Ohio State Survives Navy In Disappointing Season Opener
As your Mark Mays, Lendale Whites, and Pat Fordes of the world continue to pile on the Buckeyes for the run of play against the Midshipmen, I’m left to qualify that we did indeed win today… even if we went out of our way not to make that the case in the 4th quarter.
Indeed, the entire second half was uninspiring football. The defense held as Navy opened the second half with the ball, even pinning them to their own one yard line after a miscue. However, Ohio State’s offense on their ensuing series was highlighted by a succession of miscues. Boren jumped the gun too early, Pryor committed a delay of game, and a linemen held on a play to march the Buckeyes back into their own territory. The ensuing punt did pin the Middies at their own one yard line. It did no good, as Navy continued to march the field, undaunted by 3rd down scenarios, and found the end zone. Navy, a 3 touchdown underdog, were now down just 20-14.
Afterwards, Ohio State added a field goal and, after a Kurt Coleman strip, finally found the end zone in the 4th quarter. The PAT was no good, but the Buckeyes looked to have finally taken control of this game. Kurt Coleman, now more than atoning for getting trucked by Ricky Dobbs on a 3rd down play deep in Navy’s side of the field in their 99yd TD drive, had picked off a pass and the Buckeyes were driving. Then, things got a little crazy. On a 4th down and 1, Tressel obliged Pryor’s wishes to forgo a field goal that would’ve made it a 3 possession game and go for it. Boom Herron was stuffed on Navy’s 15. The very next play, Ricky Dobbs found Marcus Curry torching Anderson Russell in the secondary for an 85yd TD. It was the third longest play in Navy football history and it brought Navy within 8.
Still, there was only just over 6 minutes left in the game and Navy had only one timeout to their name. Ohio State looked to be driving, until Taurian Washington inexplicably short-armed a pass thrown to him. The next play, Pryor — locked on Sanzenbacher — overthrew him and was picked off and returned into Ohio State territory. 3 plays later, Ricky Dobbs was untouched on a QB Follow and ready to tie the game. Fortunately, Brian Rolle stepped in, picked off Dobbs and returned it for 2. Navy’s onside kick attempt sailed out of bounds and the Buckeyes escaped with a narrow victory.
Soo…
Offense
I thought the offensive line was disappointing. As Spielman pointed out, their inability to reliably create running lanes against a defensive front about half their size was astonishing. To be sure, Herron and Saine got yards this game, but most of them came from the double option out of the shotgun. Nothing out of the I formation seemed to work. It wasn’t any lineman in particular that I could gather, but the unit as a whole showed me they are miles away from being competitive at a national level. If the offensive line couldn’t open up running plays against an undersized defensive line for Navy — who lost their best player at NG due to an academy rules violation — why am I supposed to believe they’ll be up to the task against USC? I’m very disappointed here.
Pat Forde, for some reason, dogged on Pryor in his tweet updates, but I saw a lot of improvement today from what I remember last year. His passes had a lot more zip on them with very few wounded ducks. I’m sure critics of Ohio State football will raise an eyebrow, but it’s worth noting that his passes on the out routes were exceptional. They were put in places where only his receivers could catch them, even if Taurian Washington was unwilling to oblige. He will need to do a much better job reading defenses. Ram Vela did not conceal the fire zone blitz… at all… and Pryor never read it. This became more pronounced when Bauserman made an appearance in the second quarter since Bauserman lacks Pryor’s escapability.
Other observations about the offense:
- The Buckeyes made much better use of the TEs this game than we saw in games last season. Stoneburner made an appearance and Ballard had 3 receptions for 51 yards.
- Dan Herron looked like Brandon Saine of yesteryear whereas Saine looked like Herron of yesteryear. I was impressed with Saine and I thought he outplayed Boom. On that 4th and 1, I would’ve subbed in Saine for Herron.
- Where did DeVier Posey go? He caught Ohio State’s first pass, caught another one, and was never heard from again.
- It was hard to not be impressed with Duron Carter.
Defense
It’s hard for this untrained eye to project what to expect from the defense after watching this game, since so much of the defense’s performance is a function of an offense the Buckeyes will never see again. A few things stood out nevertheless.
Defensive line was alright. I expected more from Thaddeus Gibson this game than I got. He needed to slant inside more and needed to do a lot more in backside pursuit when the offense was opting for a pitch to the B back. He finished with 3 solo tackles, 2 TFLs and a sack. The tackles did an alright job occupying space. Larimore commanded some double teams (finished with 7 tackles). Doug Worthington did as well, and had only 2 tackles to his credit. Nathan Williams was a force when he was in the game.
