What’s it like for a recruit to say no to Urban Meyer? Penn State TE Mike Gesicki did so

UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — It’s a word Urban Meyer isn’t used to hearing too often from prospects, but Penn State’s Mike Gesicki told Meyer thanks but not thanks and picked the Nittany Lions over Meyer’s Buckeyes two years ago.

Penn State tight end Mike Gesicki drops a pass in the Lions’ win against Buffalo. (Chris Dunn/AP)

“It was just part of the recruiting process,” Gesicki said Wednesday on a conference call. “I have the utmost respect for Ohio State, their program, their coaches and everything with that university and their football team. … [I] can’t really recall what happened during the recruitment and all that kind of stuff, but they handled it with a lot of respect, I handed it with a lot of respect.”

They were the two finalists for the athletic wide receiver who would transition to tight end once he got to college. Here’s a video of what Gesicki recalled the day of his college decision when he was asked this same question: What’s it like to say no to Urban Meyer?

“Coach Meyer is a phenomenal head football coach and also a phenomenal man,” Gesicki said in a video I took the day of his college selection at his high school. “A lot of people have different opinions on him, but I will stick up for that man for as long as I play football and for as long as people ask me questions about him. 

”Saying no to a guy who has a background like himself it was so difficult and he was so understanding about it.“

At the time Gesicki committed to a Nittany Lions team coached by Bill O’Brien and Meyer even tried re-recruiting Gesicki when O’Brien left a month before the tight end signed his national letter of intent. 

"I heard from several schools with Ohio State being one of them once coach O’Brien left,” Gesicki said, “but I never really wavered in my decision.” 

The lure of playing in big-time games at both schools was enticing and Gesicki said tight end Adam Breneman and quarterback Christian Hackenberg, who Gesicki spent time with on his official visit, helped him settle on Penn State.

Gesicki saw the field last year as a true freshman because Breneman missed the season due to injury and the trio has yet to all be active for the same game. 

Perhaps Saturday night in The Horseshoe Breneman, who dressed for the first time this season last week and went through warmups and took reps with the first and second team offense this week, will play in his first game since the 2013 win at Wisconsin. Gesicki said Breneman is one of his closest friends on the team and playing together is something they’ve talked about since that visit. 

“I do believe at some point during my career, some point during his career we will be able to play together,” Gesicki said. “Adam has been been unbelievably positive and has gone about this whole entire process in a way that I personally would not have been able to. He’s always got a positive attitude, he’s always just excited for chance to get better, excited to get 100 percent healthy again. I think that if he continues with that mindset and that kind of attitude I think he will get back on the field and I can not wait for that day. Just having him back out there for warmups [last Saturday] it was awesome.”

Audrey Snyder: asnyder@post-gazette.com and Twitter @audsnyder4.