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Ross Fulton Analysis: How Ohio State's Offense Dominated Michigan · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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Speaker 1: Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning for Wednesday, December third, I'm
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Speaker 1: your host tom Or the Big Ten championship game against
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Speaker 1: Indiana in three days, the game against Michigan in three
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Speaker 1: hundred and sixty days. On today's show, we're welcoming welcoming
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Speaker 1: in our ex's and o's guru, Ross Fulton to break
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Speaker 1: down the Ohio State offense against Michigan. And when Ross
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Speaker 1: is on the show, we're sponsored by Jeff Rubies of Columbus,
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Speaker 1: slash Columbus to check out the menu and make your
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Speaker 1: reservation today. All right, Ross, this is going to be
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Speaker 1: an overwhelmingly positive show, but we're going to start with
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Speaker 1: some of the you know, there's a little bit of
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Speaker 1: iffy stuff early, especially in early in the game. We're
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Speaker 1: going to start with what is maybe the most unwelcome
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Speaker 1: new Ohio State tradition in the Michigan game. Got to
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Speaker 1: get out there throw that interception on the first drive.
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Speaker 1: It's it's tradition. I don't know what to tell you
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Speaker 1: what happened.
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Speaker 2: What happened here?
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Speaker 1: I mean Julian Sayin' said after the game what happened,
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Speaker 1: But sounds like he was expecting one thing and got another.
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Speaker 3: Yeah, exactly.
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Speaker 4: I guess maybe the good news was they got it
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Speaker 4: out of the way even earlier this this go around,
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Speaker 4: so it, you know, helped them recover. But saying yeah,
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Speaker 4: I saw he and Ryan Day you know, after the game,
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Speaker 4: said he was expecting cover one and what it was
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Speaker 4: actually is what Michigan spent most of the game playing
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Speaker 4: against Ohio State, which is particularly when you had Jeremiah
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Speaker 4: Smith to the boundary as a single receiver. We talked
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Speaker 4: about this before the game. It's quarter quarter a half,
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Speaker 4: so they played cover two to Smith and then cover
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Speaker 4: four to the field. This opened up a lot of
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Speaker 4: opportunities for our state that they exploited that they him
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Speaker 4: in the past that we'll get to, but for this
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Speaker 4: one they did. I guess fool saying because they a lot.
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Speaker 4: You know, they're showing single high pre snaff o high
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Speaker 4: state motions out to trips. The other thing I would
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Speaker 4: note we talked about before the game, and this will
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Speaker 4: again come into play with some of these later clips.
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Speaker 4: Is you know twelve personnel from Ice eight Michigan did
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Speaker 4: in fact respond with their base three four or you
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Speaker 4: know five two if you will in Ohio State, then
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Speaker 4: you know spread out their tight ends just like us.
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Speaker 4: He did and High State did successfully here as we'll show.
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Speaker 4: But so you know they run this sort of you know,
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Speaker 4: you got the cover one. I'm assuming Sayan's reading this
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Speaker 4: right like, so if you got manned, he's gonna throw
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Speaker 4: that dough ball or fae ball to Smith zone. He's
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Speaker 4: going to work to the spacing side, to the trip side,
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Speaker 4: you know, just a so Michigan fooled them obviously dropped back.
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Speaker 4: Uh you know, unfortunate because Colonel Tate's sitting there wide
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Speaker 4: open on that spacing concept that you know. But fortunately
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Speaker 4: Ohio State will come back around to taking advantage of
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Speaker 4: Colonel Tate to the cover four side opposite Smith. But
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Speaker 4: bad start. You know, I was sure many people out there.
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Speaker 4: My my phone was exploding of here we go again,
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Speaker 4: and I think my dad and I then said to
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Speaker 4: each other simultaneously, it couldn't go started work, Say it's
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Speaker 4: only six to nothing, so plenty of time to recover.
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Speaker 1: Yeah, definitely plenty of time to recover.
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Speaker 2: And one of them was talking to one of the.
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Speaker 1: Local TV folks on the sideline and said, this game
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Speaker 1: starts when someone scores a touchdown. Like it was, it
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Speaker 1: was kind of messy at the beginning for both teams,
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Speaker 1: and it was a bunch of field goals and when
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Speaker 1: Ohio State had the ball, they're down six to nothing,
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Speaker 1: they go right down the field. Okay, here they go.
