Buckeye Postgame Notebook: ‘It was better today than I remember in the past’

More Than Just Offense

The Buckeyes scored 52 points in their opening-season win over Akron on Saturday. Fourteen of those points came from the Ohio State defense.

Fifth-year senior safety Lathan Ransom picked up a third-quarter fumble forced by junior defensive end Caden Curry and returned it 27 yards for a score. One quarter later, redshirt freshman linebacker Gabe Powers snagged a tipped pass and returned it 29 yards for a touchdown in the game’s final minutes.

Ohio State forced three turnovers on the day, which was an offseason focus for head coach Ryan Day and his defensive staff after forcing just 11 turnovers last season.

After the win on Saturday, Day said they did some studies on turnovers in both college and the NFL. One was on if strip sacks happen more often in the pocket or out of it, and the other study was how to handle fumbles based on where they occur.

“If we get in open areas, we’re scooping and scoring,” Day said. “There’s an art to that and we practice that every Tuesday. And then I also thought there was some really good blocks set up on [Ransom’s score] as well. I thought the tipped ball, Gabe made a really nice play on the ball. It was just kind of a more athletic play, but ball disruption is something we spent some time on this offseason and ball security. If we’re going to win these games, we’ve got to make sure that we’re winning the ball security and turnover part of the game. Anytime you get a defensive score, that’s huge.”

The Buckeyes are also putting more emphasis on the kick and punt return games this year, which was evidenced by sophomore receiver Brandon Inniss posting four punt returns for 60 yards, including a long of 36 yards.

The Buckeyes had a total of 70 punt return yards in 2023. The last time they had more punt return yards in a game was a 76-5 win over Miami, Oh in 2019.

“You can see we were close to it in a couple of the returns,” Day said of the possibility of a special teams score. ” We’re working at it. We’re just one or two away. I don’t know what Brandon’s return yardage was but you can see there’s some potential back there. We’ve got a bunch of guys buying into that and we’re getting there. It was better today than I remember in the past. We’ll keep working on that because if we get some special teams scores and defensive scores, that can be a huge part of our season.”

Mind If He Plays Through?

Freshman wide receiver Jeremiah Smith got off to a rocky beginning in his first career start, but pointing out the rocky beginning in his first career start is kind of burying the lede.

He dropped his first pass and then was flagged for a false start on the very next play, but Smith was in the starting lineup for the season opener as a true freshman. He’s the first Buckeye receiver to accomplish that feat in recent memory.

It’s a testament to what he has done in practice and workouts since arriving in January. And that’s why nothing needed to be said to him to calm him down or correct him.

“Nobody even batted an eye,” Ryan Day said. “Nobody said a word. It was like, ‘He’s just gonna play through this and we’re gonna be fine.’ It wasn’t even a consideration because we see what he does every day in practice and we knew he was gonna settle in.”

The confidence that the team has in Smith was again echoed by Day. There will be growing pains, but it will be worth it.

“We’re gonna play right through just about all of it,” Day said. “I think he’s another guy, sometimes you look at him and you don’t think he’s quite human, but he is. He’s gonna make a few early mistakes but not very many. You can see the talent there.”

Smith’s teammates weren’t concerned either. Nobody’s perfect according to quarterback Will Howard.

“Yeah. No, there was no word said. None of us were worried about him at all,” Howard said. “Obviously, it’s a drop. It’s uncharacteristic. But, hey, I made a couple of bad passes. It’s not going to be perfect, man, but it’s that next-play mentality. Mental toughness is the ability to move on to the next most important thing. We knew his maturity level. We weren’t worried about it, and he came back and had a great game.”

It Wasn’t All Bad

The Ohio State offensive line has been a topic of consternation for about a year now, and Saturday’s slow-starting 52-6 win over Akron didn’t ease those concerns for many.

The Buckeyes rushed for 170 yards and averaged 5.2 yards per carry. They only bested that yardage four times last year, and only topped the 5.2 yards per carry three times last year.

Running backs TreVeyon Henderson and Quinshon Judkins rushed for 65 and 55 yards, respectively, on 21 combined carries (5.7 ypc).

“Yeah, when I looked at the numbers at halftime, I thought it was gonna be a lot worse than it was,” Ryan Day said after the game. “I think Trey was averaging six yards a carry and Quinshon was just under four, and then it looked much better in the second half.”

Ohio State was starting three new interior linemen on the day. With All-Big Ten left guard Donovan Jackson out, the Buckeyes went with redshirt freshman Austin Siereveld in his place. Siereveld never saw the field last year as a true freshman. Alabama transfer Seth McLaughlin also made his OSU debut at center. Right guard Tegra Tshabola was also making his first start.

Day chalked up some of the struggles to the interior of the offensive line, but they were not the only issue.

“I just think there was some things off in there on the interior,” he said. “Guys just weren’t quite fitting it up right. We weren’t that far off though schematically. We had some good ideas of what we were doing. There was a couple runs that maybe we could have hit better at running back, but I just think that we were just not great in the fits early on and I think you’d have to ask those guys. They seemed like they were pressing a little bit early on again, but then I thought they really settled in a little bit.”

The Buckeyes were also breaking in a new offensive coordinator. Chip Kelly was up in the booth calling plays with a purpose. That purpose, however, can take some time.

“I thought Chip called a good game, I really do,” Day said. “I think he knows what he wants to get done with this team. He wants to establish this run and that means, maybe that’s not scoring 70 or whatever, but we need to establish the run late in the season. So we’re gonna do that, and the quarterback’s gonna be a part of it.”

Asked to grade the running game, Day didn’t want to go too far without seeing the film, but did admit that now with iPads allowed on the sideline, he does actually get to see some film in real-time.

“So I don’t know how to grade it. I gotta watch the film and see,” he said. “The good thing is I actually get to watch some of the film during the game now so I can’t just always say ‘I’m gonna wait until tomorrow and make a decision.’ So I did see some of it and it wasn’t all great. It wasn’t all bad either though.”

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