COLUMBUS — For Marcus Williams, the hard work paid off.

Williams has been a walk-on for the Ohio State Buckeyes the past three years. Tuesday he became a full-fledged member of the program when head coach Jim Tressel announced Williams was being awarded an athletic scholarship.

Williams — who has been a member of the special teams the past three years — was one of several players to be rewarded for their work.

“It was nice that a lot of guys are getting some help,” said Williams.

“I was really excited, but if I didn’t get one, I wasn’t going to be down. I’ve accomplished a lot of my goals. As far as recognition didn’t bother me, but the financial part of it really is what concerned me.”

Williams has already earned his undergraduate degree thanks to an academic scholarship. He is now in the physical therapy school.

Williams had to do some juggling in order to get the athletic financial award. He had been given a one-year Fellowship Scholarship.

“My fellowship scholarship was supposed to be this year and I asked to get it deferred and they said they normally don’t do that,” said Williams.

“I wrote a letter to the people in charge with an explanation that one would cancel out the other. A few days later they told me they would defer the Fellowship Scholarship. It was awesome.”

Tressel is known for rewarding players for their long service and contributions to the program. One player to earn a scholarship after joining the program as a walk-on was Tyler Whaley, a teammate of Williams at Ironton.

“It’s a three-year program and he was given a one-year fellowship to handle the expense of one year and our physical therapy school is allowing him to postpone that for a year to take an athletic scholarship to handle it for his first year and. And that’s a neat thing for Marcus Williams,” said Tressel.

The announcement of the athletic scholarship wasn’t something Williams was expecting.

“It was in back of my mind I was hoping that it would happen. After time passes, you move on and I’ve got other things to focus on with school starting up so I didn’t worry about it,” said Williams.

Also getting scholarships were Jonathan Thoma, Andrew Moses, Ryan Schuck, Joe Gantz and Tom Ingham.