Latest / Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning / USC 30, Ohio State 18: 4 Things We Learned From The Buckeyes' Loss
Transcript
- 0:00Speaker 1: Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning for Sunday, November 1st. I'm
- 0:03Speaker 1: your host, Tom Orr. The Oregon game in six days.
- 0:05Speaker 1: The game against Michigan in 27 days. Today's episode presented
- 0:08Speaker 1: by our friends at Jeff Rubis at Columbus. Proudly offering
- 0:10Speaker 1: nationally acclaimed USDA prime steaks, seafood and sushi, impeccable service,
- 0:13Speaker 1: live entertainment, and an attention to detail that is simply unmatched.
- 0:17Speaker 1: Just go to jeffrubi.com slash Columbus to check out the
- 0:19Speaker 1: menu and make a reservation today. All right, I'm joined
- 0:22Speaker 1: by Chuck Mileti. Inside, it looks like we're in like
- 0:24Speaker 1: a clean room at like an Intel plant or something,
- 0:27Speaker 1: but we are inside the interview tent.
- 0:29Speaker 2: Outside the Coliseum, there's trucks driving by. There's banging.
- 0:34Speaker 1: There's all sorts of crazy stuff. So we apologize for
- 0:36Speaker 1: whatever background noise there is. We also apologize for USC 30,
- 0:41Speaker 1: Ohio State 18. Jock, that was just a bizarre game.
- 0:46Speaker 1: If I had told you beforehand, Ohio State's going to
- 0:48Speaker 1: outrush USA by like 100 yards, have 200 yards rushing.
- 0:52Speaker 1: Luke Fahey's going to throw for 260 yards. No turnovers
- 0:55Speaker 1: for the first-time starter. True freshman quarterback. You would have said,
- 0:59Speaker 1: at least I would have said, Ohio State by like
- 1:03Speaker 1: double digits. And yet, nope.
- 1:06Speaker 3: Ohio State 25 first downs to USC's 15. How about this?
- 1:10Speaker 3: Ohio State 81 total plays to USC's 50 plays.
- 1:15Speaker 1: Nuts.
- 1:16Speaker 2: Yeah. Like the stats, just reading them, you're like, no
- 1:19Speaker 2: way Ohio State lost that game.
- 1:20Speaker 3: They did.
- 1:20Speaker 1: Well, and I am a big, I like drive the
- 1:23Speaker 1: bus of time of possession is not a stat that
- 1:25Speaker 1: matters at all. Ohio State time possession, 39-28, USC 20-32.
- 1:30Speaker 1: They basically did what Navy did to Notre Dame in
- 1:34Speaker 1: the first half of the game on Saturday. You just
- 1:37Speaker 1: looked at everything, and it's like, oh, if you told
- 1:40Speaker 1: me that Ohio State did this, I'd say, yeah, for sure, 100%.
- 1:43Speaker 1: And then they don't just not win. They are behind
- 1:47Speaker 1: by multiple scores for a good chunk of the game.
- 1:50Speaker 2: It was just bizarre.
- 1:51Speaker 3: First time losing by 12 points since 1922. So, yeah,
- 1:57Speaker 3: it was a pretty handy loss despite those stats looking
- 2:01Speaker 3: like Ohio State would win if you were just looking
- 2:03Speaker 3: at the stats. And, you know, you got a first-time
- 2:07Speaker 3: quarterback playing his first game out here in a really
- 2:10Speaker 3: rough spot. USC on the other side, a team that
- 2:13Speaker 3: everybody kind of counted out all week. And I thought,
- 2:16Speaker 3: you know, it's kind of a young, talented team, which
- 2:18Speaker 3: means– It's a front-running team. When things are going good,
- 2:21Speaker 3: they'll go real good. When things are going bad, they'll
- 2:23Speaker 3: go real bad, and that's what we saw against Wisconsin.
