Our Honor Defend

I’ll handle this one, though we all agree on where this ranks in our top 5. Of course, the purpose of this poorly-cobbled list is the utility in healing. We would do the kittens route, since we’re all cat people here, but the Michigan loss to Appy State necessarily led to that being taken already¹. We’re sympathetic with the claim that once you get to the heights of The Ohio State University’s athletics department, the highs are higher and the lows are lower². Nobody knows the lows better than I do³, but we reiterate that this was a very good finish for a team projected at third in the Big 10⁴. Okay, enough wasting time though, and on to #4.

We mean not to rub this in to our friends from Northwestern⁵, since Northwestern is kind of emblematic of the Big 10 in general: quality students-athletes at a high quality school. But this, we both agree, just rocked:

04. Papa Laurinaitis introduces the Buckeyes; Northwestern feels the rush.

Again, this is not a neener-neener against Northwestern; this is, however, in praise of Joe Laurinaitis’ introduction of the Buckeyes. We here at OHD love Joe Laurinaitis since we like to think he’s basically the Team Dad of The Ohio State University Buckeyes. We hope that his enthusiasm for the game, the Bucks and his fatherly love of his son leads him to do all the things a Team Dad would do, like taking some of the players into his minivan and driving them to practice and preparing orange slices and Capri Sun in a little cooler for the kids after a hardfought game. Of course, we don’t know that he’s doing that, we just like to think he is. However, his introduction of the Buckeyes was real. As we were telling ourselves: That. Just. HAPPENED.

And it was exceptional too. Papa Laurinaitis put on the full show for TV Land: the face paint, the fast-paced, in-your-face yelling that he would do contra the since-deceased Hawk’s (Michael Hegstrand) more methodical delivery, and even the eyes-wide-open stare of death. We were thrilled, honestly. And odds are, so you were as well. We here at OHD were pumped the moment we saw it was him introducing the Bucks, and we got excited. And we do mean excited. His delivery was Oscar-quality, if at the very least pro wrestling interview quality, and it was blood-pumping enough to make us want to run through our television set, find and climb the nearest turnbuckle and deliver a devastating, neckbreaking Doomsday Device to some hapless Wildcat football player.

Evidently, the Bucks on the field felt the same way. From the very start of the game, the Bucks took the cue from the Team Dad and pummeled the Wildcats mercilessly. 3 Yards and a Cloud of Dust be damned as the Bucks became the Big Play Bucks again that we would grow to expect from the 2007 squad. Brian Robiskie had two touchdown catches in the first 4 minutes. Vernon Gholston ran in a 25yd fumble to make it 28-0 with 5 minutes left in the first quarter. The Bucks would end up ahead at intermission 45-0. They would end up pouring it on for an easy 1-2-3 pinfall — a score of 58-7, with Northwestern’s only score coming from a kick return for a touchdown to begin the second half. We like to think it started with Joe Laurinaitis’ exhilarating introduction. Demonstrable causality be damned.

Uuuuuggggggggggggggh WHAT A RUSH.

1. That said, interested readers can get their dose of kitten healing pictures here [↩]
2. hat tip to the old man in putting it this way [↩]
3. see my W-L record [↩]
4. unsourced, but we’re under the impression we were supposed to finish behind Michigan and Penn State [↩]
5. this is a half-truth, Vico hasn’t completely gotten over the 2004 loss in Ryan Field [↩]