Latest / Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning / Will The Cotton Bowl Loss Impact Ohio State's Plans For 2024?

Transcript

Will The Cotton Bowl Loss Impact Ohio State's Plans For 2024? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

• 0:00
  Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning from Monday, January first. I'm your host,
• 0:04
  Tom Moore. The Akron game is in two hundred and forty three days,
• 0:07
  the game against Michigan in three hundred and thirty four days. A very happy
• 0:11
  new year to you all. We're going to start the new year by taking
• 0:15
  a look back at the last Ohio State game of twenty twenty three, getting
• 0:19
  a little bit of a run through some of the postgame comments that I thought
• 0:22
  were sort of the most interesting that you may not have gotten here after that
• 0:26
  game if you perhaps turned your TV off in disgust near the end of that
• 0:29
  game. We understand there was some interesting stuff to come out of those postgame
• 0:33
  interviews that I'm gonna be letting you hear some of that stuff right now.
• 0:36
  We're going to start with Ohio Ted head coach Brian Day evaluating the play of
• 0:41
  Lincoln Keenholes, the true freshman who got thrown into the game on very little
• 0:46
  notice when Devin Brown hurt his ankle. I feel like link putting a tough
• 0:49
  spot there, to say the least, And yeah, I thought he battled
• 0:54
  his tail off, but clearly you know we didn't. We didn't help him
• 0:58
  up front, didn' run the back all well enough. And freshman quarterback out
• 1:03
  there, you know for the first time playing and you know, we're not
• 1:07
  running the ball well enough up front. So you know, it's hard to
• 1:11
  get much of an evaluation coming out of the game when when you can't get
• 1:14
  any balance, and so I just you know, I felt like we could
• 1:19
  have helped them in certain areas we didn't. Next up, Sometimes there are
• 1:23
  questions that get asked and then you don't really get the answer to the question
• 1:26
  that was asked, and it's like, huh, that's interesting. So here's
• 1:29
  the question. You did you played without Carson Hintsman that whole game? What
• 1:32
  what happened there? The starting center for the whole season then didn't play in
• 1:34
  the bowl game? Why was that? And then evaluate the play of the
• 1:38
  offensive line on the hole? So that was the question. Here's the answer.
• 1:42
  Well, I felt more more in the I mean, certainly there was
• 1:46
  some zero pressure that came and they you know, they were aggressive on on
• 1:49
  link. But but but in the run game, I just felt like,
• 1:53
  you know, there were a couple of things that hit, but but overall,
• 1:56
  you know, when you have a young kid in there. You got
• 1:57
  to be able to run the football and take some pressure off, and you
• 2:00
  know, we didn't do that well enough in order to win the game.
• 2:01
  I mean the defense played plenty good enough. I thought they played their tails
• 2:06
  off and you know, ran out of gas a little bit down the stretch.
• 2:07
  But you know, to give up fourteen points and was the three hundred
• 2:12
  and thirty one yards? Is that what it was? Yeah, I mean
• 2:14
  they played great and good enough to win defense. Did you know, we
• 2:17
  just could have put it together on offense and and so you know, that's
• 2:23
  the story of the game. The game plan was very obviously not to play
• 2:28
  Lincoln keen Holes in any sort of meaningful way. But then when Devin Brown
• 2:32
  suffered a high ankle sprain, well you kind of had to and you would
• 2:37
  if you had to play your true freshman quarterback who wasn't even for the spring,
• 2:39
  well you would certainly not choose him to take his first snaps back up
• 2:44
  on his own five yard line. But that's how it worked out. So
• 2:49
  what was that like for Ryan Day? When you're a freshman quarterback who comes
• 2:53
  in during the summer, you know you don't have the spring. Yeah,
• 2:55
  you really don't have much of a preseason and then you get thrown into it
• 3:00
  with you know, with the scouts a little bit here and there. But
• 3:02
  but you know, when Kyle was in there and and Devin was getting reps
• 3:05
  of the two's, Lincoln really didn't get many reps. So he did get
• 3:07
  some reps in bull practice, but that's not like playing in a game.
