Archives for November 2012

Maryland to Join the Big Ten, Rutgers to Follow?

November 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment

The University of Maryland’s Board of Regents voted Monday to accept an invitation to join the Big Ten and begin competition in the conference in the 2014-15 academic year, sources told ESPN. An afternoon announcement will be made in College Park.

Meanwhile, Big East Conference sources told ESPN that Rutgers will be announced as the 14th member of the Big Ten on Tuesday.

– ESPN.com

Why? Well, among other reasons, money:

According to a television executive familiar with the Northeast corridor, the move could ultimately be worth as much as $200 million annually for the Big Ten in cable subscription fees.

– Pete Thamel, SI.

Does this change anything for Ohio State? Other than divisional realignments, probably not.

It’s Michigan week anyway. Who cares?!

Filed Under: College Football

Blogpoll – Week 11

November 19, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Week 11 and we are down to 2 undefeated teams. Ohio State and Notre Dame oh how that would be an awesome BCS NCG but alas it cant and wont be. Are these the 2 best teams in the country? If winning games matters more then anything else then I say 100% they are. If would haves or should ofs or could ofs mean something more then winning then maybe you have a different opinion. These 2 teams though have done something that 122 other Div 1 teams have not so far this season WON EVERY GAME THEY PLAYED. That matters and anyone who tells you otherwise is a fan of one of the other 122 schools who didn’t do that so difficult and yet so simple rule of winning them all.

If Ohio State is the only unbeaten team left after all the games are played then they deserve a fair shot at the AP title. They will have done something no one else did this year and that matters. If Notre Dame wins out and wins the BCS national championship game and the AP gives them their title as well so be it they deserved it just as much as OSU did.

There you have it one week left for OSU to make its pitch for an AP title and it is a biggie against a team they hate from that state up north.

Thoughts?

Filed Under: Blogpoll

Ohio State vs Wisconsin Recap

November 18, 2012 by 3 Comments

In continuing my theme of the fewer words I write the better here goes nothing….

This 68 yard punt return was HUGE to get OSU started in the 1st qtr. OSU 7 Wisky 0

Wisconsin QB Curt Phillips will have nightmares for the rest of his life from plays like this….

While Braxton had an off day luckily for OSU RB Carlos Hyde was there to help out his 1st TD put OSU up 14-0….

Montee Ball was pretty awesome most of the night this TD made it 14-7 at the half….

Unfortunately there wasn’t a lot of anything for most of the second half until the last few mins in the game when Ryan Shazier made what seemed to be the play of a lifetime forcing a fumble of Montee Ball on 4th and 1 from the goal line….

This play kept the score 14-7 thanks to Christian Bryant recovering the fumble. Unfortunately OSU couldn’t get a 1st down to end the game which led to this with 19 secs left….

This tied the game at 14-14 and sent the game into overtime….

In Overtime OSU had the ball first and took full advantage with Carlos Hyde getting this his 2nd TD of the game putting OSU up 21-14….

When Wisconsin got the ball for their turn in OT this is how the game ended….

Christian Bryant with the pass deflection on 4th down gave Ohio State the 21-14 win in OT……

This led to OSU and Coach Meyer singing the praises to Ohio State fans while celebrating the victory on Wisconsins home field….

What this game means other victory over a false rivalry is OSU gets one of these and the players get some rings….

And Wisconsin and its fans get this…..

Most images courtesy of Ozone.net

Filed Under: Ohio State Football

Thad Matta gets first for 2014

November 18, 2012 by Leave a Comment

I won’t lie I was one of those guys who questioned whether or not Coach Matta had lost his touch in recruiting. After losing out on several big names to teams like UCLA and Kentucky and Duke I said he probably just lost guys to big name schools. Recently though he lost an Ohio kid to Wisconsin in Nigel Hayes and Noah Vonleh to Indiana I was nervous. It sucks to lose recruits to coaches like Tom Crean and Bo Ryan I can’t tell you with enough fervor how much I dislike those guys. Thad Matta then comes out recently and says that his staff has a plan and knows who they want and not to worry he will get the guys he needs to keep OSU a successful basketball school. I don’t know if I bought in fully to his speech until today where he landed his first recruit for the 2014 season.

