Saturday was quite the day for Ohio State defensive end J.T. Tuimoloau and the national awards took notice of his big outing in Ohio State’s 44-31 win over then ranked No. 13 Penn State.
On Monday it was announced that Tuimoloau was honored by the Big Ten as its defensive player of the week. Additionally. the Bednarik Award named the Ohio State sophomore as its National Player of the Week, joining the Walter Camp which did the same in naming J.T. as its national player of the week.
Tuimoloau finished the game with six tackles with three of them going for loss which also included a pair of sacks. The Ohio State star also had two interceptions of his own along with a tripped ball that led to a Zach Harrison interception as Ohio State defensive ends had three picks of Sean Clifford.
Add to that a forced fumble and fumble recovery in the 4th quarter of the game which preceded Tuimoloau’s greatest feat of the day, a pick-six (his second interception of the day).
When you total it up, J.T. led to 21 of Ohio State’s 44 points in the week nine win.
This is Ohio State’s second defensive player of the week award as J.T. joins Tommy Eichenberg on those honors. An Ohio State player has won a conference player of the week (or co-player of the week) in seven of its eight weeks that it has played a game, only being shut out on week one when the Buckeyes defeated Notre Dame 21-10.
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