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Speaker 1: They're going to punch it in. And then they didn't
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Speaker 1: punch it in. And they had they really struggled in
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Speaker 1: the red zone quite a bit, and especially sort of
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Speaker 1: in the close red zone, and they had the one
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Speaker 1: throw to Jeremiah Smith where they threw the fade and
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Speaker 1: they got one on one coverage and saying just kind
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Speaker 1: of overthrew it, and then they really didn't go back
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Speaker 1: to that. I kept waiting for them to go back
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Speaker 1: to it because it feels like if you're not able
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Speaker 1: to just pound the ball in, just win man on
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Speaker 1: man and just pound the ball in at the goal line,
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Speaker 1: it feels like that's a that's a play that is
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Speaker 1: worth exploring more. I mean, want to get your thoughts
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Speaker 1: on that. And then we'll take a look at some
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Speaker 1: of the stuff that was not working in the goal
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Speaker 1: line for them.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, I remember watching live thinking to myself, I'd really
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Speaker 4: like to see him throw it here on first down,
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Speaker 4: and they did, and obviously, you know, it was I
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Speaker 4: think a little off target, a little behind Smith. You know,
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Speaker 4: I would have liked to see them go back to
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Speaker 4: that and be more consistent. I will say that they
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Speaker 4: have tried that several times this year and really not
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Speaker 4: been very successful, which which which seemed like an easy
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Speaker 4: single coverage throw to Smith. You know, for as accurate
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Speaker 4: as as Julian sayin has been uh that he's been
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Speaker 4: off on a couple of those. But it seems like,
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Speaker 4: you know, just because you did it one time and
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Speaker 4: it didn't work, you could certainly go back to it.
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Speaker 4: I would say more generally, you know, we've talked about this, uh,
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Speaker 4: the it's always just going to be difficult down in
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Speaker 4: the short in the goal line, you know, low red
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Speaker 4: zone without the quarterback run threat.
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Speaker 3: You know, you're getting under center.
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Speaker 4: We've showed like in clips and we'll show in this
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Speaker 4: one like they can always outnumber them. I'd say, in
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Speaker 4: addition to the fade to Smith, I'd also like to
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Speaker 4: see them probably go a little bit earlier to like
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Speaker 4: the head play action boot leg like I do think
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Speaker 4: that was there to Jeelanny Thurman on that fourth down
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Speaker 4: where Bennett Christian you know, had the false start, and
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Speaker 4: I would can contrast that with the third down earlier
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Speaker 4: on this drive or third and two, the first sort
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Speaker 4: of short yardage of the game for US date, and
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Speaker 4: they went right away to a bootleg to Wilchasmeric for
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Speaker 4: the first down. And so I thought that was a
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Speaker 4: good call in that situation because Michigan was just really
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Speaker 4: you know, aggressively plugging their linebackers against the stuff. And
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Speaker 4: so you know, we see this this one is under center.
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Speaker 4: I they do send Christian out in motion. They're trying
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Speaker 4: to draw you know, the safety out of the box
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Speaker 4: the play side, like they do, keep trying different things.
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Speaker 4: You know, we obviously saw the one play where they
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Speaker 4: had Kate McDonald as a lead fullback. That was I
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Speaker 4: guess you'd say mere inches from from a touchdown. But
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Speaker 4: you know, you just these are sort of the like
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Speaker 4: the downsides, like you know, everyone Michigan's in this odd front,
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Speaker 4: you know, they Jason Barnum sort of over stacked behind
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Speaker 4: the nose guard, and so you're just really hard to
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Speaker 4: get any sort of double teams, let alone to get
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Speaker 4: to they have like this kind of double stack right
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Speaker 4: where they barn them, and then they have Rolleder right
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Speaker 4: behind them, and it's just hard. Like Nate Roberts in
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Speaker 4: theory should be picking up roller but like he's you know,
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Speaker 4: he's not a natural fullback. Like we showed this a
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Speaker 4: few times this year when they try to run this
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Speaker 4: lead stretch and like him, he has to see the
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Speaker 4: hole as well, right, And you know, I think there's
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Speaker 4: technical things like you'd like to see guys get a
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Speaker 4: little lower. I mean, I still think I think CJ.
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Speaker 4: Donaldson's been better about getting lower, but like on that
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Speaker 4: Caden McDonald one, you know, i'd still think like a
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Speaker 4: little bit lower pad level. He probably gets that extra
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Speaker 4: inch and scores, but I just think, you know, again,
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Speaker 4: I don't think it's like a dire situation for them,
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Speaker 4: but I do think it's just it's going to require them,
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Speaker 4: like to continue us the creativity and as I said,
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Speaker 4: like I would not be shy about throwing it multiple
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Speaker 4: times to Jeremia Smith in that situation or using as
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Speaker 4: I said play action earlier. Obviously, the sneaking was very
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Speaker 4: effective other places in the in the you know, short yardage,
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Speaker 4: it's just even more difficult of the goal line for
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Speaker 4: the reasons we saw. So it's going to just continue
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Speaker 4: to sort of be a grind a little bit for them.
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Speaker 4: But you know, the good news was, as we'll show later,
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Speaker 4: they threw it really well when they got down there,
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Speaker 4: and so that you know what, they spread it out.
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Speaker 3: So that's also a possibility.
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Speaker 2: And we are going to shift to the pass game
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Speaker 2: right now.
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Speaker 1: We're not going to start in the red zone, but
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Speaker 1: we'll get there, so get there shortly, just as Ohio
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Speaker 1: State tended to once they got things rolling on offense.
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Speaker 1: One thing they were very effective in was just converting
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Speaker 1: third downs. It was kind of third and medium, third
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Speaker 1: and long, and it just kind of consistently looked like, yeah,
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Speaker 1: no problem, it's fine, third and six, third and seven, Yeah,
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Speaker 1: find not a not a big deal. And they use
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Speaker 1: some concepts that we have seen before to do that,
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Speaker 1: including this next one.