• 3:10
  And you know, I think his first few drives were inside the ten yard
• 3:15
  line. That that that's a that's a tough place to be. And what
• 3:16
  I didn't want to do is put him in a situation where he's gonna turn
• 3:19
  the ball over and and maybe see something that he's not used to seeing and
• 3:23
  then all of a sudden, now we're now we're really battling uphill. What
• 3:25
  I felt like we could do there is get into halftime, get it settled,
• 3:30
  uh, you know, and then and then try to get the ball
• 3:31
  towards midfield, which he did, defense got us to stop, got us
• 3:34
  at midfield, We stalled and then missed the field goal. I felt like
• 3:38
  that was our chance to maybe you know, jump on on top a little
• 3:42
  bit, and then you know, just couldn't quite get it going. But
• 3:46
  but I mean, I give Lincoln credit. I mean he got put in
• 3:46
  a tough spot and he battled out there and did make some good throws.
• 3:51
  But you know that was that was that was a tough ask right there,
• 3:53
  and and we need to help more. Obviously. That was a disappointing loss
• 3:57
  for Ohio State and its fans. What was Ryan Day's it's the team?
• 4:00
  After the game, I just told him that I thought a lot of guys
• 4:02
  played really hard in this game, and they nobody wanted to lose this game.
• 4:05
  I mean, you saw guys fighting here and there. We got tough
• 4:09
  putt in a tough spot, and we didn't respond well enough and you know,
• 4:12
  we didn't help help the young kid at all, and and that's why
• 4:15
  we lost the game. So it hurts to, you know, finish,
• 4:18
  finish the season like this. You know, we we two losses and that's
• 4:21
  not good enough at Ohio State. And we all know that after an eleven
• 4:26
  to zh start and the year on, two straight losses had to be pretty
• 4:30
  disappointing. So what is Ryan Day looking at to turn things around for twenty
• 4:33
  twenty four? Well, I mean, now it's you know, I mean
• 4:36
  this game was very different than the last game. It was a different situation
• 4:40
  all together. And yeah, I mean we we we wanted to finish this
• 4:44
  game and and build some momentum in the next year. It didn't happen,
• 4:47
  but yeah, you know, the first thing I mentioned in the in the
• 4:49
  room was, you know, the guys who were deciding whether they come back
• 4:51
  or not. Now they got a rally together, and you know, we
• 4:56
  got to put this this team together moving forward of you know, guys who
• 4:59
  are coming back back and you know, get finished some unfinished business that that's
• 5:02
  happened here. And I know there's some guys who feel that way. There
• 5:06
  were a lot of areas that didn't look great for Ohio State during that Cotton
• 5:10
  Bowl, but the special teams it turned into another three ring circus delay game,
• 5:14
  penalty, took some other penalties, fair caught a punt inside their own
• 5:17
  five missed a field goal. What's Ryan Day's takeaway there? Well, I
• 5:23
  thought overall early on the the whole punting operation other than you know, the
• 5:29
  delay game, but there was a funky look there and we always tell them,
• 5:31
  hey, if if you're not sure, don't snap the ball. And
• 5:35
  we ended up getting that one off. So you know that one there,
• 5:40
  you know it was was okay, but I felt like, you know,
• 5:44
  we were we were punting with good hangtime, and we were covering and we
• 5:46
  were flipping the field at times pretty well. So I thought that was well
• 5:49
  done. But but you're right, I mean, you know, we shouldn't
• 5:53
  catch the ball in the four yard line. Our heel should be in the
• 5:55
  eight. I think he felt like in that moment they were kind of right
• 5:58
  behind him and he was gonna they were gonna pinant inside the four. But
• 6:01
  still you have to stick to your rules in that situation. And then and
• 6:06
  then we missed the field goal, and that one, that one was big
• 6:08
  at the time. You know, it was a little momentum swing and they
• 6:11
  get the ball back on the thirty yard line. So there was some good
• 6:15
  things there, but not good enough. And of course, as you may
• 6:17
  have heard, after the game, Jesse Murco, who was really the bright
• 6:20
  spot on special teams for Ohio State, he entered the transfer portal. Missouri
• 6:25
  Penner entered the transfer portal as well. Both punters from the Cotton Bowl in
• 6:29
  the transfer portal twenty four hours after the game ended. That was it must
• 6:32
  have been tired from all those punts. Both punters phunted eight times during the
• 6:35
  game. So all right, that's enough special teams talk. Let's talk a
• 6:40
  little bit more about the quarterbacks. Stevin Brown obviously did not get a chance
• 6:43
  to really get going too much. He was injured pretty early in the game.
