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What We Learned From Ohio State's Lockdown Defensive Performance Vs. Penn State · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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Welcome to Buck Eyes tomorrow morning for Sunday, October twenty second. I'm your
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host, Tom Moore. The Wisconsin game is in six days, the game
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against Michigan in thirty four days. Buck guys will be headed up to Madison
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with an unbeaten record. Joined by Kevin Nouon of bucke Huddle dot Com.
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Kevin, the Buckeyes. We came into the season thinking, boy, that
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road gaming against Notre Dame is going to be a real test, and they
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escaped it by by that much. But they escaped it. They they got
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out with a win, and we thought, okay, well, now,
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boy, that Penn State game is going to be a real test. This
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one was. It wasn't beautiful, it wasn't it wasn't a work of art,
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but man, it was also not a game where you felt like they
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were in any real serious danger in the second half. Believe a former coach
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here used the term rockfight, and it was very much a rock fight,
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and not even nice smooth rocks. These were really jagged and not aerodynamic and
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just very clumsy, and I think they were cropped a couple of times.
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But yeah, Ohio State certainly had its moments on offense of where it didn't
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look like it was ever going to get anything going, but Ohio State's defense
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kept Penn State very much in check, and Penn State, you know,
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put up a late touchdown that really is inconsequential for anything other than those compulsive
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gamblers out there, and I don't even know necessarily what they were going to
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gain out of it, but a big win for Ohio State. And now
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we will sit there and talk about all the pitfalls that are in all the
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rest of the games, because we certainly have not seen a finished product from
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the offense. But damn that defense is looking good. Yeah this was I
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mean, you mentioned a former Ohio State coach, and boy, this was
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a Jim Tressel era performance from this team. Now people will hear that and
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think that that's a negative. Ohio State won a whole heck of a lot
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of football games when Jim Tressel was a coach at Ohio State and his best
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season, they won a lot of games that looked a lot like this,
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where you know, Ohio State wins twenty to twelve, but it was not
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twenty to twelve. It was ten to six at the end of the third
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quarter, and then the Buckeyes put you know, put up ten points,
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kind of pull away twenty to six, and then Penn State goes on a
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kind of last minute to drive off of against the prevent defense. So really,
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when the game was in any serious doubt, it was twenty to six
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Ohio State, and boy, oh boy. For the defense to play like
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that against a Penn State offense, that's not great. They don't have when
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we've talked to death about the fact they were not a big play offfense by
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any means, but they were efiicient And for Ohio State to do that without
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Denzel Burke out there their breast corner, I mean, they dominated that game.
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I could not be more impressed with how that defense played. Penn State
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at the end of the game was held to forty nine yards rushing. But
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he looked early in the game Penn State had some success running the ball,
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drew allar looked all out of sorts. Ohio State really was able to lock
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down Penn State. There wasn't a Johan dah John Dotson on this team.
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KeAndre Lambert Smith got dinged up in the game. I don't really remember if
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he came back because somebody's not in saying yes, but the offense for Penn
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State, the pass offense was so bad that it really didn't matter. We'd
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never really focused on anybody. I think the only person I ever focused in
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on was Tyler Warren, the tight end who wears a fullback type of number
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at forty four. So Ohio State really was able to kind of impose its
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will there. I'm still going to question, probably for a while why earlier
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in the game Penn State did not ride the running game a little bit more.
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But that had kind of been something that we'd seen all season. For
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having backs like Singleton and Allen, they weren't getting those big types of games.
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And I think we can sit there and try and draw some parallels to
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maybe what Penn State did against Iowa, another great defensive team, among the
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nation's best, but to the ways that those games played out ended up being
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very different. Yeah, And I mean Nick Singleton had back to back rushes
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of twenty yards and sixteen yards and then Penn State immediately went back to the
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pass. Drella gets sacked, Dreller thirst an incomplete pass. Nick Singleton runs
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for six yards on the third and thirteen and they kick a field goal.
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That's three rushes for forty two yards right there. For Nick Singleton. The
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rest of the game for Penn State, they had twenty three rushes for seven
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yards. That I mean that you got to ride your hot hand there.
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But boy, I mean for Ohio team to lock down a this is a
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decent Penn State team. This is not I mean this is it's a good
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Penn State team, but this is a Penn State team that has a good
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offensive line. This is a Penn State team that has talented running backs.