- 2:26Speaker 1: Yeah, and I put that in our staff picks. I
- 2:29Speaker 1: basically said there's a scenario where Ohio State starts out well,
- 2:32Speaker 1: get out to a 7- or 10-point lead in the
- 2:34Speaker 1: first quarter, and they can just run away with it
- 2:36Speaker 1: because USC folds the tents and quits.
- 2:38Speaker 2: And then there's a scenario where.
- 2:41Speaker 1: I figured Luke Fahey makes a mistake early, and USC
- 2:43Speaker 1: gets out in front, and then Ohio State's sort of
- 2:45Speaker 1: chasing all game. And if you're playing from behind …
- 2:48Speaker 1: you're you're potentially having trouble that's kind of how it
- 2:52Speaker 1: played out although they were able to run the ball
- 2:54Speaker 1: they were able to be balanced throughout the game it
- 2:56Speaker 1: was just it just they just played from behind all
- 2:59Speaker 1: game and my assumption was if they lose this game
- 3:04Speaker 1: it's going to be well it's a true freshman and
- 3:05Speaker 1: his first start on the road what are you going
- 3:07Speaker 1: to do like these things happen luke fahey was not
- 3:11Speaker 1: even a little bit i don't think of why you
- 3:14Speaker 1: know i wouldn't put him in the top eight to
- 3:16Speaker 1: 10 of why they reasons they lost this game.
- 3:19Speaker 3: I thought Fahey was like, his performance was a winnable performance.
- 3:24Speaker 3: That's not a performance that I come out thinking. And
- 3:27Speaker 3: I saw a couple of comments in the post game
- 3:29Speaker 3: thinking you got to make the quarterback change.
- 3:30Speaker 2: And I'm like, that's not how I felt at all.
- 3:33Speaker 1: Yeah.
- 3:33Speaker 3: There were missed balls and balls that I think we
- 3:35Speaker 3: all know Sam would have made the touchdown potentially to
- 3:38Speaker 3: Devin McEwing. You know, that, that was one saying makes
- 3:42Speaker 3: he didn't make it. And, and there were certainly some overthrows, uh,
- 3:46Speaker 3: throughout the game. But I thought more than anything, when
- 3:48Speaker 3: you looked at the second half with Fahey, it was
- 3:52Speaker 3: him finding a rhythm and Art Smith helping him find
- 3:56Speaker 3: a rhythm with some of the little dump-offs to the
- 3:58Speaker 3: running backs and things that I thought, if you'd have
- 4:00Speaker 3: seen that maybe earlier on in the game, that things
- 4:03Speaker 3: might have gone even much better for him. But all
- 4:05Speaker 3: in all, over 50% completion percentage, and I think he
- 4:10Speaker 3: wasn't really helped out a ton by his receivers in
- 4:14Speaker 3: a game where You kind of just needed a couple
- 4:16Speaker 3: more guys to step up, and you didn't get that
- 4:19Speaker 3: from a few of the areas on the team where
- 4:21Speaker 3: you needed to with a freshman quarterback. But all circumstances
- 4:25Speaker 3: rolled in, I don't consider him a losing performer. That
- 4:29Speaker 3: didn't feel like a losing performance to me.
- 4:31Speaker 2: No, I definitely don't think so.
- 4:34Speaker 1: If the defense plays better, if you take away the
- 4:36Speaker 1: two big plays, and I know if you take away yada, yada,
- 4:39Speaker 1: yada is like the easiest, laziest crutch, but if you
- 4:42Speaker 1: take out the two long passes that Jaden Maiava had,
- 4:45Speaker 1: He was 13 for 21 for 83 yards. Entire night.
- 4:51Speaker 2: Entire night.
- 4:53Speaker 1: And Ohio State outrushed USC by almost 100 yards. But
- 4:58Speaker 1: where they didn't, they put up a lot of yards.
- 5:02Speaker 1: And then they bogged down in the red zone. And
- 5:04Speaker 1: they kicked four field goals.
- 5:05Speaker 2: And man.