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Speaker 3: Yeah.
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Speaker 4: I mean, the good news was the plan on the
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Speaker 4: sayan interception was sound against what Michigan was doing because
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Speaker 4: they went right back to it and they had a couple,
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Speaker 4: as you said, like third and five, third and six
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Speaker 4: back to back, where again Michigan like very consistently like
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Speaker 4: same plan for the most part that Michigan's used the
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Speaker 4: last few years against Ohio State, right, running cover two
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Speaker 4: the boundary, trying to get a double on Smith cover
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Speaker 4: for the field they're getting like really deep linebacker drops,
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Speaker 4: like trying to trying to get his money bodies in
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Speaker 4: the way as possible of like the deeper wide receivers.
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Speaker 4: The good news hire State is like the way they
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Speaker 4: are designed. You know, in the past with Michig against
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Speaker 4: it's been sort of like your number their number one
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Speaker 4: guy was, uh the x like where Smith is, and
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Speaker 4: your number two is a slot guy, right, And now
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Speaker 4: they have like two, they're much more like two outside
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Speaker 4: wide receiver threats, And so they were able to really
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Speaker 4: take advantage of this, like soft cover four with Carnel Tate,
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Speaker 4: Like you know, after a month you almost kind of
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Speaker 4: forget how good Carnel Tate is and like what a
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Speaker 4: difference he makes on these kind of routes because he's
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Speaker 4: just really good at finding space. So they just kept
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Speaker 4: hit him with these sort of you know, spacing routes,
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Speaker 4: curl routes. You know, Tate, I don't show it, but
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Speaker 4: like there's a few times in our High State we
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Speaker 4: talked about like ran this on first down, like the
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Speaker 4: glance RPOs or or I should say the free access
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Speaker 4: RPOs or Tate runs a hitch, Like they got to
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Speaker 4: second and three before the Tate touchdown by you know,
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Speaker 4: that free access throat to him. So taking advantage for
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Speaker 4: like the Michigan's desire to push the coverage back and
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Speaker 4: like you we'll talk about here on the other next
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Speaker 4: time that you know, it also helps that Julian sans
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Speaker 4: like happy to take those underneath throws, like we've talked
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Speaker 4: about that this year, like the pluses and minus of that,
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Speaker 4: but like he really keeps the chains moving and so
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Speaker 4: on third down, you know, the balls out and he's
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Speaker 4: getting them to the sticks. But so like you know,
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Speaker 4: Day sort of alluded to it at the press conference,
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Speaker 4: and I sort of agree, Like, I mean, a High
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Speaker 4: State could have probably thrown this stuff all day if
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Speaker 4: the weather had allowed them to do. So it's just
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Speaker 4: you know, you get a lead and that what I mean,
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Speaker 4: you would know better than me. But it got you know,
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Speaker 4: pretty Dicey. So the uh, you know, I think that
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Speaker 4: given that, you know, it's sort of like the i'd
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Speaker 4: say big picture though, like they sort of finally conquered
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Speaker 4: this Michigan split safety game plan against Ohio State by
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Speaker 4: and a lot of times like just kind of using
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Speaker 4: Jeremiah Smith to eat up to Michigan defenders. You know,
10:24
Speaker 4: it's kind of kind of expect I guess a Smith,
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Speaker 4: you know, barely practicing, as Day said after the game
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Speaker 4: last week, and just working the opposite side of the
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Speaker 4: field where there's a lot more space.
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Speaker 3: Yeah.
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Speaker 1: And one of the results of not using Jeremiah Smith
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Speaker 1: a ton and just kind of letting Michigan brow a
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Speaker 1: couple of guys at him and work on the other
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Speaker 1: side of the field was Bo Jackson had more receiving
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Speaker 1: yards than Jeremiah Smith in the game. You probably could
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Speaker 1: have gotten pretty good.
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Speaker 2: Odds on that.
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Speaker 1: But Bo Jackson, as a just individual in terms of
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Speaker 1: total offense outgained Michigan one hundred and sixty six to
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Speaker 1: one hundred and sixty three, all by himself, including forty
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Speaker 1: nine yards receiving. This next one is his long reception
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Speaker 1: of the day, and boy, when you add him into
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Speaker 1: the mix. You already got Jeremi Smith, you already got
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Speaker 1: Cardinal Tate, you got Brandon Nis, you got Max Claire,
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Speaker 1: and then you throw in bo Jackson, his potential impact
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Speaker 1: guy in the past game. That just that feels almost
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Speaker 1: like overkill.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, And we talked about, you know, last week before
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Speaker 4: the game, that Jackson could have a big role in
11:20
Speaker 4: the past game because of this Michigan strategy. And so
11:24
Speaker 4: you know, again same coverage cover six here again, so
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Speaker 4: we're attacking the cover four side of the field opposite Smith, right,
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Speaker 4: and they're just using sale concepts.
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Speaker 3: So we've talked about this a lot.
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Speaker 4: You know, outside receiver here, Tate's going to run a
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Speaker 4: deep go route, Brandon Inn this is going to run
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Speaker 4: that like deep out and then you have the flat route.