• 6:47
  And even before he was injured, he looked kind of shaky, did
• 6:50
  not look like the quarterback that we heard about all third Bowl practices. So
• 6:56
  what was the deal with there? Was that just some first start jitters?
• 6:59
  What was going on and brought I felt like he was going to have nerves
• 7:01
  early on. I felt We're gonna be able to play through it and figure
• 7:04
  out what that looked like. Going into the second half. He had a
• 7:09
  little bit of nerves, which you know, you could see him. You
• 7:10
  see the athleticism, you see him break the pocket almost you know, just
• 7:13
  missed the throat down the sideline. You know, he missed the screen early
• 7:16
  on. But I felt like, you know, he was going to kind
• 7:19
  of have to play through that a little bit. And this is his first
• 7:21
  start. So and then we lose him, and you know, we had
• 7:27
  a lot of things in the game plan design for his style of play,
• 7:30
  and we lost him. That was you know, it was a little bit
• 7:33
  of a scramble, and you know he came up short. Now, question
• 7:39
  for true freshman Lincoln Keyholes playing his first meaningful snaps in a game, and
• 7:44
  he did it on national TV in a New Year six Bowl game, that
• 7:48
  that had to probably have his head swimming a little bit. Did the game
• 7:51
  slow down for him at some point during the game? Oh, I mean
• 7:56
  it wasn't really that fast, honestly, because I go against the best defense
• 8:00
  every day in practice, So I mean it was pretty good. I think,
• 8:03
  uh of the Amazoo coaches just trying to speed me up, give me
• 8:07
  some zero looks, but I mean, uh, just other than that,
• 8:13
  I'm pretty sure like it was just like another game. And I mean I
• 8:18
  think like the big thing for me was that, I mean just gotta uh
• 8:24
  just slowed down and just focus on my mechanics and everything and just trust my
• 8:28
  eyes. Now back to Ryan Day, he was asked to evaluate the quarterback
• 8:33
  room on the whole for this season. I think it's hard to say,
• 8:37
  because you know, we're talking about, you know, a year's worth of
• 8:39
  play of Kyle. He's not here. I don't think it's fair to me
• 8:43
  to to go back and you know, go through all of that right now,
• 8:46
  and then this game is was very unique. So you know, bottom
• 8:52
  line is, you know, we didn't reach our goals this year and and
• 8:56
  that that's everybody and so you know the quarterback room is one of them.
• 8:58
  And so that's the bottom line. We need to look at a hole.
• 9:01
  We didn't get our job done. So if that's what you're looking for for
• 9:05
  an answer, that's that's kind of what it is. But it's just I'm
• 9:07
  not going to go through and kind of evaluate Kyle at this point. I
• 9:11
  don't think that's fair. And then you know, as you saw what happened
• 9:13
  in this game, and again we got to be able to help him out
• 9:16
  more. Some of those zero looks that Lincol's talking about, we can do
• 9:18
  a better job with as coaches. The Ohio State defense was definitely one of
• 9:22
  the big bright spots for the Buckeyes during the game. And Jack Sawyer with
• 9:26
  three sacks, well, he was one of the bright spots on the bright
• 9:28
  spot of the defense. So did that performance three sacks against Missouri impact his
• 9:35
  thinking at all about potentially putting his name in for the NFL draft? Uh?
