DaytonDailyNews.com

BEAVERCREEK — With time escaping before halftime, the Beavercreek High School football team chased a 14-7 Carroll lead. Then-sophomore Zach Domicone took the snap and ran left, working to get out of bounds and stop the clock.

Unfortunately, it rained the day before that 2005 season-opener. The Carroll track was flooded, so the marching band crept near the field to prepare for halftime. Domicone saw the band and slapped on the breaks.

His right knee popped, and Domicone's sophomore season ended with a torn anterior cruciate ligament. The player hailed for his speed since elementary school and one of the most promising sophomores in Beavercreek history went from winning the starting quarterback job to a broken ligament.

"I went from an ultimate high to an ultimate low," Domicone said.

This month, though, that feeling has reversed. After a slow start to his recruitment because of the torn ACL, Domicone has become one of the most interesting prospect stories in Jim Tressel's seven years of coaching Ohio State. His tale underlines the uncertainty of the recruiting process and the power of an Ohio State scholarship to change a high school football program.

A quarterback and defensive back in high school, the 6-foot-3, 215-pound Domicone will play safety at Ohio State after signing his National Letter of Intent today, the first day allowed. Many, in fact, say Domicone would've been a no-brainer prospect if he had concentrated on defense throughout his high school career.

That's the reference that Wayne coach Jay Minton provided when he was one of several Greater Western Ohio Conference coaches Tressel called before offering Domicone a scholarship. Minton compared Domicone to Steve Bellisari, whom he coached at Boca Raton (Fla.) High School before Bellisari became Ohio State's starting quarterback.

If Bellisari, like Domicone, played defense only, he would've starred at safety, Minton said.

"You know if he played that position full time," he said, "it would've been, wow, lights out."

A born speedster

Born in Fairborn and raised from an early age in Beavercreek Twp., Domicone is the oldest of Fred and Stacey Domicone's three children. Fred had his share of football success, moving from Fairborn's Park Hills High School to a career at the University of Dayton that included a 1980 NCAA Division III national championship and a national title game appearance in 1981.

Domicone started football in third grade, and his first run from scrimmage was a 65-yard touchdown on a play he calls, "outrun everyone to the sideline, outrun everyone up the sideline." By then, he was sold on sports. As a small child, he was watching ESPN instead of cartoons and asked every Christmas for a new hockey stick to play on the frozen backyard pond.

The family, which owns Domicone Printing in Fairborn, encouraged Domicone to concentrate on recreational-league sports instead of travel teams, a somewhat unusual view in the competitive world of youth sports. He played football and recovered from the wear on his body with basketball at the YMCA.

Soon, Fred was telling his wife and her mother that Zach showed the speed and athleticism to have great success. They weren't buying.

"We would say, 'Oh no, everybody can run like that,' " Stacey laughed.

In seventh grade, Domicone moved from running back to quarterback. A linebacker throughout peewee football, he stopped playing defense. That's when Stacey Domicone stepped in.

"We never approached a coach, we really tried to stay out of it," Stacey said. "In the eighth grade, I don't remember why I did this, I went to the coach and I told him 'You've got to give him a shot; put him in (on defense), he can handle it. He's going to need the experience. My son is going to play football in college.' "

Changing a program

Even though Domicone's middle school teams won at a steady clip, the Beavercreek varsity was wilting. From 2001-03, Domicone's junior high years, the Beavers went 1-29 with consecutive zero-win seasons.

Entering his freshman season in 2004, Domicone considered transferring. But he liked the new coach, Scott Clodfelter, and stayed with Beavercreek, watching from the varsity sideline as the Beavers went 3-7 in Clodfelter's first season.

In 2005, after Domicone tore his ACL, Beavercreek went 2-8. Around that time, Domicone attended his only game in Ohio Stadium with a ticket and a Ted Ginn Jr. jersey that were birthday presents from his parents.

In the past two years, Beavercreek has finished 5-5 and 6-4, the school's first winning season in 16 years. Evidenced by the records and increased participation in the weight room, Domicone profoundly affected the program, quarterbacking a change in culture that now shows optimism.

His Ohio State scholarship can only increase the good feelings, evidenced by the reaction to Tressel's visit to Beavercreek last week, when the mayor, school board members and the business community stopped by for autographs and handshakes.

Beavercreek, for now, is on Ohio's football map.

"If he does well, and Brent Musberger says, 'Beavercreek, Ohio,' the third-graders will hear that," Clodfelter said. "That can help their commitment to football."

Recruiting race

Fred and Zach spent much of their 2007 summer driving to senior camps as Domicone fought for a scholarship. His only scholarship offer to that point came from Air Force, and a lack of interest from other schools can worry suitors.

In the camp drills, Domicone was dominating.

"Parents on the sideline were asking, 'Who's that kid? What's his name?' " Fred Domicone said. "They would come up to him afterward and say, 'Where have you been offered?' The answer was the same. Nowhere, really."

By the end of November, Ohio University offered. Connecticut and Akron did the same shortly before Christmas. Nebraska hired Ohio native Bo Pelini, who added his brother, an OU assistant, to the staff. That got Domicone's tape to Nebraska, which offered just after Christmas.

Domicone was thrilled to have a high Division I offer, but the race was ongoing. Oklahoma caught wind of Nebraska's offer and phoned Clodfelter, asking for a visit to Norman the next day. On Thursday, Jan. 10, Clodfelter made one last call to Ohio State recruiting coordinator John Peterson, saying, "For your information, we have these offers."

At 10 a.m. on Friday morning, Peterson called Clodfelter, asking him to hold off on other schools until he could talk to Tressel. By 3:30, Domicone was a Buckeye. The headline on news and recruiting Web site Bucknut.com advised, "How To Become A Buckeye in 5½ Hours."

"I was floating around," Domicone said.

Now the lifelong Ohio State fan prepares for his unexpected college career as an underdog, a player noticed throughout his life for his speed but often underestimated.

"The lesson is, you know what, we're not all going to Ohio State, but the unexpected can happen," Clodfelter said. "And now everyone's rooting for him."

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7389 or knagel@DaytonDailyNews.com.