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Speaker 4: They run that off of heavy play action here, and
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Speaker 4: so you know Jackson is getting the fake and then
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Speaker 4: running to the flat And obviously, like Michigan, one thing
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Speaker 4: they did a lot, particularly with this kind of action
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Speaker 4: or you know, run threat is they wanted to plug
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Speaker 4: the linebacker down. That's another thing they've done a lot against.
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Speaker 4: How I say these past couple of years, you're basically
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Speaker 4: sort of like building a bear front for lack of
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Speaker 4: a better term, like you're you're using that linebacker, you're
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Speaker 4: tacking it into your gap, and so you're you're trying
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Speaker 4: to gap everything out again to eliminate double teams. So
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Speaker 4: you see Jimmy Rolder here do that and then he
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Speaker 4: tries to drop back and coverage, but it's too late.
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Speaker 4: But you know, Michigan's carrying all the routes here, so
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Speaker 4: that just leaves Jackson underneath for a big game run
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Speaker 4: after the catch. And again, like another example of like
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Speaker 4: Saying is the strategy that Michigan's used in recent seasons.
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Speaker 4: It just works less well against Saying as a quarterback
12:36
Speaker 4: because he is perfectly happy to take these throws and
12:39
Speaker 4: like keep the offense moving down the field, and so
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Speaker 4: like if you want to gain all this depth and
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Speaker 4: carry routes vertically and double Smith, like he'll just take
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Speaker 4: what's underneath, you know, whether it's a couple of times
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Speaker 4: to Jackson. You know he had that like check down
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Speaker 4: to Claire that kept the chains moving. So obviously some
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Speaker 4: big time throws down the field from Saying, you know
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Speaker 4: he's here, But maybe his best one is probably that
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Speaker 4: seam route to Pasmerk you know, it was also a
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Speaker 4: great catch by him, the guy you don't really expect
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Speaker 4: it to have that vertical threat, but you know, he
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Speaker 4: just happy to keep the offense moving, and so that
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Speaker 4: that really cut into Michigan's strategy as well.
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Speaker 3: All Right.
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Speaker 1: The next one I thought was one of the guts
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Speaker 1: of your calls from Ryan Day all day. This was
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Speaker 1: the Jeremiah Smith touchdown, which was on fourth and five.
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Speaker 1: I think that kind of got lost in the hole
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Speaker 1: kerfluffle about possession or non possession or whatever was he
13:31
Speaker 1: juggling it as he crossed the goal line. That kind
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Speaker 1: of overshadowed the fact that that was a fourth and
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Speaker 1: five from thirty five and he you know, you're kind
13:39
Speaker 1: of a.
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Speaker 2: No man's lane.
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Speaker 1: You're not gonna punt there, and it's probably too far
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Speaker 1: for a field goal. But that was also it felt
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Speaker 1: like they were trying to set up a four down
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Speaker 1: territory thing. They had five yards on first down and
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Speaker 1: then got stopped on a run for no gain on
13:53
Speaker 1: second down, got stopped on a run for no yards
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Speaker 1: on third down, so then it turns into fourth and
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Speaker 1: five and you're kind of in no man's land. But
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Speaker 1: that was I thought, you know that was a gutsy
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Speaker 1: call from Ryan Day and a really nice throw by
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Speaker 1: Julian Sayan.
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Speaker 4: Yeah, I think if you look back in previous seasons, right,
14:09
Speaker 4: we've talked about like where sort of Michigan has been
14:11
Speaker 4: a step ahead of them in terms of x's and
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Speaker 4: o's choices in the games, and I think this year
14:18
Speaker 4: was really the first time, or you know, I guess
14:20
Speaker 4: it's easy to say after you win, but you really
14:23
Speaker 4: can point to some situations where like they use what
14:26
Speaker 4: Michigan and wink Martindale wants to do against them. And
14:31
Speaker 4: so this is a good example, right, Like it's fourth
14:32
Speaker 4: and five, and we talked about how Martin Dale automatically
14:36
Speaker 4: response multiple tight ends with his base front right, and
14:41
Speaker 4: so Ohio state it's in thirteen personnel on fourth and five, right,
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Speaker 4: So yeah, it's kind of it's a you would assume
14:47
Speaker 4: it's a passing situation, but you got it. You got
14:50
Speaker 4: three tight ends and Michigan responds with their base three four.
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Speaker 4: The other thing is so by doing that, they got
14:57
Speaker 4: Michigan out of that covered to bracket of Smith, right,
15:02
Speaker 4: So you've got your base front end here against thirteen,
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Speaker 4: and so they call cover three. Uh, and so that
15:08
Speaker 4: gets you the one on one matchup on the outside.
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Speaker 4: Obviously a great move by Jeremi Smith. Max Clayer was
15:15
Speaker 4: also wide open to the opposite side, so Michigan was
15:18
Speaker 4: just pretty lost and so great throw and catch the
15:23
Speaker 4: you know, the other thing before I forget is all
15:25
Speaker 4: these examples is like how good the pass protection was,
15:28
Speaker 4: Like Michigan we talked about before the game, you know,
15:31
Speaker 4: how aggressive would Martindale be. Like obviously he's known as
15:34
Speaker 4: a blitz heavy guy, but as we discussed, they have
15:38
Speaker 4: Michigan has not been very successful blitzeing this year. Like
15:41
Speaker 4: they've just left themselves pretty vulnerable. And I wouldn't say
15:44
Speaker 4: there was a ton of pressure being brought again like
15:47
Speaker 4: he was copying a page from last year's playbook where
15:49
Speaker 4: they just played a lot of these split safety coverages.