• 9:39
  You know, honestly, I'm not even really thinking about that right now.
• 9:43
  You know, I'm just upset about the game. I wanted to send
• 9:46
  the seniors out the right way. And when you put so much work in
• 9:48
  there, you know, it's tough when you know you don't get the outcome
• 9:52
  you want. And I just want to give Lincoln a shout out for just
• 9:54
  stepping in there and playing with confidence in a tough spot. I thought,
• 9:58
  you file your ass off, man, and it's not easy, and and
• 10:01
  he went in there and needed the best you could, man, So let's
• 10:03
  shout out to you. Man. The Cotton Bowl was supposed to be the
• 10:07
  first real chance to watch Devin Brown in an extended run, a full game
• 10:13
  against the Power five team, maybe kickstart the evaluation process for the twenty twenty
• 10:18
  four season. Well, losing him early after he really didn't have a chance
• 10:20
  to get going, how does that impact the evaluation of that room now moving
• 10:26
  into twenty twenty four. Yeah, I mean, for Devin, I know
• 10:30
  he wanted to play in this game worse than anybody, and even after he
• 10:33
  hurt himself, you know, he wanted to get back in there and actually
• 10:37
  did it for a series, but he just that wasn't fair to him.
• 10:39
  He couldn't move, and you know, he wasn't supposed to be in a
• 10:45
  game at that point, but he was fighting to get back in there.
• 10:46
  And you know, he kept the great attitude the whole time. He's a
• 10:50
  he's a great young man with a great attitude. He's a great teammate.
• 10:54
  Yeah, I don't I don't have a great answer for that right now,
• 10:58
  because this is not what we are then coming out of the game, you
• 11:01
  know, where we didn't have a game to look at and go through and
• 11:03
  evaluate. We know we see in practice, but you know, it's certainly
• 11:09
  different when you play in a game. So disappointed, we don't we don't
• 11:13
  have that. So we'll we'll, you know, get back to work and
• 11:18
  figure that part of it out. But you know, again, I don't
• 11:20
  have a great answer in that right now, because we just we didn't have
• 11:22
  a game from Devon now. A reporter took a second swing at the question
• 11:28
  that got asked earlier but wasn't answered. What was what the offensive line?
• 11:31
  With Carson Hinzman sitting out, Matt Jones moving from right guard to center,
• 11:35
  and Enick Famahi stepping in at starting right guard. I don't want to get
• 11:39
  too much into it. But you know, Carson, you know, was
• 11:43
  having a tough time the last couple of weeks in practice, and we just
• 11:46
  felt like at the right time, all right, this was the right thing
• 11:48
  to do. At the time, you know, it was having you know,
• 11:52
  a few a few issues there and and so it's not that you know,
• 11:58
  Carson will never play here again, and you know, but based on
• 12:01
  the last couple of weeks of play, the decision was made that Matt gave
• 12:07
  us the best chance at center after Devin Brown went down. Lincoln Keenhols was
• 12:11
  not the only other option at quarterback. Christian Jebbia, who they brought in
• 12:16
  as a transfer from Oregon State, who has started some games in his pre
• 12:18
  in his in his past, did not play it all this year, but
• 12:22
  he was available. So when you were faced with the option of throwing a
• 12:26
  true freshman out there, when you had a veteran on the bench like Christian
• 12:30
  Jebbia, did you give any thought to playing him instead? Well, we
• 12:33
  felt like, you know, Lincoln have been taken all the backup reps and
• 12:37
  you know, moving moving forward in the future, felt like this was the
• 12:41
  best thing. And Lincoln also gave us a chance a little bit with some
• 12:43
  of his own read stuff where that's not really Tristan's game, and the game
• 12:48
  plan had more of that stuff in it, even more than you saw because
• 12:52
  it was more of that's what Devon can do, and we felt like Lincoln
• 12:56
  could at least, you know, do those type of things as opposed to
• 13:00
  Tristan that's not really his style of game. So we felt like with everything
• 13:03
  to do is that it was to have Lincoln in there. This next one
• 13:05
  is one of the more leading questions you're going to hear from a reporter.