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That was That was a defensive performance you have not seen from Ohio State in
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quite a while. I went into the game saying that Ohio State was the
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better team, Penn State have better line play. Well, for everything that
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I said about Penn State's offensive line, Ohio State's defense just did a great
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job of getting up in their business and really imposing its will. And while
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the sacks were not now this wasn't a six sack type of game for Ohio
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State, but they really had Drew Alar with the Yips for much of the
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game. He was having to duck and dive and dodge throughout everything, and
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it just really kind of seemed like there was just a point even in the
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first half, where it's like he doesn't got it today, he doesn't have
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it and it's just not going to happen. And then at that point you
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just have to kind of insulate yourself from the dumb place. And I think
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that, you know, we can kind of talk about how the first half
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ended. Ohio State gets the ball with forty some seconds left and they just
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just take a knee. That's the only way Penn State's been able to beat
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Ohio State as of late. Or a couple of crazy plays. I mean,
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obviously the blocked field goal in Happy Valley, and then I think if
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you go back to one of the other previous wins by Penn State, it
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was when Terrell Pryor was going around the end, only needed to pick up
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a yard and the ball got punched out. But if he would have been
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able to make that one guy missed, he's still running at this point,
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you know, all of these years later, he's still running. That was,
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Yeah, it was two thousand and eight, and I think they lost
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that game ten six or something like that, thirteen six something along those lines.
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You know. I mean, the Oho Sate defense definitely did throw a
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wrench into Penn State's offensive game plan. If you can't run, you can't
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throw, You run out of options pretty quickly. Ohio State they stuck with
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the run. To their credit, they stuck with a run. Forty one
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carries for Ohio State seventy nine yards one point nine yards per carry, and
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yeah, there's a couple sacks on there, but not enough. Mayan Williams
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twenty four carries, sixty two yards, Chip train him nine carries twenty two
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yards. Devin Brown two carries five yards and then sprained his ankle. Xavier
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Johnson two carries four yards. Just not They couldn't get it done on the
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I couldn't get it going on the ground, but the pass pro was decent.
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This felt like it was not a incredible effort by the offensive line by
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any means. But when you go back to what this team looked like against
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Indiana, you can see clear signs of progress on that line. I mean,
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on one pole, you have fantastic game. On another pole, you
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have absolute liability. They've moved out of that absolute liability range. They have
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not gotten to that great game poll at this point, but I think that
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they are making progress. There were a couple of offensive line penalties, one
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of them on Josh Simmons questionable. Not here to debate it. It doesn't
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really matter at this point whether or not the Big Ten office sims Ryan Day
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an apology on that one. I think there are probably some other plays that
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will be talked about a little bit more, but I think that the line
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play is getting better in terms certainly of pass pro early in the game,
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not that Ohio State necessarily had a lot of big runs, but it did
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seem like they were getting a push and then maybe there's a little bit of
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a reversion back to what we've seen before. But I think also at that
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point Penn State really kind of had to sell out against the run and was
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like, we're not going to let that happen. A lot of first down
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runs that were getting blown up in the backfield, things that you don't want
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to see, but it is what it is. Yeah, Well, and
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this felt also like a game where Ohio State's sort of you got the sense
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of the Ohio State coaching staff was looking at it and saying, I don't
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think Penn State's going to score twenty points today, so you don't need more
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than twenty points today. And when it was ten to six. They were
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kind of managing the game to you know, it wasn't like they were desperate
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to build on the lead. Was it was a much more conservative game plan
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than we've seen. And part of that is probably faith in the defense.
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Part of that is Kyle McCord was good, but not great, and it
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felt a little bit like just don't make the big mistake was kind of part
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of the game plan in the second half. But he finishes twenty two to
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thirty five, t hun eighty six yards, a touchdown, sixty three percent
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completion. He was he was, I mean for a higher state to do.
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You know, the running game without Trey Van Henderson, he missed the
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whole game, the passing game without Amcca Abuka, the defense without Denzelberg.
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You're missing three of your big name players on both sides of the ball,
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and you still win pretty comfortably. I mean, for Kyle McCord, how
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would you grade Kyle McCord's performance in that game. Oh, that's a good
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question, because I'd work my way up to just something and I want to
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get this one out first. To give Tony a shout out. In the
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third quarter, I said, I don't think ten points is going to be
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enough to win this game, and he said, well, I think thirteen
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might and he was proven to be correct, as much as that pains me
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to say. But as from a Cord, I don't know, because he
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almost threw for three hundred yards and of course we know that getting all hung
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up on total yardage or anything like that is a fool's Errand he had some
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good, he had some bad. Blah blah bla uh blah blah blah blah,
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the facts of life. I don't know. I think be minus.
