One of the top 2025 quarterback prospects in the country is Ryan Montgomery (6-3 212) of Findlay, OH, hometown of Steelers great Ben Roethlisberger. Since the second week in March, Ryan and his father. Mike, a former linebacker at Miami of Ohio, have been making campus stops and meeting with head coaches and offensive coordinators/quarterback coaches. Friday and Saturday they were at Clemson. Sunday and Monday they were at USC.
Mike Montgomery had visited Clemson twice before with his oldest son Luke, now an offensive lineman at Ohio State. Clemson was one of the finalists, so Mike was already familiar with the program.
Monday night, after arriving in Athens for their Tuesday visit with Georgia, Mike Montgomery gave this overview of the Clemson visit:
“We started there the day before and we got to get a look at practice, and then grabbed dinner with some of the staff, which is awesome,” Montgomery said. “We’ve got a real good rapport with Tajh Boyd and Jordan Sorrells specifically, and a couple of other staff members that went out to dinner. The next day was that elite underclassmen day. Probably the highlight was Coach (Dabo) Swinney in the morning talking for about an hour on how he’s built the program. Some pretty amazing statistics behind it that he was able to share. Really a testimony to the tenure of success they’ve had there under his tutelage. Super, super impressive. That was good. Ryan got to talk to him as well.”
Another key period of the visit was Ryan’s first meeting with new offensive coordinator/QB coach Garrett Riley.
“We wanted to spend some time with Riley,” Mike Montgomery said. “We thought highly of Brandon (Streeter). You know he’s down here at Georgia, so we kept that relationship going, so it was great to see him. We had no relationship with Riley. It was good for Ryan to spend some time with him watching film with the other quarterbacks that were there, and just getting to get to know him a little bit more. He seemed like a really cool customer. Seems like a great hire for Dabo. I thought the practice was really well run, very physical and very competitive.”
Montgomery said Riley will be coming up to Findlay in May to watch Ryan workout.
Mike had also visited USC previously when taking his older son to Clemson for a visit. He is friends with former USC defensive analyst Joe Bowen, and when driving through the area, Bowen suggested he stop by and meet USC head coach Shane Beamer, which he did.
Here is the overview from Mike Montgomery on this most recent visit with the Gamecocks:
“The whole Columbia thing is a belief in Shane Beamer,” Montgomery said. “Meeting Shane in person, and obviously following him since then, with what he does on social media and what he does in the community, just that culture that he’s built, it kind of reminds me of what Dabo is. Super energetic. Super authentic. High energy. High character. That’s exactly what he is. The fact that he had such a good year last year doesn’t surprise me because those are the type of guys that kids want to go play for because they are going to love you up, they are going to coach you hard and you’re going to have some fun, too. They are going to be there with you the whole way. Those two guys are two of the same almost, cut from the same cloth.”
Just like at Clemson, one of the key points of the visit was for Ryan to meet the Gamecocks’ new OC and QB coach Dowell Loggains.
“He’s been great with Ryan,” Montgomery said. “He was awesome. What really got Ryan’s attention was his NFL pedigree and how he’s going to let his quarterbacks just really run the offense check plays and make reads, and really give them an NFL style offense. I could tell in the room with (Spencer) Rattler, he’s going to even get better this year, so I’m sure his draft stock will go up. I know Ryan really liked that NFL background and all the quarterbacks he’s worked with, and he’s just a great guy as well.”
Loggains also plans to go up to Findlay in May to watch Montgomery throw. The Gamecocks’ new offensive analyst Sean Ryan also met with Montgomery on the visit.
Ryan Montgomery has not named a list of favorites just yet, but he will at some point later this spring or summer. According to his dad, these visits served Clemson and USC well with him.
“If there was a ten, both of those schools would be in it,” Montgomery said. “I don’t want to speak for Ryan, but I’m pretty confident they’ll be in a mix. He was talking while in Columbia that he would like to go to their main game in November. I think that would be good. South Carolina, I’ve heard so many good things about their game day atmosphere and how wild it is here. I can see Dowell keeping up that relationship with Ryan. He said all the right things, and he’s about the right things. I would be surprised if they didn’t get a game day visit. That will be the next step for the schools that will still be in the hunt.”
After the Georgia visit, the Montgomerys are scheduled to visit Florida Thursday and then Ohio State April 15th. They have also been to Michigan, Michigan State and Kentucky. Montgomery also just added offers from Auburn and USF.