- 5:07Speaker 1: you know, you cannot kick field goals. You know, you
- 5:10Speaker 1: can get kick one, maybe two when you're lining up
- 5:13Speaker 1: for the third field goal and the defense has not
- 5:16Speaker 1: been completely lights out. That's when you kind of go
- 5:19Speaker 1: like the alarm bell should be going off.
- 5:21Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 5:21Speaker 3: You're getting in, you're getting in the trouble zone. And
- 5:23Speaker 3: the one in particular where you've got it, uh, where
- 5:26Speaker 3: the Fahey touchdown gets called off the board, right? So
- 5:30Speaker 3: they pull those points off the board. You're at first
- 5:32Speaker 3: and goal. And you rush the ball once in the
- 5:36Speaker 3: second play, you get.
- 5:37Speaker 2: The false start. You rush the ball from shotgun. Yeah,
- 5:39Speaker 2: from shotgun. And then false start and now, you know,
- 5:44Speaker 2: drive killer.
- 5:44Speaker 1: It's over.
- 5:44Speaker 2: You're kicking a field goal.
- 5:45Speaker 3: And it's just like, man, that was a blown opportunity
- 5:49Speaker 3: that felt very, very self-inflicted. And that one right there
- 5:53Speaker 3: very well, you know, changes the whole scenario of the game.
- 5:57Speaker 3: That was a real bummer to watch.
- 5:59Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 6:00Speaker 1: Yeah, that was one where they get the ball down there.
- 6:03Speaker 1: It was right before halftime, and you thought, well, boy,
- 6:06Speaker 1: you punch one in here. You're getting the ball after halftime.
- 6:09Speaker 1: They would have been down a field goal or something
- 6:12Speaker 1: like that at that point. You get the ball after halftime.
- 6:14Speaker 1: It's like, boy, you can really take control of this
- 6:16Speaker 1: game at that point. And then they don't punch it in.
- 6:19Speaker 1: They get the ball after halftime. They run the ball
- 6:21Speaker 1: three times and then punt it. And it was just
- 6:23Speaker 1: like you had– Ryan Day is so big on the
- 6:26Speaker 1: middle eight, and they had a chance to put up. 10,
- 6:29Speaker 1: 14 points in the middle eight and they get three.
- 6:32Speaker 2: And it's like, Hmm, that's that. Yeah.
- 6:34Speaker 1: I know there's lots of debate about how important the
- 6:36Speaker 1: middle eight is, but it's important to Ryan day.
- 6:38Speaker 2: And they, they did not make the most of it.
- 6:40Speaker 3: I think another play where you, where you really saw
- 6:42Speaker 3: the game totally swing is if we're a little, doesn't
- 6:46Speaker 3: try to punch the ball out of Mark Bowman's hands.
- 6:49Speaker 3: Like the game is on the line and you got
- 6:51Speaker 3: to force a turnover. And instead he just gets into
- 6:53Speaker 3: the ground. I think that the defense was playing good
- 6:55Speaker 3: enough at that point that they likely hold USC to
- 6:58Speaker 3: three there. Instead, Bowman gets the ball down to the
- 7:00Speaker 3: one-yard line, and they punch in an easy one. And
- 7:02Speaker 3: that one right there kind of felt like self-inflicted wound
- 7:06Speaker 3: right there. Dominic Kelly misses the tackle. Earl goes for
- 7:09Speaker 3: the punch, misses the tackle. And this is after he
- 7:12Speaker 3: hurdled Jalen McClain. And on he goes. But, hey, hell
- 7:15Speaker 3: of a player. That was a great play.
- 7:17Speaker 1: Yeah. Well, and he was one of those guys we
- 7:19Speaker 1: talked about this week. He had been out the last
- 7:21Speaker 1: couple weeks. And why did it look so different for
- 7:24Speaker 1: USC at the Coliseum as opposed to at Camp Randall
- 7:28Speaker 1: a week ago? Part of it is you're playing on
- 7:30Speaker 1: the road versus playing at home, but part of it
- 7:31Speaker 1: is you got him back, and boy, take that 70
- 7:34Speaker 1: yards away, and boy, it's a very different looking game.