Keita Bates-Diop is a 6’7″ 190 lbs 4 star Forward from Normal Illinois. Keita announced from his twitter account @KBD_33 “Official committed to THE Ohio st university!!”. Keita is one of those really special players along the lines of an Evan Turner. He has the ability to do everything on the court. He can score from all over the place and has a wonderful jump shot. Has a huge 7’3″ wingspan that allows him to rebound and block shots with the big men. ESPN ranks him the 27th best player in the 2014 class. Scouts ranks him the 7th best PF in the class. Rivals ranks him the no. 20th best player in 2014. 247sports ranks him the 21st best player. Keita is a huge get for Matta for so many reasons but most importantly because Keita was being pursued heavily by TTUN and many other Natl Heavyweights proving that he hasn’t lost his touch and I was wrong happily. Below you can see his highlights.

Filed Under: Ohio State Basketball

Wisconsin Live In Game Chat

November 17, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Join your fellow Buckeye fans to chat during the Wisconsin football game, and since the game will be out of hand by the time 5 o’clock rolls around, we’ll just transition into talking about the basketball team’s tilt against Rhode Island.

Filed Under: Ohio State Football

Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Tipoff

November 16, 2012 by Leave a Comment

As college basketball fans, it can be difficult to keep up with the slew of early season tournaments. Let’s face it, unless your team is involved, no one cares about them. That being said, they can provide an opportunity to get important wins that will mean something come tournament selection time in March. The basketball buckeyes are in the midst of the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame Tipoff Tournament. The bulk of the tournament takes place this weekend at the Mohegan Sun Area in Connecticut.

The opponents this weekend are not upper echelon teams (not even close) and it is too early to tell if potential wins will be considered quality (not looking likely) come March, but nonetheless the buckeyes will be playing two games against opponents from decent basketball conferences.

First up is Rhode Island tomorrow @ 5pm EST. The game should start at about halftime of the football game against Wisconsin. Unfortunately, the game will be shown on ESPN3 so your DVR will not be much help. Rhode Island has been picked to finish near the bottom of the A10 conference. I have no reason to believe this game will be anything but a “W” for the buckeyes. On Sunday, the buckeyes will play the winner of Washington (who just lost to Albany – yes the same team that the buckeyes smoked 82-60) and Seton Hall. Sunday’s game will be broadcast on ESPN2 @ 4:30pm EST.

These two games will be important tune-ups for impending games against Duke and Kansas. The game against Marquette would have been a great measuring stick, but Thad will have to work the hand that has been dealt.

Filed Under: College Basketball, Ohio State Basketball

Ohio State at Wisconsin Preview

November 16, 2012 by 2 Comments

We here at Men of the Scarlet and Gray know that along with all the great Buckeye fans we get around these parts, we also get our fair share of fans from other teams. Some are curious to see what we might be saying about their favorite team. Others want to know what the match-up looks like from the opposition’s point of view. And some struggle to read. We call these “readers” “Wisconsin fans”. For their benefit, we have dcided that we will put this in terms they can understand: PICTURES!

Here is what will happen when Wisconsin has the ball…

A little bit of this

or possibly some of this…

When OSU is on defense you will see a lot of this…..

and a ton of this…..

and if that’s not enough you will see a great deal of this…

What you won’t see is Wisconsin throwing the ball a lot with their third string, fifth year back up quarterback so our defensive backs will play a lot of run support and turn Wisconsin’s only receiving threat, Jared Abbrederis, into a non-factor.