Brian Rolle looked to be as good as advertised. He finished with 9 tackles, 3 solo. He, more so than the others, was able to read the backside guard on designed toss/pitch plays. However, the Buckeyes need more consistency from him. I remind myself of a play early in the game where he stormed the point of attack and inadvertantly overran the play. Of course, he had that pick-2 in the final moments of the game. Spitler, for his limited appearances in the game, was not up to the challenge. Jermale Hines was relied on more than he for precisely that reason, I guess. Nevertheless, Spitler did little to separate himself from Sabino this game.
As for the secondary? Well, Kurt Coleman went into gorilla mode (defensive MVP in my book) after getting trucked on a 3rd down play by Ricky Dobbs early into their 99yd TD drive. His strip and his INT were highlights of the game. Chimdi Chekwa looked to hold his own. Everyone else, though, looked meek. I guess I would be remiss if I didn’t single Anderson Russell out in particular, but Chris Spielman did enough of that on my behalf during the telecast. I guess I’ll cite Dave Biddle:
For starters, we learned that fifth-year senior Anderson Russell shouldn’t be, uh, starting. He’s a good young man and there is no reason to trash him personally. But we’re talking about his football skills and if he is one of the top two safeties on this team, then OSU is seriously lacking in talent at the position.
…I think Jermale Hines is going to take the starting job away from Russell at some point. Hines is basically OSU’s third starting linebacker (he was out there instead of Austin Spitler to start the Navy game) even though he’s listed as a safety. He’s also the Buckeyes’ No. 1 nickel back. But I think the time has arrived to just make him a starting safety, period. They can also move him down to outside linebacker or nickel back/star whenever they want.
To make a long story short, Hines should play more and Russell should play less in my opinion.
Yeah… well, yeah, pretty much.
Concluding Thoughts
This game is an unqualified disappointment. The only things that didn’t happen that would have made this game worse are A) lose and B) having someone important injured. Minus Pryor’s improved mechanics, the Buckeyes did nothing this game to positively answer lingering questions about the Buckeyes entering this season. If we permit that the Buckeyes eased off the accelerator, for whatever reason, with the adverse consequence of allowing Navy back in the game, we’re still left with the conclusion that being so reckless and inattentive to the matter at hand cost players like Jaamal Berry, Jordan Hall, Dorian Bell, Andrew Sweat and others from getting valuable playing time. It’s a good thing that the Buckeyes are not in school yet; they can spend an inordinate amount of time towards getting from, basically, A to Z1. I hope they do. The Buckeyes have important questions to answer about Anderson Russell, about the offensive line, and consistency from the linebackers.
Miscellany
- I’m glad Navy didn’t show up in those hideous uniforms they wore against Army and in the bowl game last year.
- The pregame ceremonies, including Navy and Ohio State running out together, looked really cool.
- I’m very disappointed with the crowd at Ohio Stadium. I can’t stress the “very” enough. Fans were sitting most of the game and looked disinterested the entire game. I fear Ohio State fans are going to degenerate into Michigan fans at this pace. Stand up and cheer dammit.
- I wish Tressel would stop going on offense first. The logic is that, if the Buckeyes get the ball first and score, they get the opposing team playing behind a score early. However, it’s basically an irrelevant advantage, and it’s one that costs the Buckeyes from getting the ball after halftime. I’d like to see halftime adjustments on offense first.
- I had no idea Stefanie Spielman was wheelchair-ridden. It’s impossible to see that and not ache for Chris Spielman and family.
- We skip B through Y when talking about USC. [↩]
Thanks B-Rolle for getting it done…………..
Why did Tress go away from the spread offense??………..it was working. We could have really put up passing numbers.
Hopefully , Tress wasn’t giving up alot due to USC next week. Thats the only reason I could think of not going nuts with the spread ……….
I believe Navy won the toss and deferred to the 2nd half…at least that’s what they announced at the stadium.
Could not possibly agree more about the fans at the game today. Hands down, it was the quietest I have ever heard the ‘Shoe. It was almost as if the fans were scared to yell lest it be seen as disrespectful to our esteemed visitors. I am all for paying our men and women in uniform their due respect (and we owe them a TON) but that doesn’t mean we can’t cheer against them at a football game.
Ah, thanks for the heads-up Josh.
The sad part about the fans is that it’s basically what I saw last year against Youngstown State, Ohio and Purdue, from what I recall.
