Friday, October 30, 2026

Good Morning! On this day in 1965, the mascot that became Brutus Buckeye debuted at Ohio Stadium during Ohio State’s homecoming game against Minnesota.

🏈 The road to Canton kicks off tonight as Ohio’s high school football playoffs get underway. Find out more in Top Stories.

Does your car insurance renew automatically? Convenient, sure. But you could be overpaying. Today’s sponsor, Money.com, makes it easy to compare rates, switch, and save. Check your new rate now.

Player Puts Referee in Hospital

A high school soccer referee is recovering from broken ribs and a collapsed lung after a Steubenville player charged into him during Tuesday night’s playoff game against New Philadelphia.

During the game, the official issued a red card to a Steubenville player who appeared to say something to the official. A teammate then charged at the official and knocked him to the ground.

Steubenville City Schools says it has disciplined the player but won’t say how, citing student privacy laws, and the Ohio High School Athletic Association (OHSAA) will now review the matter, vowing to “pursue this to the fullest extent.”

The referee, who finished officiating the game, is reportedly “doing better,” but video of the hit is fueling calls for criminal charges.

Akron Transit Opens $61M Bus Facility

The Metro Regional Transit Authority has opened a $61 million maintenance facility in Akron, replacing a 40-year-old garage the Summit County bus system had outgrown.

The old building, in use since 1984, was designed for 90 buses. Metro’s fleet now tops 230. Chief of staff Jarrod Hampshire said the added space lets mechanics finish repairs without shuttling buses around.

Federal taxpayers covered more than $37 million of the cost through a transit grant awarded in 2023, and the new 107,000-square-foot building is designed to accommodate electric and natural gas buses.

High School Football Playoffs Kick Off

Ohio’s high school football playoffs begin tonight, with more than 300 teams chasing seven state titles.

The top 12 teams in each of the state’s 28 regions made the field, with the top four seeds earning first-round byes and seeds No. 5 through No. 8 hosting games this weekend.

In Division II, Avon is chasing a third straight state championship, while Bishop Watterson is unbeaten after moving up from Division III. Marion Local remains the team to beat in Division VII after years of domination.

One contender is already out after the OHSAA removed three-time state champion Glenville Thursday amid an investigation into players from Ginn Academy, a magnet school founded by Glenville coach Ted Ginn Sr.

All seven state championship games will be played Dec. 3-5 at Tom Benson Hall of Fame Stadium in Canton, their home for a sixth straight year. You can find more postseason information on the OHSAA’s website.

A Note from Cole, CEO of The Flyover

Dear Reader,

Every year, auditors count how many copies America’s biggest newspapers actually put in people’s hands. The new numbers are brutal.

Of the 25 largest papers in the country, 24 shrank last year. Average decline: 12.5%. Nearly a quarter-million daily papers, gone in a single year. The Denver Post now prints about 24,000 copies a day. The Arizona Republic, 33,000. The Houston Chronicle, 35,000. The Dallas Morning News, under 40,000. These are metros of millions. And the steepest collapse in the country belonged to The Washington Post: down 21% in a single year to fewer than 88,000 print copies.

The industry will tell you it’s the internet. It’s a convenient story, because it means none of this is their fault.

Here’s the story they won’t tell: Americans didn’t stop caring about the news. They stopped trusting the people delivering it. Somewhere along the way, the papers stopped reporting what happened and started campaigning for what they wanted to happen—and their readers noticed. Trust in the media now sits at the lowest level ever recorded.

So no, that’s not an audience drifting away. That’s a jury coming back with a verdict.

And here’s the part the industry really doesn’t want to talk about: those readers didn’t give up on news. They went looking for someone who would just tell them the truth. Millions of them found their way to The Flyover’s network of morning news publications built on one simple deal:

We call things what they are.
We keep the spin out and trust you with the facts.
And The Ohio Flyover stays free.

It turns out that when you just give people the facts and trust them to think for themselves, people respond.

So today I’m asking: will you help us continue? If news that plays it straight is something you want to see thrive, will you stand behind us?

Chip in and support the news that gives it to you straight—and free, every morning.

Will you make a generous donation to support The Ohio Flyover?

