes of many.

“One of the things that stands out in my mind is how well he loved on little kids. Little kids just flocked to him,” Rios said. “We’d come out for a practice or to a game and there would be 50 kids outside just wanted to touch his hand and say hi to him. And watching him play with, at the time, my four-year-old on the floor was just incredible.”

There had to be a lesson involved in Humphrey’s death, however difficult it might have been to decipher.

“It’s still hard to believe that it happened,” Rios said. “God has his reasons for everything and I think there was a bigger purpose in that it probably helped the kids in our area understand a little bit more about what it meant to live your life to the fullest and be dedicated to what you do, not knowing that tomorrow is not promised to you. I think it brought our kids closer together after it happened.

“There was definitely some good things that came from it that we learned as far as our kids growing up and maturing and coming together as a team,” Rios said, “but it was a hard thing getting through.”

And it’s still hard at times.

“It’s been hard the last couple of years. It wasn’t just hard right after, it was hard going back on that football field again. But we’ve kind of gotten to the point where we’ve kind of got some peace about it and Lord willing we will have some big things coming up this season.”

The reminders of Humphrey were especially difficult last season while watching Ohio State run the table to win the national championship.

“Being a Buckeye fan, I mostly thought about it after (Maurice) Clarett kept getting hurt thinking that Dru would have been there or vice-versa, regardless,” Rios said. “But we thought about it throughout the season, me and my wife would talk about it a lot. Dru would have been a freshman this year, it would have been him and Clarett and that would have been something special to watch.”

Humphrey would have been another of the many highly touted blue-chip recruits that were members of OSU’s freshmen class last year. Like Clarett, Humphrey was being recruited to carry the football for the Buckeyes. In his junior year at Rogers, Humphrey ran for 1,225 yards and 21 TD’s in his first and only season as a running back.

“They made no bones about it that they were recruiting him as a tailback and if it didn’t work out, then he can play something else,” said Rios who, in his mind, regarded Humphrey as a bigger Clarett. “But they were not recruiting him for anything other than being a running back.”

Looking back on it now, Rios said that Ohio State was a perfect fit for Humphrey.

“The thing that I always think about is that he was invited to a Nike camp and it was at Michigan that year,” he said. “I gave Drushawn the information for the Nike camp and he said, ‘Will you take me?’ I said, ‘Yeah I’ll take you.’ He said, ‘Where’s it at?’ I said, ‘Michigan.’ He said, ‘Well I guess we’re not going.’ He was a Buckeye all the way. That was all him.”

Rios said that Jim Tressel and the Ohio State staff and the family there have treated them like family from the get-go. Tressel brought them the framed Buckeye jersey with Humphrey’s name on the back not long after he passed away.

“Tressel had never met Drushawn,” Rios said. “He would have been a part of that first class but he had never met Drushawn, he hadn’t had that opportunity yet because of recruiting rules.”

Tressel attended the funeral and when they did a clinic at Rogers that year, they brought the jersey.

“That really touched me because again they had never even met him,” Rios said.

And in typical Tressel fashion, the Buckeye head coach didn’t forget about Humphrey when it counted the most.

“They petitioned the NCAA and they got clearance that they could provide a National Championship ring with Drushawn’s name on it, since he would have been a freshman on this year’s team, that they are going to give to Drushawn’s mother," Rios said. "So they have not forgotten him as well and that’s endeared him to our hearts that we feel like we’ve got a family bond here with them. Tressel is a special guy, he’s more than special and I hope he’s at Ohio State for a long, long time.”

It’s easy to see why Rios has a special place in his heart and in his classroom for the Ohio State Buckeyes. He has an entire side wall adorned with Ohio State photographs cut out of the newspaper. It obviously fits in well at a school that has a very strong allegiance to the Buckeyes now because of Humphrey.

“People can say that Coach Rios is a pro-Ohio State guy and everything,” he said, “but it’s to the point where, even if I wasn’t, the kids at Rogers are pro-Ohio State because of what Drushawn stood for when he was here.”