- 7:36Speaker 2: It's a very different looking score.
- 7:38Speaker 1: We got to talk about the defense a little bit,
- 7:40Speaker 1: because we talked about Fahey not being too bad.
- 7:41Speaker 2: We talked about the struggles in the red zone.
- 7:44Speaker 1: The defense, it felt like for long stretches of the
- 7:48Speaker 1: game was okay, but then it didn't look like it
- 7:52Speaker 1: has looked for most of the season. It was not
- 7:57Speaker 1: as good as it has been, and I don't want
- 8:00Speaker 1: to put this all on Jay Timmons was out, but man,
- 8:04Speaker 1: when you give up a play, a long play, a
- 8:06Speaker 1: long pass play on the second play of the game
- 8:08Speaker 1: for a touchdown, 69 yard touchdown on the second play
- 8:10Speaker 1: of the game to a guy that is like, maybe
- 8:13Speaker 1: the guy Jay Timmons is covering. It's hard to not
- 8:15Speaker 1: look at that and go, boy, they really missed Jay Timmons.
- 8:18Speaker 2: No doubt. They certainly missed Jay Timmons. Not an excuse.
- 8:22Speaker 3: You definitely should have some answers. It's pretty clear at
- 8:26Speaker 3: this point that they just don't.
- 8:28Speaker 2: They don't.
- 8:29Speaker 3: Anything from Jay Timmons to the next guy in whatever
- 8:32Speaker 3: form or fashion they try to work around. They've tried
- 8:35Speaker 3: many things. No Jay Timmons, big drop off and no
- 8:40Speaker 3: excuse to not try to. And we talked about Wisconsin
- 8:43Speaker 3: laid the plan, 17.
- 8:45Speaker 2: Pressures on Mayaba.
- 8:46Speaker 3: I didn't see a serious effort to try and generate
- 8:49Speaker 3: a whole lot of pressure. I don't know what the
- 8:50Speaker 3: final numbers are, but the guys weren't getting it done
- 8:54Speaker 3: one to one. Uh, and, and one-on-one matchups. So you
- 8:57Speaker 3: needed to bring some extra help and that just wasn't happening.
- 9:00Speaker 3: And that felt like, you know, looking back here at
- 9:03Speaker 3: the end of the game, well, you could have potentially
- 9:05Speaker 3: tried some, you know, it gone, it gotten a little
- 9:07Speaker 3: more risky to.
- 9:08Speaker 2: Try and get some more pressure on him, and it
- 9:10Speaker 2: just never came.
- 9:12Speaker 1: I wondered, because I had that thought during the game,
- 9:14Speaker 1: and I thought, I wonder if that second play kind
- 9:17Speaker 1: of spooked the defensive coaching staff a little bit, where, boy,
- 9:21Speaker 1: if you had another safety back there, maybe it doesn't
- 9:23Speaker 1: go for a long touchdown, because he, I think Matt Patricia,
- 9:28Speaker 1: by nature, is a little more conservative, and he had
- 9:31Speaker 1: sort of gotten away from that, but then you get
- 9:32Speaker 1: burned on it right away, and I think it might,
- 9:35Speaker 1: you know, I don't want to psychoanalyze him or anything
- 9:38Speaker 1: like that, but It just feels like it would sort
- 9:40Speaker 1: of be a natural response to go, OK, well, that
- 9:42Speaker 1: didn't work. We're not going to do that again. But,
- 9:44Speaker 1: you know, I obviously could have played out a little
- 9:47Speaker 1: better otherwise.
- 9:48Speaker 2: So now management at the end of the game.
- 9:50Speaker 1: OK, all right. Well, I was going to I was
- 9:52Speaker 1: going to say we normally do this as three things.
- 9:55Speaker 2: But you know what?
- 9:56Speaker 1: We'll make an exception. It'll be four things. joe what'd
- 9:59Speaker 1: you think of the time management at the end of
- 10:00Speaker 1: the game you.