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I don't know. I don't know, and I don't know if I'm being
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an unfair greater one way or the other. But that's that's the first thing
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that comes to mind. Yeah, he was just it was in up and
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down performance where he started hot and then missed a bunch of throws in a
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row and then finished pretty well. And you know when you when you're looking
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at him compared to Duller. I came into this game thinking which quarterback is
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going to make the play or make the bad play? And I picked a
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housey to win based on the fact that I thought Kyle McCord is going to
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outplay Duller, and he did. I mean, Kyle McCord has an extra
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year in college, Kyle McCord is playing at home, Kyle McCord has better
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receivers, so it all kind of makes sense that that would happen. But
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he did it. He did what he needed to do. But boy,
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having Marvin Harrison doesn't hurt. Sixteen targets from Marvin Harrison, which is a
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lot, but also maybe not enough. Eleven catches, one hundred and sixty
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two yards a touchdown, he had the kind of the game ceiling touchdown that
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made it twenty to six late, you run out of ways at some point
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to say, hey, Marvin Harrison good at football, especially when you don't
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have a mecha booka out there. So you're kind of having a little bit
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of a platoon situation between Zavra Johnson and Carnel Tait out there. And it's
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not taking anything away from either of those guys. Neither of them are a
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mecha booka at this point. So you have Marvin Harrison and you target him
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right about one out of every three pass attempt that you have there, And
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I think that's fair if he's available, if you don't want to force it
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in. And we're talking about a quarterback in Kyle McCord who's throwing one interception
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this season, so he's not somebody who is really trying to fit the ball
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into the tightest of windows. I don't have a problem with that. And
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actually, you know that's eleven receptions. He had sixteen sixteen targets, so
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I mean we're well above one out of three at that point. So no,
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I think you've got it. I think you've got to go to him
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until somebody takes him away. And that's why it's so important for Ohio State
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to have a Mecca Buka out there. And I think once Ohio State gets
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to the end of November, try and make sure you have that third target,
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whether or not it's Kate Stover who had a fantastic game or whatever,
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is going to go on there. Because we saw kind of what happened against
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Georgia last year, and once Ohio State lost Marvin Harrison and only had a
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Mecca Buca and everything else, it became a lot easier to just bracket somebody
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and say we'll take our chances elsewhere. Well. And one thing that I
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think gets lost a lot in that conversation with the Peach Bowl last year,
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is. Yeah, they lost Marvin Harrison, but do you remember who they
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lost in the first half of that game. I lost their tight end,
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Kate Stover. Well, they had Kate Stover on Saturday against Penn State,
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and Kate Stover only got thrown the ball four times, and he caught all
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four of those passes, including one that was I don't know how he caught
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it, went went up and took it away from the no no, no,
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no yes. Yeah, oh yeah that was That was a very much
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a no no, no, no yes pass by Coyle McCord. But Kate's
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do over. I mean last week against Perdue there was one where he caught
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a touchdown. It. The first time he caught he it was like behind
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him and it was like, oh no, that's a bad throat. No,
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he caught it. Turns out it was a good thrill. Four catches
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seventy yards long of thirty. He is just he's just been turned into such
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a reliable target for kylem accord. And it's not like a safety blanket where
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he's just a checkdown guy. He is he's getting open. This is how
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many times have we seen him where he catches it eight yards downfield and then
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turns it into a twenty five or thirty yard game. It feels like that
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happens once a week. At this point, he's a legitimate threat. He
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is not that checkdown. He is not that guy. It's like there's nothing
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there. I'm gonna take my four yards and try and stay ahead of the
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chains. At this point, he is a legitimate weapon in the offense.
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During the postgame show, obviously we talked a little bit about you're of the
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tight end, but Kate Stover is well on his way to putting in some
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records in the record book in terms of tight end production, especially here in
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this quote unquote modern era of college football, and Ohio State was doing all
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of this against what is pretty universally regarded as a good Penn State defense.
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This is, you know, Penn State's offense. I think we came into
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the week looking and going, you got some questions with the big plays,
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you got some you know, you're not hitting big plays in the ground,
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You're not hitting big plays in the air, so like, how exactly is
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this going to work? And the defensive side of the ball. I don't
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think there were really any questions. The defensive side of the ball was just
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consistently very good. This is I think they were number one in scoring defense
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in the nation, and you want to they haven't faced consistently great competition.
