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Good luck, Buckeyes!

January 08, 2015

Cie Grant, a member of Ohio State's 2002 National Championship team and #BuckeyeForLife, leads a chorus of fans wishing this year's team luck in Monday night's first College Football Playoff National Championship.


Snow covered the field at Ohio Stadium, and the wind was biting when it came rolling off the Olentangy River.

But Cie Grant stepped up to the microphone, his smile as bright as that afternoon’s sun, and belted out Carmen Ohio to the fans, friends and family gathered there that day to celebrate Ohio State’s 2002 National Championship team.

The team had been referred to as “The Cardiac Kids” because of a season full of nail-biting wins, and the national championship game was no different as it went into double-overtime. Grant was instrumental in putting pressure on University of Miami quarterback Ken Dorsey’s final pass play of the game. He succeeded in breaking up the play, and the field swarmed with fans in mere seconds as the Buckeyes claimed victory.

"From the time I grabbed Dorsey and he went to the ground, I couldn’t even hear. I went deaf,” Grant said. "I think it was when Coach Mark Snyder grabbed me and said, ‘Cie Cie, we just did it!’ and I could hear the jubilation and Buckeye Nation and the fans.”

To return to Columbus as a champion – and to be coaxed by teammates and staff to sing the alma mater a cappella – were incredible moments of Grant’s senior year. He wishes the same kinds of experiences for the 2014 Buckeyes as well.

“This is a special time,” he said in a message to the team on Friday. “The pen is in your hand, man. You can write this thing however you want to write it. This is your world.”