- 10:00Speaker 3: Know ryan day talked about it in the press conference
- 10:03Speaker 3: and he basically said that he felt i mean it
- 10:06Speaker 3: worked they got a touchdown out of the drive and
- 10:08Speaker 3: i'm just like you know yeah i suppose it did
- 10:13Speaker 3: but then you only allow yourself defensively to give up
- 10:16Speaker 3: one first down assuming that they got the two-point conversion
- 10:18Speaker 3: or kick the extra point You only allow your defense
- 10:21Speaker 3: to give up one first down and you're cooked. Why
- 10:23Speaker 3: are you not playing with some urgency in that situation?
- 10:26Speaker 3: I don't get it at all. I think that, you know,
- 10:30Speaker 3: if you're going to say, well, it's a young guy
- 10:32Speaker 3: in that situation, like, well, you know, there are also
- 10:35Speaker 3: benefits to trying to play with some urgency there, too.
- 10:37Speaker 3: But they're subbing guys in and they're allowing the defense
- 10:40Speaker 3: to sub. The whole thing looked like a discombobulated mess.
- 10:43Speaker 3: And I think we saw that from Day was freaking
- 10:45Speaker 3: out on the sideline doing gyrations at one point when
- 10:49Speaker 3: I was looking at him. but yeah, man, that felt
- 10:52Speaker 3: like a real mess at the end there.
- 10:54Speaker 1: Yeah, it was, that wasn't great. I had my, my
- 10:58Speaker 1: bigger issue was with the sequence at the goal line
- 11:01Speaker 1: right before halftime where they're first and goal at the
- 11:03Speaker 1: one and you get in shotgun and then it's second
- 11:06Speaker 1: and goal and you take Jeremiah Smith off the field
- 11:08Speaker 1: for your third tight end.
- 11:10Speaker 2: Like I didn't notice that. Oh yeah.
- 11:13Speaker 1: He, there was at least one play where Jeremiah Smith
- 11:14Speaker 1: was off the field and you know, I, we said,
- 11:17Speaker 1: I said this on the post game show, but, if
- 11:19Speaker 1: you're going to do something that the opposing coaching staff,
- 11:22Speaker 1: if they got to choose what you were going to do, yes.
- 11:25Speaker 2: Yeah.
- 11:26Speaker 1: They're over there fist pumping at the fact that you,
- 11:28Speaker 1: you know, you've got the ball six inches from the
- 11:29Speaker 1: goal line and you're going to take the willingly take
- 11:31Speaker 1: the snap at the four. Like, yeah, they're going to
- 11:33Speaker 1: be happy about that. You're going to take the best
- 11:35Speaker 1: player in college football off the field and put the
- 11:37Speaker 1: 743rd best player and on in his place. Like, yeah,
- 11:40Speaker 1: they're gonna be happy about that. Like, so what's the
- 11:43Speaker 1: exact benefit? Like, don't talk about, well, it didn't work. So,
- 11:46Speaker 1: you know, like, What's the thinking there? Because it feels
- 11:49Speaker 1: like the thinking is, you know, I don't want to,
- 11:52Speaker 1: this is probably overly simplistic, but if the coaches on
- 11:55Speaker 1: the other side are really happy about what you're doing,
- 11:57Speaker 1: like you're probably not doing the thing you should do.
- 12:00Speaker 1: But maybe that's me oversimplifying things.
- 12:03Speaker 3: I don't think it is, Tom. I think it's pretty
- 12:05Speaker 3: easy at this point. After the Indiana game, when we
- 12:08Speaker 3: just saw that for three straight plays, Jeremiah freaking out,
- 12:11Speaker 3: he comes back on. touchdown very easily doesn't go to
- 12:14Speaker 3: him doesn't need to he's just that good he draws
- 12:17Speaker 3: that much attention I don't know.