What to expect when OSU is on offense…

Hi, Wisconsin fans. You may remember me formerly as the source of all your nightmares from the past eleven months. Guess what?! I’m back and I’m better than ever!

Unfortunately for Wisconsin fans, the nightmare will never end (for at least three more years). He can also do this really well…

Braxton isn’t the only threat for OSU on offense. This guy will see a lot of carries as well…

When Wisconsin is on defense expect a lot of this…

and his partner in tackling crimes….

The OSU offense will roll as long as Braxton and Carlos are on their game and the offensive line does what it has done all year: dominate the line of scrimmage, run inside and out and move people out of the way. Meanwhile, the Wisconsin defense relies on Borland and Taylor to do everything for them.

How I see it….

Which will result in Ohio State fans constantly yelling…

Which brings copious amounts of this….

Which causes Urban Meyer to celebrate the teams victory and his ability to make Bret Bielema cry like a little girl….

Ohio State wins 42-17!!!

Thoughts?

Filed Under: Ohio State Football

Don’t Let The Door Hit You, Penn State

November 15, 2012 by 12 Comments

So for the past couple days, the professional journalists at PennLive have been whining virtually non-stop about some supposed Big Ten conspiracy against them. This is centered mostly around officiating (no-calls, botched replays, etc.) and has culminated in this piece of brilliance suggesting the school leave the conference for the ACC.

I really hope they do.

But first, let’s talk about that “conspiracy.” If there was a plot to make Penn State lose games through purposefully shoddy officiating, it would actually be amazingly simple to detect. Penalty statistics are readily available (we here at MOTSAG prefer cfbstats.com but we’re not trying to tell you what to do) and all one would have to do is compare penalties and yardage for each team and those of their opponents to see if there is a noticeable imbalance.

So I did. I calculated the percentages of total penalties and penalty yardage each team received in all games. This sounds harder than it was; it literally took me four minutes. Apparently, no one at PennLive has four minutes to spare while pounding out yet another Completely-Missing-The-Point post about how sorry we should feel for them.

Now, conspiracies aren’t easy to pull off perfectly, but it would make sense that if Penn State was being treated unfairly that they would at least be in the bottom 3 of the Big Ten in Officiating Equality (me? oh, just inventing new stats. whatchu doin’?)  and probably, say, the bottom 25 nationally, right?

But of course, they’re not.

Six Big Ten teams have been less fairly treated by the refs than Penn State this year. Six. Out of eleven. Nationally, the Nittany Lions come in at #66 (of 124). That’s right. They’re actually on the winning side of officiating imbalance both in the conference and in the nation! Granted, I can’t easily account for botched replays, but those are at least somewhat subjective and heavily reliant on the call on the field.

There is simply no officiating conspiracy against Penn State. There’s not even a subconscious bias, as others who want to whine but still want to sound like reasonable human beings have suggested. Penn State is getting a pretty average officiating treatment this year. I know that’s hard for Nittany Lion fans to hear. That’s no fun.

Making absurdly childish threats is fun.

So go ahead and move to the ACC (where six teams have been less fairly treated than Penn State so far this year too). That would allow the Big Ten to add Notre Dame or Oklahoma without splitting up the pie any further. Oh yeah, that pie? They don’t have that kind in the ACC. The financial hit would only further hurt your program on top of the NCAA sanctionbomb you haven’t even truly felt yet.

That is, of course, if the ACC even wants Penn State. And really, why would they?

Filed Under: College Football, Miscellany

Wisconsin: By The Numbers

November 15, 2012 by Leave a Comment

As always, presented without comment.

