We wish this counted. After all, there is a special glory in getting the first arrest of the season, like getting the first quail of the hunt, or the first candy bar of the adolescent shoplift.* It would also mark a proper start to the tenure of Urban Meyer at Ohio State, a tenure that if is anything like his Florida career will be successful, exciting, relatively short, and marked by a plague of small arrests for weed, driving stupidity, and maybe the occasional DUI.
It may be a bet early yet to credit The Meyer Effect for the arrest of Dominic Clarke for three driving-related offenses including OVI. TME has barely had time to sink in at Columbus, and should take some time to take hold, but more importantly Dominic Clarke's poor decision-making predates Meyer's arrival. Remember that Clarke was arrested for discharging a BB gun outside a restaurant in Columbus this past fall in the saddest incident of keepin' it real we have ever seen. Don't make me go to the trunk and make me get the street sweeper! Exfoliator! Whatever!
So as exciting as this would be, it does not count as the incident happened before the January 9th Fulmer Cup Kickoff. Hold out hope, though: as long as there are bags of shake and a few ill-advised scooter rides in play, Ohio State can still kick off the festivities appropriately.
*A formal tradition in Pennsylvania and the Mid-Atlantic