Archives for September 2012

BIG TEN NON-CONFERENCE WRAP-UP

With most of the Big Ten finishing up their non-conference schedules last weekend, it’s time to force ourselves to review where the conference stands. Try not to be too scared.

Combined record: 33-13. Hey, that doesn’t sound so bad, so immediately I am incredibly suspicious. Let’s investigate.

vs. AQ teams: 5-9. Honestly, that’s not as bad as I thought, but all 5 wins are courtesy of the conference’s three unbeaten teams: Ohio State (Cal), Minnesota (Syracuse) and Northwestern (Syracuse, Vanderbilt, Boston College). Add in the facts that none of those teams are elite and none of the wins was by more than 10 points and you can see why the Big Ten is getting zero respect. That’s probably more than we deserve.

Saturday’s games were more of the same we’ve seen this season so far: Beat up on teams we should be embarrassed to play, look lackluster against teams we should beat up, lose to Notre Dame and a couple of mid-majors.

So how is the rest of the season going to go? Your guess is as good as mine, but here’s something that’s worth considering: Northwestern, the Big Ten team who has arguably proven the most so far with their 3 wins over AQ teams, does not play Ohio State, Wisconsin or Purdue, the three top teams (right now) in the Leaders division. At this point, it’s hard to imagine the Wildcats losing to Indiana, Penn State (their next two games) or Illinois (who could, conceivably, improve by the end of the year). With Ohio State ineligible and Wisconsin struggling to register a convincing win over anybody, we are now in a realm where a Northwestern/Purdue Big Ten title game is not at all unrealistic.

You’re scared now, aren’t you?

ESPN SUBJECTS HYPE MACHINE TO TOUGHEST CHALLENGE YET

Ohio State @ Michigan State is the site of ESPN’s College GameDay this week, which must mean the rest of the schedule is a dystopian wasteland that would put Cormac McCarthy to shame. The good news is that this will mean increased Heisman hype for Braxton Miller from the Worldwide Leader in Self-Serving Hyperbole. Expect high doses of this and this in the promos.

Wisconsin @ Nebraska may also be interesting, because at least one head coach is going to totally lose it on the sideline.

OTHER THINGS TO STARE AT

Thursday: Person of Interest season premiere (CBS), Forrest Gump (Cinemax), Arrested Development (Netflix), Browns @ Ravens (NFL Network). If you wanted an actual football game, then Stanford @ Washington is as close as you’re going to get.

Friday: Hawai’i @ BYU. Last week, BYU opted not to go into overtime against a team who had shown no ability or willingness to score in overtime-like conditions for the entire game and instead failed on a two-point conversion attempt to lose the game in regulation. And this after I was nice to Mormons last week. You know you can’t re-baptise that touchdown as an 8-pointer now that the game’s over, right? GO WHATEVER HAWAI’I’S NICKNAME IS!!!!

Saturday: Seriously, these games all stink.

As I sat around this weekend thinking about how I was going to write this recap post I thought about mostly all the things that bothered me the most. So I was writing down all the negative aspects to the game and my watching experience I was right around 3000 words when I erased the whole diatribe and decided I needed to change my entire thought process. So I will stay positive in this post even if it kills me. I asked myself one simple two part question.

Did Ohio State win the game and why can we as fans not just enjoy the victory?

First, the important part of the question. Yes Ohio State won the game 29-15. Here is how that played out.

The Offense

Braxton Miller continued to show why he was such a highly ranked High School recruit. Can the fans (myself included) just take a few minutes to enjoy how incredibly awesome he is? This young man is a true Sophomore leading this offense in nearly every category. In this game alone he completed 60% of his passes for 143 yards and no INTs he also ran 11 times for 64 yards and 2 TDs including this beauty.

Enjoy that short video OSU fans as we will have many more like that to enjoy for the next 2.5 years so smile and savor.