15:52
Speaker 4: But even so, like you know, there was you know,
15:55
Speaker 4: Michigan's has some you know threats up front as pass rushers,
15:59
Speaker 4: and like just here, as in the previous examples, like
16:03
Speaker 4: you know, I thought, particularly like the defensive or the
16:05
Speaker 4: offensive tackles handled the defensive ends really well. You get
16:09
Speaker 4: like the hat four and one half slide here. You know,
16:11
Speaker 4: they use a lot of that four guys to one
16:13
Speaker 4: side and the offensive tackle big on Big to the other.
16:15
Speaker 4: Obviously they're helping out with a chip here, but a
16:18
Speaker 4: lot of times there's just five man or six man protections.
16:21
Speaker 4: And you know, Julian sand was hardly touched other than
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Speaker 4: I think, you know, like on naked bootlegs where they're
16:27
Speaker 4: leaving someone on block. So that obviously made it made
16:30
Speaker 4: it a lot easier to throw the football as well
16:32
Speaker 4: before the weather set in.
16:34
Speaker 1: Speaking of great blocking that makes it easy to throw
16:37
Speaker 1: the football. We got to talk about Max Claire and
16:39
Speaker 1: his what no, I'm just running a route? What no,
16:42
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm running around in the end zone. What
16:44
Speaker 1: this is the Brandon in his touchdown And this is
16:47
Speaker 1: certainly another way you could go in terms of getting
16:49
Speaker 1: the ball in the end zone from the low red zone.
16:51
Speaker 4: Yeah, exactly. This is another great concept. And actually i'll
16:55
Speaker 4: high stay ran this twice on the same drive, right,
16:57
Speaker 4: so we're just talking about like those third medium pick
17:00
Speaker 4: up opportunities. And so they ran this same exact concept
17:04
Speaker 4: in the middle of the field. It was against cover
17:06
Speaker 4: six here. This is more like a red two or
17:10
Speaker 4: even like two man, so they got two deep safeties
17:12
Speaker 4: and man underneath, and so this is just a great
17:15
Speaker 4: job getting a free release, right, so you've got this
17:18
Speaker 4: yo yo motion to stack the wide receivers. And then
17:21
Speaker 4: this is a knife concept. So knife is basically like
17:24
Speaker 4: dagger is a concept like we run at one guy
17:27
Speaker 4: deep and have a dig come underneath him. Knife is
17:30
Speaker 4: just like a shorter version of that. So Claire's like
17:33
Speaker 4: running vertically and in this is kind of running like
17:35
Speaker 4: a square end behind it, right, But like you know,
17:39
Speaker 4: Claire's allowed again to release on his route and so
17:42
Speaker 4: that stack freeze NS up for the touchdown again saying great,
17:47
Speaker 4: great delivery here. I think, you know, another great job
17:50
Speaker 4: of pass protection by Daniels.
17:53
Speaker 3: But I agree.
17:54
Speaker 4: I mean I think that to the extent that, like
17:56
Speaker 4: you know, this is at the three yard line. They
17:59
Speaker 4: obviously this third down, so they had to throw here.
18:01
Speaker 4: But I do think there's probably some opportunities out there
18:06
Speaker 4: for you know, just using I wouldn't say your base offense,
18:10
Speaker 4: but spreading things out and you know, throwing the football.
18:14
Speaker 1: So the next pass play we're gonna be talking about,
18:16
Speaker 1: the last pass play we're gonna be talking about, is
18:17
Speaker 1: that long touchdown to Carnel Tait, and this is one
18:21
Speaker 1: where you could sort of pick apart some some areas
18:24
Speaker 1: where Oldhouse it was probably gonna be able to find
18:26
Speaker 1: some opportunities in the secondary. And then once Michigan started
18:29
Speaker 1: getting into their depth in the secondary, that was really true.
18:33
Speaker 1: And this is one this ended up. Julian Santa said
18:35
Speaker 1: after the game, Boy, the bowl was up there a while.
18:37
Speaker 1: It felt like it was up there for quite a while.
18:38
Speaker 1: But Cardinal Tate was very extremely open on this one.
18:42
Speaker 4: Yeah, and I you know, there are things on this
18:45
Speaker 4: play that the Michigan defense does wrong. I Cody Alexander
18:49
Speaker 4: had a thread on x discussing that and so highly
18:53
Speaker 4: recommend that if you're interested.
18:55
Speaker 3: But I I'll go through it.