While the biased legacy media is failing, will you join our movement to keep the bias out of the news, free to your inbox every morning?

I’d be grateful if you did.

Give $10
Give $25
Give $50
Give $100

Our promise: we answer to you. Help us keep it.

– Cole
CEO, The Flyover

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➤ Chillicothe: Police say no one was stabbed outside of President Trump’s Wednesday rally at Ohio University Chillicothe, despite viral claims. An officer’s pocketknife clip snagged a man’s shirt as the officer broke up a fight. (More)

➤ Lucas County: Vice President JD Vance will hold a rally Monday at the Toledo Express Airport, the day before Election Day. (More)

➤ Also Lucas County: The Toledo Lucas County Public Library’s new, nearly 20,000-square-foot Washington Branch on Alexis Road opens Dec. 5 as the first project in a $153 million plan to modernize branches countywide. (Watch Video Report)

➤ Columbus: Mayor Andrew Ginther is pushing back against U.S. Sen. Bernie Moreno, R-Ohio, calling the senator’s claim that the city spent $225,000 recruiting Ghanaian nurses “misleading clickbait.” (More)

➤ Delaware County: Truck driver Modou Ngom was sentenced to 22 1/2 years in prison for an April Interstate 71 crash that killed Luke and Lynnea Soposki and their 1-year-old son. (More)

➤ Massillon: The OHSAA has asked the Ohio Supreme Court to toss an appeals court order letting a pair of brothers play for Massillon Washington amid an eligibility battle, but the Ohio Attorney General’s Office says the association “called the wrong play.” (More)

➤ Warren County: With about 100,000 new residents in 25 years, the county is studying a possible connection between Interstate 75 and I-71 and ways to move truck traffic out of Lebanon. (More)

Enjoy reading The Ohio Flyover? Click here to share with your friends and family.

➤ Cincinnati men’s basketball will face a loaded Big 12 this winter after league media picked the Bearcats to finish No. 9 in the conference behind Arizona, Houston, Kansas, Texas Tech, Iowa State, BYU, Baylor, and TCU. (See Poll)

➤ Ohio State and its Big Ten peers now face a roughly $49 million per-school cap on institutional involvement in athletes’ NIL deals under a rule passed unanimously ahead of possible congressional action on the Protect College Sports Act. (More)

➤ Buckeye fans rallied behind former star quarterback Braxton Miller after the NBA’s official X account labeled the two-time Big Ten Offensive Player of the Year just another fan seeking LeBron James’ signature. (More)

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➤ General Motors will pay Ohio more than $8 million—the state’s share of a $220 million multistate settlement over allegations the automaker secretly sold customer Smart Driver data. (More)

➤ Centrus Energy shipped its first newly built centrifuge from Tennessee to Piketon ahead of schedule, advancing a multibillion-dollar expansion of domestic uranium enrichment. (More)

➤ A computer outage at CSX Transportation slowed Toledo-area rail traffic for two days, halting railcar swaps for Stellantis’ Toledo Jeep plant. The railroad said the disruption wasn’t because of a cyberattack. (More)

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➤ World War II veteran Bob Masters, days before his 101st birthday, soared over Napoleon in a 1941 Navy trainer piloted by retired Delta captain Barry Behnfeldt. Both men served on different ships named USS Enterprise. (More)

➤ Construction is underway on a $10 million tennis and education center in Norwood that will give Greater Cincinnati kids courts, classrooms, and mentoring. (More)

➤ Gahanna book lovers will find more shelves and cozy corners when The Bibliophile Candle Co. moves into a 100-year-old house at 116 Mill St., with a grand opening weekend set for Nov. 14-15. (More)

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The following stories are featured exclusively on The Flyover Podcast—a daily show that gives you the most important headlines in under 15 minutes.

➤ Protesters clashed with riot police in Madrid, demanding the prime minister’s resignation after Wednesday’s train crash killed nearly seventy people. (Hear Details)

➤ Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang reportedly grew close to a suspected Chinese spy whom U.S. intelligence spent a year tracking. (Hear Story)

➤ A popular WNBA star said the FBI is monitoring roughly 20 people tied to stalking and threats against her. (Listen Now)