Jordan Hall in just his second game back from a bad foot injury rushed for over 100 yards in the win. Jordan had 17 rushes for 105 yards and had 2 catches for 21 yards. He is becoming that guy who everyone thought he would be in the Urban Meyer offensive system. With time and more reps I am sure we will see even more improvement in his game.

Honestly Corey Brown and Devin Smith have enjoyed having Urban Meyer become the HC at OSU more then anyone. They are finally having the ball thrown their way and making plays. Sure they both have had some bad drops but at least this year they will have more catches then games they played in.

The Defense

Doran Grant is a star in the making. With star CB Bradley Roby out with a shoulder injury Doran took full advantage of his first career start. Mr. Grant forced and recovered a fumble he also had an interception and for good measure he added a sack to the great day he had.

I wish there was more I could say about the defense but in staying with my keeping it positive my review of the defense will have to end here.

Last thoughts

I just wanted to take a few moments here to remind my fellow fans how lucky we are. Ohio State is coming off a year of hell in the program and a 6-7 season with mostly the same players returning and very few new guys. We have a new coaching staff and new offensive and defensive schemes. Yet these guys are sitting here 4-0 and ranked in the top 15. They are learning and changing. Are they perfect? No of course not they aren’t even close yet. Are they improved? Heck yes they are. The offense is light years ahead of where they were last year. Sure they still have the occasional miscues or droughts in effectiveness. They are however exciting and developing. The defense has some serious issues most of which won’t and can’t be fixed with the personnel we currently have. Even saying that though the defense is giving up around 15 points a game and for the most part have been productive for nearly any other school in CFB just not up to par with what OSU is use to having. Can they get better? I sure hope so for their own sake.

Lastly, I have thought about this a lot Ohio State fans need to show a little patience. Given everything they have been through and all the changes that have been made a lot of fans need to maybe temper their expectations. Yes I am one of those guys who said OSU could go 12-0 this year and we would see a complete turn around in year one from last years dismal season. The good news is they still can go 12-0 but it will surely be more difficult of a season then many of us expected it to be.

One thing I hear a lot is the crowd at the ‘Shoe feeds off the emotions of the players in their crowd noise. Isn’t the exact opposite also true though? So next time you go to a game stand and cheer and be loud and maybe the team will feed off of it and play much better or maybe not but at least you tried right.

In conclusion Ohio State won the game and that’s all that matters right TTUN fans?

Four weeks into this glorious college football season and I think the better teams are starting to separate themselves. Some of the better teams are surprising and others were expected. Some teams many expected to be good are really bad. Some of the teams expected to be bad are honestly pretty good. And that folks is what makes CFB so exciting each and every year.

Men of the Scarlet and Gray Ballot – Week 4

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Alabama Crimson Tide	—
2	Florida St. Seminoles	1
3	Oregon Ducks	-1
4	Georgia Bulldogs	2
5	Notre Dame Fighting Irish	3
6	West Virginia Mountaineers	3
7	LSU Tigers	-3
8	South Carolina Gamecocks	4
9	Florida Gators	1
10	Texas Longhorns	1
11	Stanford Cardinal	2
12	Kansas St. Wildcats	5
13	TCU Horned Frogs	1
14	Ohio St. Buckeyes	1
15	Louisville Cardinals	1
16	Oregon St. Beavers	5
17	Mississippi St. Bulldogs	6
18	Rutgers Scarlet Knights	7
19	Ohio Bobcats	3
20	Iowa St. Cyclones	4
21	USC Trojans	-2
22	Oklahoma Sooners	-17
23	Clemson Tigers	-16
24	Northwestern Wildcats	—
25	Minnesota Golden Gophers	—
Dropouts: UCLA Bruins, Arizona Wildcats

SB Nation BlogPoll College Football Top 25 Rankings »

Time for me to explain my thought process. I value winning more then anything else. I do however recognize that some great teams will and do lose games. If you lose a game to another great team I will value that. I wish I could honor every undefeated team before I rank teams with losses but a few of the undefeated teams haven’t played anyone tough enough to make the list over teams with losses to other great teams.

