No Jason
Hunting with a rifle isn't poaching. Its simply illegal.
Edit - I was wrong on this, any form of illegally taking an animal is poaching. Including using the wrong weapon to kill it.
If the guy is in city limits, he needs to get an antlerless urban deer permit:
http://www.dnr.state.oh.us/Portals/9/pdf/pub117.pdf
Archery season started a couple days ago. If he wants to hunt that way, then he needs to go to wherever sells hunting licenses/permits (probably any gun store) and see what permit he needs for where he lives. If he wants to use shotgun, that season is from November 30 to December 6. Again, making sure that he can legally use shotgun where he lives.
http://www.ohiodnr.com/wildlife/dow/regulations/seasons.aspx
Hunting out of season - poaching. Hunting without deer tags - poaching.
The reason that the DNR sets things up the way they do is so they can keep track as to about how many deer their are in the state, so they can adjust bag limits to either keep the population in check, or preserve the population depending on how things are going. For example, in parts of PA right now the deer population has thinned otu way too much from overhunting, to the point where you can barely hunt them there any more. If the OP wants to hunt in his back yard, there are legal ways to do it.