- 12:18Speaker 1: Yeah so now four games left in the regular season
- 12:23Speaker 1: and I look at this at Oregon Northwestern at Nebraska
- 12:28Speaker 1: and Michigan and I look at those four games and
- 12:30Speaker 1: I think I think Ohio State could win any of
- 12:32Speaker 1: those four games I look at those four games and
- 12:35Speaker 1: I think Ohio State could lose any of those four
- 12:37Speaker 1: games now I don't think they're going to play the
- 12:40Speaker 1: way they played against usc i think that this there
- 12:43Speaker 1: there will probably have several games where they look substantially
- 12:46Speaker 1: better and everyone goes how does this the same team
- 12:48Speaker 1: that played at usc i think you're probably going to
- 12:50Speaker 1: have i don't know if they're going to go for
- 12:52Speaker 1: no and they may they probably need to go for
- 12:54Speaker 1: no at this point to make the college football playoff
- 12:57Speaker 1: but you're also at the point where everything is in
- 12:59Speaker 1: front of you they control their own destiny for the
- 13:01Speaker 1: big 10 championship game still They control their own destiny for,
- 13:05Speaker 1: you know, you can control your own destiny to beat Michigan.
- 13:07Speaker 1: You control your own destiny to make and win the
- 13:10Speaker 1: big 10 championship. And you control your own destiny to
- 13:12Speaker 1: make the college football playoff, which means you control your
- 13:14Speaker 1: own destiny to win the national championship. So they still can,
- 13:17Speaker 1: everything is still in front of them, but they got
- 13:20Speaker 1: to win the next four games.
- 13:22Speaker 2: They do.
- 13:23Speaker 3: They will likely be favored in all four. But when
- 13:26Speaker 3: we talked about this one, you know, like, beginning of
- 13:29Speaker 3: the year like that's a tough looking spot yeah spot
- 13:32Speaker 3: was tough i think everybody forgot about that based on
- 13:36Speaker 3: usc's game at wisconsin yep that didn't change that this
- 13:40Speaker 3: was a really uh tough environment yeah there was a
- 13:43Speaker 3: lot of buckeye fans it was allowed in here there's
- 13:46Speaker 3: no doubt like they're the usc fans uh once usc
- 13:49Speaker 3: got rolling early it became a really difficult spot it
- 13:52Speaker 3: was a tough spot on the schedule it was tough
- 13:54Speaker 3: travel everything all still applied and And now when we
- 13:58Speaker 3: look at that Nebraska game, that looks like another really
- 14:00Speaker 3: tough spot.
- 14:02Speaker 2: So right there is the one I'm looking at thinking, OK,
- 14:05Speaker 2: it's going to be tough.
- 14:06Speaker 3: Yeah, it's going to be tough to do. If they
- 14:08Speaker 3: do it, they will have earned it. If they don't
- 14:10Speaker 3: do it, they will have earned the worst season of
- 14:13Speaker 3: the Ryan Day era.
- 14:14Speaker 1: Yeah. Yep. So.
- 14:15Speaker 2: All right.
- 14:15Speaker 1: So we will have. Boy, will there be a lot
- 14:17Speaker 1: to talk about this week at Buckeye Insiders dot com.
- 14:20Speaker 1: Oregon Ducks coming to town. You want to know what
- 14:24Speaker 1: another team with a little bit of a disappointing season
- 14:26Speaker 1: looks like. Oregon Ducks probably would love to trade places
- 14:29Speaker 1: with Ohio State and still have all of their goals
- 14:31Speaker 1: in front of them. So we will be talking about
- 14:33Speaker 1: all that with you at BuckeyeInsiders.com. Got our member appreciation
- 14:38Speaker 1: month kicking off in November. Got a tailgate outside Ohio Stadium.
- 14:42Speaker 1: We've got pregame field access for the Northwestern game or
- 14:45Speaker 1: the Michigan game. We've got a live event in Lincoln
- 14:48Speaker 1: for the Nebraska game. That is all coming up. All
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- 15:02Speaker 1: all at BuckeyeInsiders.com. That'll do it for today. Thank you
- 15:05Speaker 1: guys all for joining us.
- 15:05Speaker 2: Have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.