“jimmy: What I saw was an OL that has to be the biggest false start offenders in big situations I have ever seen. Easily the most undisciplined squad at a big time program in the nation, so fundamentally flawed it’s just plain laughable.” … “lancelott: by the way, i’m all for getting rid of our o-line coach”

“these goofs like lancelott expect you to believe that it’s acceptable for 65 teams in the nation to consistently have more talent on offense than we do?” … we are actually ranked 45 in offense (scoring, because that’s what i assume is all you care about), and i would challenge some of the competition that some of the teams ahead of us had to play.

“They want you to give a passing grade to Tressel when Illinois, Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana, Northwestern, Michigan State and iowa all had more talent and “better” offenses than OSU. Only one team had “similar talent” PSU and they finished 1st but OSU finished 9th in this conference.” … looking in conference we finished 4th in offense (scoring again). Also, which one of those teams that you listed beat us? o, right. only psu.

“Another comment, Texas just came at us relentlessly, I saw ONLY one screen play and it worked, few if any quick slants or mid level slants.” … seems like our run worked just fine:
tOSU Texas
1st Downs 21 33
3rd down efficiency 4-12 6-17
4th down efficiency 0-0 3-4
Total Yards 379 468
Passing 176 414
Comp-Att 10-25 41-58
Yards per pass 7.0 7.1
Rushing 203 54
Rushing Attempts 39 29
Yards per rush 5.2 1.9
Penalties 7-67 8-83 … wait… texas actually had more penalties?
Turnovers 0 1
Fumbles lost 0 0
Interceptions thrown 0 1
Possession 30:13 29:47

“jimmy: Tressel used little clock management when he had the game won” … “SM:
Nonetheless, what you describe is clearly what Tressel was thinking when he called two running plays up the gut once they were in FG range. Only nobody figured Boom would break one right between the tackles for a 20+ yard TD.

In hindsight, if Boom doesn’t score that TD, then OSU probably wins. Tressel would have wasted the clock centering a nice FG attempt, in the process forcing Tx to use at least one of their TOs, probably both of them, and result would have been 18-17 victory for OSU.

So in reality, it wasn’t the clock management, it was the unexpected touchdown that gave Tx the ball back with 2 mins left.”

We certainly had a glimpse of things to come by 2004 with Cooper’s upperclassman gone we ranked 90-something nationally in offense. One of the things that bothers me is how thick headed and clueless some fans can be, we grade our student/players based on achievement and yet these goofs like lancelott expect you to believe that it’s acceptable for 65 teams in the nation to consistently have more talent on offense than we do? They want you to give a passing grade to Tressel when Illinois, Wisconsin, Purdue, Indiana, Northwestern, Michigan State and iowa all had more talent and “better” offenses than OSU. Only one team had “similar talent” PSU and they finished 1st but OSU finished 9th in this conference.
You saw the game last night, some posters to this tread commented how talented Texas was. Now imagine a team that has produced TWICE as many NFL players over the last 8 years, wouldn’t you expect it would have more to show? Another comment, Texas just came at us relentlessly, I saw ONLY one screen play and it worked, few if any quick slants or mid level slants. What I saw was an OL that has to be the biggest false start offenders in big situations I have ever seen. Easily the most undisciplined squad at a big time program in the nation, so fundamentally flawed it’s just plain laughable.

We all hoped Tressel would change things and there was hope with the first couple of scUM wins and that one miraculous 2002 season. Since then, other than beating scUM (partly while they decline) and getting a few favorable bowl matchups, he’s continued an obvious trend. The more disturbing aspect is how acceptable it all is, I say OSU and our kids deserves better coaching.

I’m talking about once OSU was clearly in field goal range. I’m just suggesting that with 2 minutes left and the ball in the red zone, Texas coaches might have gone all or nothing. Sell out to try to force a turnover/move the line of scrimage back, and if they aren’t successful, let them score. I’m not saying they did that, but it had to be on their mind. The chance of OSU’s kicker missing a <40 yard field goal are much lower than the chances of Colt taking the Texas team down the field in 2 minutes. The guy had already made a 50 yarder and a 40+ yarder, and Texas fans have seen Colt march down the field at the end of the game quite a few times at this point.

As in, “let’s go ahead and let OSU drive 73 yards for their go-ahead TD now, so that we can have the ball last and score & win the game?”

As a Texas fan I was hoping they would let OSU score at that point, and it happened. I don’t know what the Texas coaches were thinking at the time, but I think it was definitely the right way to go (especially in hindsight).

Nonetheless, what you describe is clearly what Tressel was thinking when he called two running plays up the gut once they were in FG range. Only nobody figured Boom would break one right between the tackles for a 20+ yard TD.

In hindsight, if Boom doesn’t score that TD, then OSU probably wins. Tressel would have wasted the clock centering a nice FG attempt, in the process forcing Tx to use at least one of their TOs, probably both of them, and result would have been 18-17 victory for OSU.

So in reality, it wasn’t the clock management, it was the unexpected touchdown that gave Tx the ball back with 2 mins left.

Also, to clarify “collectively impressive;” if you’ve read this site for the entire season, you know that I’m NOT a fan of the way the coaching has gone this year. I’ve repeatedly called for Jim Bollman’s head, and I still feel that way. This season was successful from a win-loss perspective, but the recent pattern of offensive underachievement of great talent is inexcusable, and it’s a direct failure of the offensive coaching staff (particularly the O-Line staff).

So my statements regarding the coaching success of _this_ game were in that context. There’s no question that this game was the best coaching job of the year – overall. Again, if you’ve seen OSU put together a better game this year, then please point it out to me.

All of that is why I begged the question, “why couldn’t we see this type of coaching effort earlier in the year?”