I’ve noticed that the chorus is coming down on Anderson Russell so far from the likes of Ken Gordon, Heath Schneider, Dave Biddle and so on. It’s not overly negative or critical of Russell (he’s still a Buckeye and a good citizen), but it’s one of those things where you’d expect some media types to try to put a positive spin on it or try to assuage our anxieties. It’s just simply not coming.
I’m gonna sign on to everything you’ve written here, Vico, and refer back to my own answers to the last Block O re: OL and Russell.
If we want to try and find a silver lining/make excuses for the OL’s performance, well – I guess we can say that it’s a lot of new faces in new places and we should allow them a game to jell; or we can agree w/ Lou Holth’s halftime observation that teams make their biggest improvements from Week 1 to Week 2; or we can even point to an observation I seem to remember hearing from the ESPN crew that it might not be a true measure of an OL to watch them against an undersized and pesky DL rather than a more conventionally-sized one. But those all sound and smell like bullshit to me. I wish I could say I was surprised. Jim Cordle stood out to me as the worst performer in a bad showing by the unit; that holding call was the dagger to an otherwise probably manageable situation, and in general, I don’t know if I’ve ever seen a football player just standing around abjectly watching the end of a failed play as often as he did today. It’s like RT is where half-assed talent goes to die since Barton left.
Jebus, Russell: Here are the stats on Navy’s 1st two scoring drives – 15, 80, 6:54 and 15, 99, 8:38. When Navy stepped to their own 15, there was just 6:27 on the clock and Navy had just one timeout. While they certainly would have tried to “hurry-up”, whatever that means in terms of their offense, they were still down 15 at that point. But Anderson Russell decided he was going to make it easy for the Middies. He also, according to Spielman – who I think we can agree knows a little bit – was primarily responsible for allowing another TD catch. Think about that: because of Russell, Navy has more passing TDs right now than Terrelle Pryor. As Carlo said about Gay Vito, “He’s gotta GO!”, no questions asked.
I said in the liveblog over @ tBBC that I’m a lemonade-from-lemons guy when it comes to the Buckeyes, and that’s still true, but the more I think about this game the more I seem to be running out of sugar. But: I thought TP was good, Saine very good, 4 TE catches outstanding, and I guess I can get behind the idea of a true test being better for this team at this point than a pedestrian walkover. And the idea that – aside from Russell – there was nothing we saw today that can tell us much about how the D is likely to perform against the Trojans next week, unless Carroll decides to install a triple-option attack over the next few days. So we’ll see.
I think we can see now why T- Washington hasn’t broke into the playing lineup …………..
For me what kept navy in the game was when tressel went with the backup so early. Pryor was getting it going on offense and we could have blown it open. I was going to make the trip next sat. but now im in major limbo after that lackluster performance.
Oh, one other thing that I forgot, and thank you, tampa, for reminding me: The 11W threads have quickly become a very stupid place.
What kept Navy in the game was not going for the throat on offense……………Tress should have went no-huddle and spread that navy D out and just shred away
All I know ………if we have a killer instinct inside that coaching staff……….it better come out next week.
Julio Jones just dropped a 3rd and 1 pass that would have been about a 15 yd completion. Why aren’t the Bama fans calling for his neck like we are for Taurian. People drop passes, this isn’t NCAA 2010 guys. Shit happens sometimes but you have to kep plugging away and getting better. We’ve got to do the best we can with what we have
I now i am going to get slammed, but I have had enough of Tressel ball and think it is time for him to retire. His teams have increasingly lacked passion, fire, and look unprepared. Once again the offensive line gets blown up. I firmly believe we could have 5 five star linemen start for 4 years and the result would be the same. Lack luster play, lack of hitting or driving a defender off the ball. Speilman even stated that when a team like osu cannot get 2 yards on 2 tries, that team has a serious problem. We do and it really pains me to say but it starts at the top. Tressels team have become more vapid with time.
I don’t like to bash coaches or players but if you make mistakes in life your held accountable, right….right el? So how long can Tressel ride 2002?
We won the game but we are watching the same thing over and over with different players year after year. That tells me its not the players. So what is it?
I watch other teams and they look excited and the fans sound excited. I watched the game today and it looked like we were sleep walking out there. After we did get it going Tressel pulls the Star QB mid 2nd quarter to get reps for the backup?!
NEWS FLASH COACH TRESSEL if T. Pryor goes down with an injury this team won’t make a bowl game based on what I saw from them today. So why not give your starter all the work you can give him? Stop coaching in fear or not to lose. Tresselball isn’t pretty.