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But there's the other team. That's yeah, lots of lots of other teams
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have lots of other teams have not played great competition, and they're not number
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one of the nation. So to do this against that Penn State defense,
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you know, this is this is real tangible signs of progress. And well,
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I don't think that Ohio State is right now where they need to be.
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Oh let's hypothetically say two days after Thanksgiving, give or take. They
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certainly feel like they're on track to maybe get to where they need to be
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to at least, you know, at least have that be a four quarter
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very good competitive game and then you know, who knows, maybe more than
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that exactly. And I think that I think Ohio State certainly benefited from a
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couple of things. I think that Ohio State benefited from Penn State losing Chop
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Robinson in the game. Even though I feel that the other end, Desa
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I think is his last name, I thought, Lisa Isaac, Yeah,
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that's it. Yeah, I felt that he had maybe a little bit more
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production. I felt that Ohio State really had an opportunity against the Penn State
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Secondary, which I didn't feel it had been really tested that much this year.
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To Penn State's credit, I felt that they were able to limit some
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of the big plays. But then you still look and see that that comic
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cord through for two eighty six, but he only had the one touchdown pass.
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Ohio State kind of still once again bogged down in the red zone.
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But seeing things get put together, and for Ohio State to be able to
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do that against Notre Dame, to be able to do that against Penn State,
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I think all of that is important. And of course people are going
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to quickly turn their attention to Wisconsin and the whole Luke Fickle's got all their
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secrets. Well, Luke Fickele hasn't been around for a couple of years.
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Luke Fickele has not been around for the current incarnation of how a lot of
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things are working at this point. So I think Ohio State's defense really I
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go back to a point that I made upon the hiring of Gyminals. It
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took Gymnals three years to turn around Oklahoma State. I told people do not
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throw the baby out, baby out with the bathwater. After year one,
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this is going to be at least a two year process, probably three years.
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And here we are at a little bit more than one and a half
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years, and this defense is really rounded into one of the nation's best.
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And of course people are going to say, yeah, but how would they
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how would this go against Georgia. Well, Georgia's without brock Bowers right now
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now for quite some time. How would this go against Alabama? I don't
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know. Alabama's really kind of dragged its feet against Tennessee early in that game.
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I do know that around the time that we're recording this, Alabama taking
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the lead. But you know, I think that I think that this defense
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is showing that it has uh, you know, certainly has the chops to
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be able to hang with the best in the nation. Oh boy, Alabama
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sure did take the lead. Holy smokes, that is quite a second half
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the Tide rolling. But you know, the Tide also has a loss,
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and the Tide also will even if they keep rolling, have to play Georgia
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in the SEC Championship game. So in the Buckeyes, they they are rolling
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to undefeated, seven to zero. Now headed into Madison, and you know,
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now you're at the point of the year where now you can kind of
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remember the schedule without having to really even think about it. Madison, Rutgers
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and Michigan State and Minnesota and then you know who to wrap up the regular
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season. Like you like the fact you were kind of moving your eyes,
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like you were thinking, who's you know who? I knew who who?
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We should have been throwing faces at the camera and not at tom or you
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know who? Well, you know who is in thirty four days? Oh,
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I mean, you know they It was one of those things that I
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didn't want them to steal my clients. They've stolen everything else. So you
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know who is in thirty four days? Wisconsin in six days. We will
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be there for both of those. We'll be there for what should be a
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very eventful week for Ohio State football as they now have Penn State in the
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rearview mirror. Also a very very big recruiting week for the buck Eyes.
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A lot of visitors in the Horseshoe on Saturday to see that win over Penn
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State should be you know, you probably got a couple of guys on Potential
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Commitment Watch had a five star Alabama wide receiver Jamie French in the stadium to
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watch that game and watch Marvin Harrison just absolutely blow up like Vesuvius. That
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probably can't hurt. And there should be plenty of stuff to talk about on
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the recruiting front, plenty of stuff to talk about on the x's and o's
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front with Ross Fulton little later around in the week, many stuff to talk
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about on the team front. Is the buck Eyes a proof to seven and
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zero with a twenty to twelve win over Penn State. That will do it
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for today. Thank you guys all for joining us. Have a great day.
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We'll talk to you tomorrow.