As I sit down to write this I admit that I am having difficulty coming to grips with Ohio State’s win over Cal. Looking at the stats, there are some memorable performances of which to take note. At the same time, even though the Buckeyes went up 20-7 in the first half, I can’t seem to shake the fact that for almost two full quarters the Buckeyes only managed one first down. I also can’t seem to shake the fact that the Ohio State defense gave up a whopping 512 yards.
As grim as that may seem, there were bright spots in the game. For example:
Good: Devin Smith put up a career high 145 yards receiving including a few more amazing catches.
Not so good: If it wasn’t going to develop into a spectacular catch, Smith seemed pretty determined not to catch it at all.
Good: The Ohio State defense scored six sacs — twice the total number of sacks in the first two games of the season
Not so good: 512 yards
Good: Ryan Shizer made 10 tackles by himself and got help on another three.
Not so good: How many tackles did Shizer miss because he failed to wrap his arms? How many tackles did the Buckeye defense miss because of bad technique?
Good: Miller moving the ball through the air a total 249 yards.
Not so good: He only completed 16 of 30 passes. Not entirely Miller’s fault. There were a number of dropped passes that should have added to Miller’s passing total.
Good: Punt coverage resulting in six fair catches and -11 negative yards on the punts they did return.
Not so good: Fact that we gave Cal the opportunity to make six fair catches. Buckeyes kicked it away eight times, six of those on on 3 and out.
Good: Braxton Miller taking fewer hits than in first two games.
Not so good: Can you say overcompensate?!
Against a team who’s biggest weakness going in appeared to be rush defense, especially against a mobile quarterback, it seemed as though Meyer held Miller back almost to a fault. Yes, I want to see a more balanced attack but at some point you need to turn Miller lose. When Miller finally did open up in the fourth quarter he moved the ball 75 yards on 11 plays for a touchdown and he added another two points on the conversion.
Call it maturity or credit the Cal defense but there were times when Miller couldn’t find his receiver and needed to take off but ended up throwing it away.
Good: Nice to hear Meyer saying good things about the offense after the game. He’s gotten down on them quite a bit this year.
Not so good: How much of that was due to the fact that we got out coached? Maybe he was still too choked up after John Simon’s post-game locker room speech. Not too sure what Simon said but apparently he played with an injury that hurt much more than he was willing to admit. Meyer was so moved that he said he is planning to name his next son Urban John Simon Meyer.
Good: Three missed field goals by Cal.
Not so good: 11 penalties against the Buckeyes for a total 101 yards.
Good: Kicker Drew Basil making a great tackle. Best thing is that he wasn’t the last defense preventing a touchdown. Basil was right in the mix and made a great hit.
Not so good: O.K. I don’t have anything here. Basil made a good tackle. Maybe he can teach the defense a thing or two.
Count it as a win and move on
As Meyer said in the post game press conference, “…best thing about 3 0 isa chance to go 4 0 and get better.” That’s one thing we have seen from this Buckeye team under Meyer is the ability to improve. They’ve got a lot to work on this week and chances are, we’ll see changes come UAB.
Thoughts in the weekend
Dammit Spartans
Notre Dame held Michigan State to three points and is now off to a 3-0 start. That puts us in a lose/lose situation. If Michigan beats Notre Dame, we get an entire season of Michigan/Denard Robinson hype. If Notre Dame wins…well…it’s just annoying.
Best we can hope for is for Michigan to beat the snot out of them making Michigan look that much better when we meet them. I’m not counting on it though. The Notre Dame defense completely shut down MSU. Unlike MSU, Michigan is completely one-dimensional. They should have no trouble with the Wolverines.
Thank you Stanford
So USC took a bow out to Stanford. It will be interesting to see how far they drop in the polls. ESPN’s fan poll on the subject has some interesting results.
Thank you Louisiana Monroe
Thankfully, last week’s Louisiana Monroe’s win over Arkansas let the world know that Alabama’s 52-0 routing of the hogs really doesn’t mean anything. If it wasn’t for ULM’s overtime win the SEC would have yet another feather in their toughest division in the world hat. Of course, ULM pushed Auburn into overtime today meaning of course that ULM must indeed be a top 10 caliber team.
{ 8 comments… read them below or add one }
Chris Speilman, resisting the animal instinct to gear-up, take the field, and demonstrate to da youngsters how to tackle, said it best, “They’re not wrapping up.”
I find myself less confident about the conference schedule than I was a couple of weeks ago. I guess we have going for us the fact the nobody else looks very good either, and that the kids did not give up. Some would have folded after Cal came back and took the lead. Braxton moved the ball when they really needed to. But, where was that offense the rest of the second half? I saw some very Bollman like play calling at times. I thought we brought in an inventive offense coordinator. It looked like the game plan was run run run then let Braxton scramble and make a play.
They now have a whole lot of coaching opportunities and a weak UAB coming in to practice them on. Hope it works.
And AB, a bad for Basil would be his place kicking. A missed PAT and another that squeaked inside the upright makes me nervous when we really need one.
Good: Kicker Drew Basil making a great tackle. Best thing is that he wasn’t the last defense preventing a touchdown. Basil was right in the mix and made a great hit.
Not so good: O.K. I don’t have anything here. Basil made a good tackle. Maybe he can teach the defense a thing or two.
…. how about….
Not so good: Drew Basil missed an XP.
Big 10 to this point in the season has been horrible. I don’t know that anyone is going to beat Bama. Just sayin.
Yep. I guess that would be a not so good for Basil. I think that one was so big that nature prevented me from remembering e pain of that kick.
How about the new AP. Buckeyes drop after a win.
No question Bollmam made a return to the play calling. I think that is a big reason Meyer was much more refrained in his post game criticism. The Buckeyes were out coached.
I think you can thank the BIG10 officiating crew for this win. There were way too many questionable calls that went tOSU’s way…….. including the “hold” against CAL that took away a touchdown. CAL ended up up with ZERO points on that drive. The NCAA should use nuetral refs with non conference FBS games.
On the bright side …….. tOSU picked up the pace and was playing much quicker this week.
You always get home cooking when playing at your house. The best thing that happened for the Buckeye’s was every time Cal scored the buckeye’s would answer with a score.
I think Luke needs to have a long talk with his defence, the played like crap, especially the secondary, they forgot how to cover and to much arm tackleing.
Miller still misses to many wide open receivers, he floats the ball to much, no zip at all.
The running game picked up with the return of Jordan Hall.
Except for the no huddle I still say the offense still looks like the same old Tressel ball.
Just saying, Peace out.
Referee arrangements are made when schools agree to these home and home series. I’m not arguing with you, but it’s not up to the NCAA if a school willingly agrees to the terms of scheduling with another school.