I think I should discuss Notre Dame first. Let me just say I am not a Notre Lame fan and hate that I have to rank them so high. But dad gummit they are a pretty good football team. Surprisingly their defense is the best part of their team. Coach Brian Kelly is more known for his offensive juggernauts so I am sure he will find a way to get the offense up to speed and matching Manti Te’o and his defensive cohorts.

Florida St. did the one thing they haven’t been able to the past few years beat a really good team and prove they are worthy of their ranking. Their schedule looks pretty easy the rest of the way so maybe just maybe they will fulfill their trip back to glory this year.

The Big Ten has proven to be worthy of a few more ranked teams. They however are not TTUN with their second huge letdown on National TV. They also aren’t going to be MSU and their bad showing against Eastern Michigan or Nebraska and their blow out of Idaho St. (Are they div. 3?) It will be Northwestern and Minnesota so lets show them some love they along with Ohio St. are carrying the leagues banner at least for now.

USC, Oklahoma, and Clemson are the lone one loss teams in the rankings. These teams are great teams who just happened to lose to other great teams. They will have chances to prove they belong in the great ranks going forth.

I also thought I would add a brief rankings of the BCS conferences just for fun and for some insight as to where I rank teams based on their conference powers as well.

1.) Big 12
2.) Pac 12
3.) SEC
4.) B1G
5.) ACC
6.) Big East

One of the things we like to do here is an instant analysis after every Buckeye game. Sometimes they are fun sometimes they are painful to do. This one is kind of right in the middle.

The Good 🙂

1.) Ohio State won 29-15
2.) Jordan Hall gained 100 yards rushing
3.) Braxton Miller only ran 11 times
4.) Ohio State is 4-0
5.) The OOC season is over

The Bad 🙁

1.) Ohio State only won 29-15 while they were favored by 37 points.
2.) Blocked punt for a TD (Bad play call No way Zach Boren could block 3 guys)
3.) Defense still has tackling and play maker issues
4.) Honestly we have 2 Defensive Coordinators and Head Coach all who may be calling plays at some point during the game on defense. That is a problem.
5.) We have to go to Michigan St. next week.

I will have a lot more to say on Monday after I digest the game completely and watch it again. I will say this my critique wont be as bad as most. I truly think this team is much improved from last years 6-7 team and that is something to be happy about.

Edited by writer

Sorry, meant to get this up earlier, but with the turd the Buckeyes laid on the field during the first quarter, I can’t be blamed.

So when El kaiser gave me the info on my first game preview assignment I swear to crap I thought he said the Univeristy of Alabama game. It caused me to go into a brief high pitched girls voice with excitement to know OSU had scheduled such a high profile and difficult opponent. What I hadn’t heard was his whole statement and the key word BIRMINGHAM. Then it hit me it was just going to be another cupcake game where I will have to try to find a reason to why the game may be closer then the stats project it will be. Then again this is the 2012 Buckeyes and there is no telling how this game will go so I will break it down and do my best to figure out if UAB is as bad as they seem or if OSU will make them look better then they really are.

Ohio State Defense vs. UAB Offense

So all of Buckeye Nation seems to be in an uproar over the defense this year so lets look at the actual numbers. OSU is 68th in the country in total defense. Giving up an ungodly 392 yards a game. OSU is also 86th in the country in TFL with 14 in 3 games. The Buckeyes are 104th in pass defense and 32nd in rush defense. All of these numbers add up to this years defense being pretty middle of the road to horrible. Who cares if OSU is giving up 17.7 points per game and are ranked 32nd in the country in that category. You would think based on these numbers that OSU would be 1-2 or 0-3 but they aren’t they are 3-0 and winning games by trying to keep the ball in front of them and between the 20s. is this the same dominating defense of years past? Heck to the no!!! We just don’t have the quality of LBers and Safeties we have had in the past and it is slowing down the progress this year.