Statistically Speaking
Ohio State
Value (Rank)
Value (Rank)
Wisconsin
Advantage
Rushing Offense (ypg) 256.1 (8) 103.4 (13) Rushing Defense (ypg) Push
Passing Offense (ypg) 189.2 (101) 206.2 (34) Passing Defense (ypg) Wisconsin+
Pass Efficiency 138.3 (49) 116.1 (27) Pass Efficiency Defense Push
Total Offense (ypg) 445.3 (35) 309.6 (15) Total Defense (ypg) Push
Scoring Offense (ppg) 39.9 (11) 17.2 (12) Scoring Defense (ppg) Push
Rushing Defense (ypg) 107.9 (16) 218.8 (17) Rushing Offense (ypg) Push
Passing Defense (ypg) 259.7 (99) 166.8 (112) Passing Offense (ypg) Push
Pass Efficiency Defense 116.4 (28) 137.3 (53) Pass Efficiency Offense Ohio State
Total Defense (ypg) 367.6 (40) 385.6 (78) Total Offense (ypg) Ohio State
Scoring Defense (ppg) 23.9 (40) 29.5 (58) Scoring Offense (ppg) Push
Turnover margin +0.00 (60) +0.30 (48) Turnover margin Push
Penalty Yards/game 67.5 (107) 33.0 (8) Penalty Yards/game Wisconsin++
Sacks (/game) 2.20 (46) 2.00 (69) Sacks Allowed (/game) Push
Sacks Allowed (/game) 2.20 (84) 2.00 (53) Sacks (/game) Push
3rd Down Conv. (%) 45.1 (32) 31.4 (17) 3rd Down Conv. Def (%) Push
3rd Down Conv. Def (%) 33.1 (24) 34.8 (101) 3rd Down Conv. (%) Ohio State++
Redzone Offense (%) 88.6 (19) 90.9 (113) Redzone Defense (%) Ohio State++
Redzone Defense (%) 74.2 (22) 85.7 (33) Redzone Offense (%) Push
 Legend
  Difference <25 in National Rank = Push
  Difference >25 in National Rank = Ohio State
  Difference >50 in National Rank = Ohio State+
  Difference >75 in National Rank = Ohio State++
  Differences >100 in National Rank = Ohio State+++

Stats are grabbed from cfbstats.com.

Filed Under: Ohio State Football

Houston we have a Commitment

November 14, 2012 by Leave a Comment

Well well well of all the names floating around the Ohio State recruiting rumor highway the one who just committed is probably the least known of the group but may be the most important. Why you may ask? A few weeks back Urban Meyer moved Zach Boren to LB and Adam Homan to RB and essentially did away with the Fullback position and in doing so allowed some of OSUs foes to use that as a negative recruiting tool. They would say things like see Coach Meyer is doing away with the power running game and you big backs have no place in his offensive system. Which if you have watched any game this year it is painfully obvious OSU is still a power running team just from a different formation. Carlos Hyde and even to some extent Braxton Miller aren’t exactly those tiny scat backs. With todays commitment it just proves a point that there is room on this team and in this offensive scheme for big powerful bruising fullbacks. So meet todays newest member of the 2013 Ohio State recruiting class.

William Houston is a 6’0″ 235 lbs 3 star fullback from Dublin, Ohio. William who had scholarship offers from MAC schools and preferred walk-on offers from several B1G schools has chosen to accept a preferred walk-on spot at OSU over Michigan and Penn State. Houston announced it from his twitter account a few minutes ago. “‏@Thewillhouston
I will be playing football for The Ohio State University, in the fall. #GoBuckeyes #BuckeyeNation”. Houston who plays RB in HS is huge and powerful and will bring toughness to the position as well as the ability to play like a true RB. He also allows Coach Meyer to add a real quality player and person and get a player without using a scholarship that OSU is so limited with right now. ESPN ranks Houston as the #2 FB in the nation. Rivals ranks him as the #5 FB in the nation. Scouts ranks him as the no. 109 best RB overall in the nation showing his ability to play both positions fairly well at a high level.

His stats for this year. He had 215 rushes for 864 yards and 15 TDs. He also had 32 receptions for 308 yards and 2 TDs. Below you can see his JR. year highlights.

Filed Under: Ohio State Football
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