18:57
Speaker 4: But I do think there's things that Ohio State did
18:59
Speaker 4: here to to get them in this situation. So again,
19:02
Speaker 4: twelve personnel, but they have Max Claire as the receiver
19:06
Speaker 4: to one side, and opposite him, they put Smith and
19:09
Speaker 4: Tate to the same side, and then they're gonna motion
19:12
Speaker 4: into trips and put Casmeric in line, and so that
19:17
Speaker 4: obviously forces you know, when you get trips, you have
19:19
Speaker 4: to adjust compare to two by two. And so again
19:22
Speaker 4: Michigan is in there they play cover two here because
19:26
Speaker 4: now you've got Smith and Tate to the same side
19:29
Speaker 4: of the field, but they you know, you need to
19:31
Speaker 4: do a trips check and so Ohio State basically runs
19:33
Speaker 4: with as essentially like a bomber concept what they call it.
19:37
Speaker 4: So you have Claire on this deep pearl and then
19:40
Speaker 4: Tate running a post opposite. It's kind of similar to
19:43
Speaker 4: the play that Jeremiah Smith scored against Oregon and the
19:46
Speaker 4: Rose Bowl last year on same concept and in theory
19:51
Speaker 4: Michigan's nickel here Metcalf has to carry Tate down the
19:56
Speaker 4: middle of the field, and then that backside safe should
20:00
Speaker 4: be picking him up because you see the front side
20:02
Speaker 4: safety again like he's widening it to Jeremiah Smith, right,
20:06
Speaker 4: and that backside safety though like once they don't carry him.
20:10
Speaker 4: You know, the concept is that curl is supposed to
20:14
Speaker 4: hold that backside safety just the way it does, and
20:17
Speaker 4: that opens up tape for a wide open throw. So
20:20
Speaker 4: again like doing things to mess you know, taking advantage
20:22
Speaker 4: of either using Smith to knowing that you're dictating how
20:27
Speaker 4: Michigan's going to cover that, like you're probably going to
20:29
Speaker 4: get quarters opposite that and use concepts against that or
20:33
Speaker 4: you know, put them on the same side, mess with
20:36
Speaker 4: Michigan's rules and see how they're able to respond, including
20:40
Speaker 4: with motion and so yeah, this was sort of the
20:42
Speaker 4: kill shot they needed for lack of a better term,
20:44
Speaker 4: as I said, set up, I hit the glance route
20:46
Speaker 4: on first down, getting second and three, and then take
20:49
Speaker 4: your shot.
20:51
Speaker 1: All right, and we are going to finish things up
20:53
Speaker 1: by going real heavy in the run game, just like
20:55
Speaker 1: Ohio State did on Saturday. First of all, this is
20:58
Speaker 1: the play. This is a really nice run by Bojackson.
21:00
Speaker 2: The red zone. Get a couple pullers out in front
21:03
Speaker 2: of him.
21:03
Speaker 1: Luke Montgomery and Max Clayer get out in front of
21:06
Speaker 1: him and they block it nicely. But man, great leg
21:09
Speaker 1: drive here from bo Jackson as well to get them down.
21:11
Speaker 1: And this ended up setting up that it Brandon in
21:13
Speaker 1: his touchdown we talked about a minute ago.
21:17
Speaker 4: Yeah, the one thing that was noticeable throughout the game. Again,
21:21
Speaker 4: as I talked about, like Michigan liked to play that
21:25
Speaker 4: bass odd front when they're Ohio States in two tight
21:28
Speaker 4: ends or you know, insert a linebacker and like create
21:31
Speaker 4: a bear front. If anyone, I guess is a glad
21:34
Speaker 4: for punishment wants to go back, like look at how
21:37
Speaker 4: Michigan did that last year we talked about in the video.
21:40
Speaker 4: But the difference is this year, Like Ohio State was
21:44
Speaker 4: overwhelmingly a zone team at this time last year, and
21:46
Speaker 4: now they're just like they're so gap heavy and it's
21:49
Speaker 4: just such a better concept against odd fronds for the
21:52
Speaker 4: reason we've talked about, the same reason that teams keep
21:54
Speaker 4: using gap scenes against when Ohio States in a penny
21:57
Speaker 4: front and we did discuss a lot of the year
22:01
Speaker 4: Ohio State had some issues executing particularly gh counter excuse me,
22:06
Speaker 4: where you're pulling the guard and pulling the backside tight end.
22:08
Speaker 4: But like they've really cleaned that stuff up, and so
22:11
Speaker 4: this is just really well executed. Great kickout blocked by Montgomery,
22:15
Speaker 4: great lead through the hole by Claire. You know, they
22:19
Speaker 4: kick out lead through great double teams. You're getting guys downfield.