UAB on offense is just plain awful. The Blazers are 86th in the country in yards per game at 383. They are 117th in rushing offense with 80 YPG. They are an almost impressive 30th in passing offense with 282.5 YPG. Scoring defense is where they really fail coming in at 110th with scoring 17.5 points per game. Here is a breakdown of the UAB offense they are extremely bad and most of their passing yards are gained in garbage time when their team is already well behind and they are trying to catch up.

Advantage: Ohio State

Ohio State Offense vs UAB Defense

I decided I wasn’t going to use any players names in this preview so I will just say this a certain OSU player who is their QB is basically their entire offense so far on this season. Ohio State is 22nd in rushing offense with 237 YPG and their QB accounts for 125 of those YPG. OSU is 76th in passing YPG with 216 YPG and the OSU QB accounts for 203 YPG of that. OSU is 42nd in Total offense with 453 YPG and the QB accounts for 329 of those YPG. Ohio State is scoring 40.7 PPG and is ranked 20th of that the OSU QB is responsible for 25 PPG. To say the QB is important is an understatement right now he is EVERYTHING.

UAB Defense is just horrible on defense I mean horrible is probably an understatement. They are 111th in rushing defense giving up 220 YPG. They are 85th in the nation in passing defense giving up 256 YPG. They are 108th in total offense giving up 477 YPG. Lastly, and probably the worst they are 123rd in scoring defense out of 124 teams giving up 44 PPG.

Advantage: Ohio State

I could keep going and going on every category but why not just cut to the chase and list them and tell the advantage.

Special Teams: Ohio State

Everything else in the whole Galaxy: Ohio State

Bottom line here is this is a game OSu must win and win big and fix some issues they have been having. Some players need to step up more and others need to just slow down and think more. The coaches need to use the game to prepare the team for the difficult B1G schedule coming up sooner then later. This is the 4th game of a 12 game pre-season slate getting the team prepared and used to a completely new system for next years run at glory. Fans need to remember that and give these guys some time to gel and fix the problems and stop with the constant comparing and complaining and whining. If you really want to enjoy a game turn off twitter and walk away from the chat rooms and just watch the game and see how much different this system is and how we all need to let them take this entire year to get better in it. The players haven’t changed from last years 6-7 team only the coaches and systems have and they are trying to find their footing in it so have patience I beg of you.

How I see this game it could very well be a 63-13 type game or it could be a 35-21 game but no matter how it plays out it will be an OSU win and thats the most important thing after all isnt?

(H/T to CFBStats.com for helping me provide all these numbers and not need to use any ones name)

Everett Withers is the Co-Defensive Coordinator but last year he was the Head Coach at North Carolina. One of the reasons he was brought on board at OSU other then his experience with defense and coaching was his prowess in recruiting a region OSU has had trouble with for years. Last years class it payed off but so far in this class it hasnt worked out very well with guys who were deemed to be be OSU leans going elsewhere to play their college careers. That all ended today with the 17th commitment in the 2013 class.

(Photo courtesy: Rocky Mountain Telegram photo / Alan Campbell)

Tyquan Lewis is a 6’4″ 225 lbs DE/LB hybrid from Tarboro, North Carolina and he becomes the 17th member of the Ohio State 2013 recruiting class. Tyquan is rated a 4 star by both Rivals and 247sports. ESPN and Scouts have him listed as a 3 star. Tyquan brings a lot of speed and strength to the position he will play at OSU. He projects as a LB in college but most likely he will end up playing in the Hybrid position of DE/LB much like Bobby Carpenter did for the Buckeyes. This is a big time get for Coach Meyer as it fills a need with a guy who has a ton of skills and flexibility. Below you can see his highlight reel and get a feel for what kind of player you can expect him to be.