Get them ready to play. Plain and simple. That is the job of a coach. Anyone could win a 10 games a year with 77 nfl players over the last 9 seasons. Show us something!!!
Don’t forget to credit Thad with his forced fumble, that was a big play. But I agree, I expected a bit more from him; namely, I expected him to destroy everything moving.
The fans. I told my wife the exact same thing. We looked like a bunch of wine sipping, cheese eating, mi fans…sad.
This is what I mean: “Get them ready to play” and “get (meaningful) reps for the backup” are, apparently, goals that are in conflict. Not to mention that we’ve known for a couple days now that Bauserman was absolutely going to get a 2nd Q series w/ the starters and I didn’t hear any howling until today. Not to mention, further, that Bauserman led the team on a SCORING drive against a pretty good opponent in his very 1st meaningful game minutes EVER.
Did anyone watch Alabama vs Virginia Tech? I was rooting for Tech but Alabama is what I WOULD LIKE OUR TEAM TO LOOK LIKE. They play fast and aggressive with great execution. Why is it that a first time starter at QB at Bama with a bunch of new lineman can look so smooth and in control but we can’t seem to develop or coach our players in this same manner?
We are going to get our ass whipped by USC.
I will take Tresselball of Stoops ball any day. The fans out here in Big 12 country want him fired. When ever I tell them “some” Buckeye fans want Tressel gone, they laugh and tell me they would take Tressel. They remind me that at least Tressel wins the games he is supposed to win.
I meant to say Tresselball OVER Stoopsball.
Some game, eh? On the plus side I thought Pryor played pretty well, Saine looked really good and Coleman was a beast. On the negative side, our running game (I-formation) sucked, thanks to some pretty indifferent play from the O-line and some pussyfoot running by ‘Boom-let Herron.’ Defense seemed pretty much sleepwalking in second half and someone needs to show Anderson Russell how to play safety.
Right now, I’m not overly confident about this coming Saturday.
My biggest problem with Anderson Russell is that his screwups appear to be mostly of the mental variety – something that you shouldn’t see from a fifth year senior. He’s now personally given up the Buckeyes’ opponents’ last three TD passes. Against Texas, it was clearly dumb of him to decide to try and break up the pass rather than make the sure tackle and watch the clock tick away. On the first Navy TD pass yesterday, the broadcasters pointed out that it was his responsibility to take away the WR’s outside because Coleman was coming from the middle of the field. Again, a mental mistake. On the 85-yarder, I don’t know. Maybe he just got totally outclassed by a Navy wideout, which makes me shudder to think of what might happen against one of USC’s 5 star studs.
I think we played a quality opponent , Navy has put up numbers that has ranked them high nationally in several catagories. And they have won thier previous Bowl games the last couple yrs. And this team is the youngest we’ve had in a long time. I think Navy would give alot of Big Boys fits with that option offense…………….
USC was not tested at all Saturday ( San Jose St. ), heck if your gonna start a Frosh …….that is a good time to do it. Next Saturday, different environment……….very different opponent. Pryor wasn’t intimidated by USC last yr………….and isn’t gonna be next week. LAst memory I had of Pryor in last yrs contest was him converting a 1st down………only to get yanked and replaced by Todd ( who looked like a petrified deer ).
I am not throwing in the towel , nor am I wanting Tressel’s job vacated. There are some things we can improve on before next week, but lets not get ridiculous here. Tressel admitted on that 4th and short play he shoulda kicked the field goal( as he normally does )…………and he stated that will never happen again .
…………..on to next week……………Go Bucks!!
Another quick note on the crowd at Saturday’s game. While it was uber-quiet (as noted earlier, the quietest I can ever remember), it’s important to remember the students are not yet in session and, as such, many of them aren’t attending games. I’m confident that this week’s tilt with USC, and all other home games this season, will have a very different vibe.
It should also be noted that it’s hard to get excited about non-exciting football…unless you consider Navy with a chance to tie in the 4th quarter exciting.
Fans were comparably as quiet and disinterested during the Purdue and Ohio games last year as well. It’s the principle of the thing. Games at Ohio Stadium need to resemble more of a Premiership game, less of a bingo night at a retirement home.
Vico,
The only Buckeye game in the past 3 years I quit watching and left to do something else was the Purdue game from 08. That, my friends, was boring football. I wanted to fall asleep on my couch, no wonder the players and fans in the Shoe are so quiet.