22:23
Speaker 4: You know, bo Jackson, as he said, like he he's
22:25
Speaker 4: really sort of starting to come into his own in
22:27
Speaker 4: terms of like at the second level, whether they're making
22:30
Speaker 4: guys miss most noticeably on that you know where he
22:33
Speaker 4: kind of gave you the stop and go or you
22:37
Speaker 4: know early in the game a couple of times, but
22:40
Speaker 4: he you know, really fighting through second level contact. You know,
22:43
Speaker 4: the other thing that was nice about these counters is
22:46
Speaker 4: that Ohio State was pairing them with a lot of
22:48
Speaker 4: different looks on the backside, like they're running both GH
22:51
Speaker 4: counter and GT counter. You know, they brought in James
22:55
Speaker 4: Peoples a couple of times and they sort of used
22:57
Speaker 4: him as the now screen threat outside here running double
23:00
Speaker 4: verticals with Tait and Smith. So that's obviously you know,
23:03
Speaker 4: Michigan again is in too high safeties because they're they're
23:07
Speaker 4: worried about that vertical threat. So that opens things up
23:10
Speaker 4: at the second level as so you know, you just
23:12
Speaker 4: get the more as we said that you can get
23:14
Speaker 4: teams in too high, the better the run game is
23:17
Speaker 4: going to look. But I think all in all, just
23:19
Speaker 4: like you have to be pretty pleased. They ran counter
23:22
Speaker 4: a bunch, as I said, they also ran power a
23:24
Speaker 4: lot at that that last you know twenty play drive
23:27
Speaker 4: where you're kicking out with the fullback and leading through
23:30
Speaker 4: the backside guard both really successful. So we'll get into
23:34
Speaker 4: that drive here and in a second. But like just
23:37
Speaker 4: you see the benefits now of the run game diversity
23:40
Speaker 4: coming through. I think there were some growing pains this
23:42
Speaker 4: year in terms of the number of concepts young running backs.
23:46
Speaker 4: But I do think, you know, there were caveats going
23:49
Speaker 4: into this game about you know, was the run game?
23:51
Speaker 3: Was it fools gold.
23:52
Speaker 4: In terms of improvements because of the level of competition,
23:56
Speaker 4: But I think you know, this game sort of stamped that,
23:59
Speaker 4: like there have been improvements, and it's just like in
24:01
Speaker 4: terms of both execution and then you know, the younger
24:04
Speaker 4: running backs, Jackson in particular, just like really getting comfortable
24:07
Speaker 4: and that's leading to him being more explicit at the
24:09
Speaker 4: second level.
24:11
Speaker 1: And they were very effective running the ball. And yeah,
24:14
Speaker 1: twenty play drive in the snow for almost twelve minutes.
24:18
Speaker 1: That felt like Ryan Day, that had to be about
24:20
Speaker 1: the most satisfying thing that Ryan Day has has experienced
24:24
Speaker 1: over the last year or so, outside of maybe winning
24:26
Speaker 1: the National championship possibly, but other than that, Yeah, as
24:30
Speaker 1: he said after the game, well you didn't finish it
24:32
Speaker 1: with a touchdown, but otherwise that might have been up
24:35
Speaker 1: there in terms of his favorite moments in football.
24:38
Speaker 2: And one of you know, here's this is just one
24:39
Speaker 2: of these plays. This is CJ. Donaldson.
24:43
Speaker 1: I mean, they really got everyone involved by the time
24:45
Speaker 1: things were done, But this is one from C. J.
24:47
Speaker 3: Donaldson. Yeah, so this is wind back.
24:49
Speaker 4: So I just again like you know, emphasized sort of
24:52
Speaker 4: the diversity on that drive. So they ran wind back
24:56
Speaker 4: several times, you know, as I said, they ran counter,
24:58
Speaker 4: they ran stretch, ran power, they ran split zone, they
25:03
Speaker 4: ran split zone to the to the split like we've
25:06
Speaker 4: we showed a couple of weeks ago. But you know
25:08
Speaker 4: what really kind of started off here as wind back,
25:10
Speaker 4: and so wind back, you know we showed before, is
25:13
Speaker 4: sort of do everyone's down blocking and then you're kind
25:15
Speaker 4: of counter running back and you've got the wide receiver here.
25:18
Speaker 4: And so again using what Michigan wants to do in
25:22
Speaker 4: terms of playing Cover six, So you're playing Cover two
25:24
Speaker 4: to the boundary, and that means the corner is the
25:27
Speaker 4: for support player, and so you're gonna you're gonna they
25:30
Speaker 4: keep rant it running wind back to the boundary and
25:33
Speaker 4: have David Adolf basically serve as a lead blocker right
25:36
Speaker 4: and dig out that Cover two corner for big games
25:39
Speaker 4: and just running downhill at them at Michigan. The other
25:42
Speaker 4: thing I would I would note, though, as the game
25:45
Speaker 4: went on, because of Ohio State's passing game success, Martindale
25:50
Speaker 4: stopped playing a lot of times hit that base front
25:53
Speaker 4: even against twelve personnel and played much more like a
25:55
Speaker 4: nickel even front, and so that like further help on
26:00
Speaker 4: this drive, you know, so again using the passing game
26:03
Speaker 4: to set up the run game here. You know, I
26:06
Speaker 4: do think that drive, I know Day said, you know,
26:09
Speaker 4: without a touchdown, it doesn't go down in his all time.
26:12
Speaker 4: I do think that was where the weather sort of
26:14
Speaker 4: came into effect. I think he talked about like they
26:16
Speaker 4: basically like on that third down they tried to throw
26:19
Speaker 4: sort of like a flat route off a snack to
26:22
Speaker 4: the Roberts as the full back. You know, I think
26:24
Speaker 4: they're being pretty conservative. They did take the one shot
26:27
Speaker 4: down the field on that drive to tape, but the
26:30
Speaker 4: you know, as I said, it started sort of the
26:32
Speaker 4: elements began working against them. So had to be pretty
26:36
Speaker 4: satisfying just in terms like again like the execution though
26:41
Speaker 4: running downhill much better on double teams getting to the
26:43
Speaker 4: second level.