• 13:09
  But Brian Day was asked, you know, would he like to see things
• 13:11
  change for maybe opt outs or transfers don't have such a big impact on the
• 13:16
  team that's out there for the ball game. Yeah, I hope, So,
• 13:18
  I hope there's there's something because you know this this you know you have
• 13:24
  keep his pieces missing and it's just not the same team that you played with
• 13:28
  a month ago. But not that that's excuse, it's just the way it
• 13:31
  is, and you know, you know, we got to go in the
• 13:33
  game. But yeah, I feel like absolutely, you know that, And
• 13:39
  I think maybe with the playoff that'll change things as well. Well. After
• 13:41
  the Ohiosate offense really carried the defense for the twenty twenty and twenty twenty one
• 13:46
  and even twenty twenty two seasons. This year, the defense was really kind
• 13:52
  of carrying the offense at times. So after a somewhat disappointing season on the
• 13:56
  on the offensive side of the ball, is Ryan Day looking at his offense
• 14:00
  staff and maybe even potentially making some changes before next year. Yeah, we
• 14:03
  want to look at everything. Yeah, you know, ultimately, like you
• 14:07
  said, you know, game this is this is an example of a game
• 14:09
  like it doesn't nobody cares that you have a freshman quarterback in there. You
• 14:13
  know, you got to go win the game, and it didn't happen.
• 14:15
  So, like I said before, everything's gonna get looked at, and if
• 14:20
  it's what helps Ohio State go reach our goals and win these games, then
• 14:24
  then we'll make those changes. So got to you know, got to really
• 14:28
  evaluate it the right way and make sure I'm doing it the right way and
• 14:30
  do what's appropriate, what's best for the program. And finally, let's hear
• 14:35
  from Jack Sawyer one more time. How does this game maybe impact Jack Sawyer's
• 14:41
  decision on next season? Uh, you know, I think a lot of
• 14:45
  us all are on the same page about you know, we don't want to
• 14:48
  enter our high state careers like this, h two tough losses. You know,
• 14:52
  we all love it here, We love coach Day, we love the
• 14:56
  staff, and uh, you know, sometimes you know, unfortunately things happen
• 15:00
  and you don't get the outcoming Wan And I think that's going to play a
• 15:03
  big decision and her big factor in our decisions. Well, I wanted to
• 15:07
  thank you all for sticking with us through a very eventful, very busy twenty
• 15:11
  twenty three Ohio State football season. We are now turning the page to twenty
• 15:15
  twenty four. Quite literally, a happy new year everyone. It's going to
• 15:18
  be a very busy and very eventful offseason as well, as we start heading
• 15:22
  into transfer portal announcements and NFL draft declarations or guys announcing they're going to come
• 15:26
  back to Ohio State. Then you start getting into winter workouts and then spring
• 15:31
  ball, and then the summer and camps and all that good stuff, and
• 15:35
  before you know it, fall camp will be here. It'll be counting down
• 15:37
  the days to the start of the twenty twenty four football season. That accoring
• 15:41
  game just right around the corner, just a little over two hundred days away.
• 15:45
  We will be counting down those days with you here and Buck guys tomorrow
• 15:48
  morning, all year long. So thank you for sticking with us for twenty
• 15:50
  twenty three. We look forward to seeing you every morning here for twenty twenty
• 15:54
  four. That will do it for today. I thank you, guys all
• 15:56
  for joining us every great day. We will talk to you tomorrow