26:45
Speaker 2: Yeah, as you.
26:46
Speaker 1: Said, I was there on Saturday out in the out
26:48
Speaker 1: in the elements. It was not ideal football weather. Great news.
26:51
Speaker 1: The forecast for Saturday night in Indianapolis seventy no wind,
26:56
Speaker 1: no precipitation, should be a pretty perfect fast dry track
27:00
Speaker 1: for both the buck Eyes and the Hoosiers.
27:02
Speaker 2: And these are two teams.
27:04
Speaker 1: This is these are teams that are not only one
27:05
Speaker 1: two in the nation in the polls, one two in
27:08
Speaker 1: the nation in sp plus, they are one two in
27:10
Speaker 1: the nation in defensive sp plus as well. This is
27:13
Speaker 1: going to be a challenging Indiana defense for the Buckeyes.
27:17
Speaker 1: I just want to get some sort of overall thoughts
27:19
Speaker 1: from you on that. We Tony Jerderman and I have
27:21
Speaker 1: rewatched I think four games at this point, and my
27:24
Speaker 1: overall takeaway is the defensive line is pretty good. The
27:26
Speaker 1: linebackers are really good. D'Angelo Pons is a very good corner,
27:31
Speaker 1: but he's five to nine. I'd be interested if that's
27:33
Speaker 1: something you think they might explore with the taller wide
27:36
Speaker 1: receivers and then the other corner, Jamari Sharp. Maybe there's
27:41
Speaker 1: some some opportunity there for Ohio State in the past game.
27:44
Speaker 1: Just want to guess, sort of get your thoughts on
27:46
Speaker 1: the on the Hoosier defense.
27:48
Speaker 4: Yeah, so, I guess I'd say a big picture. While
27:50
Speaker 4: Michigan I thought was fairly static in terms of what
27:53
Speaker 4: they were doing up front, Indiana will stunt and move
27:57
Speaker 4: a ton they are going to uh you know, loop slant.
28:02
Speaker 4: They're a four down front, but they will get in
28:05
Speaker 4: an odd, you know, tight front. They did that a
28:07
Speaker 4: lot against O High State last year. Again, that'll be
28:10
Speaker 4: interesting one because as we said, O High State was
28:13
Speaker 4: a very heavy zone team last year, so that makes
28:15
Speaker 4: a lot more sense that is less good against gap runs.
28:18
Speaker 3: So we'll see how they they handle that. Brian Hayes their.
28:22
Speaker 4: Defense coordinator though, like their cover their heavy cover three
28:25
Speaker 4: on early downs and like last year, you know High
28:29
Speaker 4: State again like those we were talking about, the free
28:31
Speaker 4: access kind of hitch routes hit some of those against
28:34
Speaker 4: Indiana really probably could have done it more, and you know,
28:37
Speaker 4: they really need to do that again to Tait and
28:39
Speaker 4: Smith on early downs on Saturday.
28:42
Speaker 3: They because then.
28:44
Speaker 4: If what Indian wants to do is get you in
28:46
Speaker 4: passing downs, because then he likes to use a lot
28:48
Speaker 4: of simulated pressures and fire zones like you know, played
28:51
Speaker 4: kind of like two D four under bring guys from
28:53
Speaker 4: different places, plug the linebacker, try to mess with your protections.
28:59
Speaker 4: Uh they were, Yeah, So he was pretty aggresive against
29:01
Speaker 4: Ohio State last year, in particular when he thought Ohio
29:03
Speaker 4: State was going to run the ball, so I think,
29:06
Speaker 4: you know, to sound like a broken record maybe, but
29:09
Speaker 4: I think passing on early downs and using the pass
29:12
Speaker 4: to set up the running will also benefit a high
29:15
Speaker 4: state on Saturday.
29:17
Speaker 1: All right, well, we will have much more about that
29:20
Speaker 1: Ohio State Indiana game coming up all week long at
29:22
Speaker 1: bucke huddle dot com and YouTube dot com slash bucket Huddle.
29:25
Speaker 2: We'll also'll be back a little later on the.
29:26
Speaker 1: Week to talk about the Ohio State defense and what
29:29
Speaker 1: they did against Michigan and what that might mean against
29:31
Speaker 1: the Indiana offense, which is also pretty good. We'll have
29:34
Speaker 1: that and we'll have much more coverage coming up all
29:36
Speaker 1: week long at bucke huddle dot com and YouTube dot
29:38
Speaker 1: com slash bucket Huddle. Once again, I want to thank
29:41
Speaker 1: our sponsors Jeff Rubies of Columbus, the award winning Upscale
29:43
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29:51
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29:53
Speaker 1: Thank you guys all for joining us.
29:55
Speaker 2: Have a great day.
29:55
Speaker 1: We'll talk to you tomorrow, assass