Ryan Day Updates: Buckeyes Moving Beyond Penn State Win

COLUMBUS — Ohio State head coach Ryan Day met with reporters on Tuesday to revisit the win at Penn State, talk about the state of his team, and look ahead to this week’s game against Purdue. The highlights of everything he had to say can be found below.

On the left side of the offensive line: They both graded out champions and played their best down the stretch, especially on that last drive. New challenge this week. That game’s behind us.
Update on Tyleik Williams: He’s day to day. Doing well.
Kayden McDonald really stepped up and they hope he can continue to give them more snaps. They’re going to keep asking more and more of him in big short-yardage situations.
Eddrick Houston has a very bright future at Ohio State. He hasn’t played a lot inside so he’s learning a new position. He embraced the position move and can be an elite player at three technique.
On the CFP rankings: Just focused on Purdue. That’s all that matters. Gotta keep winning.
On the confidence down the stretch in a game: “I think we know we can do it.” Should they be in those situations two weeks in a row? No, but the game of football takes its twists and turns along the way. “You’ve got to win the game in the fourth quarter.” They milked the last five minutes of the game, which doesn’t always happen. “Whatever it takes to win the game is what we’ve got to do.” Have to run the ball physically.
On Will Howard’s turnovers, concerns? “It can’t happen. It can’t happen. We have to take care of the football.” He was fooled a bit in what he saw on the interception, and you can’t fumble the ball inside the 10-yard line. “Just can’t do it.” “He knows that.” They will keep hammering it home this week for everybody.
On Carson Hinzman: They looked at him in the preseason. He was out with an illness. He was the backup center, then they moved him to guard. They liked Tegra Tshabola better as a starter. Moving Donovan Jackson to tackle left a hole. They felt like Hinzman’s experience was the thing to do at Penn State. They will continue to go with him this week and he has to keep building on that performance.
How was the conversation with Donovan Jackson on moving to tackle? Any time you’re making a move like that and doing it against a talented opponent, there’s a lot to think about “but he never flinched.” He embraced it. They tailored the game as best they could around the situation, but they did leave him alone a couple of times. Jackson fought his tail off. “I think he can be a very good tackle.” He’s athletic and has good feet. Now he needs more reps to build his confidence.
The fourth-and-two throw to Jelani Thurman: “Those are not easy decisions.” Thurman was the last read in the progression. They never got to that read in practice. He had three catches and three drops on that play. The sideline was excited for him. He has a tremendous amount of talent. When he’s consistently doing his job and knowing what he’s doing, you can see it.
On Carson Hinzman’s growth from last year: He has toughness, athleticism. He’s smart. After watching the film, having guys next to him and not worrying about line calls as a center allowed him to focus on his job.
Having Seth McLaughlin in there has built a confidence in the entire offensive line. He talks technique, approach, attitude, etc.
What more do you need from Tegra Tshabola? He was close to grading out a champion. “We thought he played his tail off.” Just a few things to clean up. It doesn’t take away from the effort. He was right there.
On Will Howard moving on from mistakes: “Better than me.” He definitely moves on quickly. “He’s got a knack for that.” There is a fine line between acknowledging what went wrong and not letting it affect you the next time. They try to make practice hard and see if bad plays bog a player down for an entire practice. Look at the way Davison Igbinosun responding with an interception after getting beaten deep. This team has been tested more than OSU teams in the past.
Are you concerned at all with Seth McLaughlin’s snaps? “We want very, very accurate snaps. It makes a big difference.” He’s been accurate. This was a clean game from the offensive line. No penalties. “I thought Seth handled himself well and handled the environment well overall.”
On Chip Kelly’s playcalling: “I thought he called a good game. I thought he had patience.” He’s more patient than Day is. He established the run. He did a good job putting the defense in conflict, such as the touchdown pass to Emeka Egbuka.
“The Penn State game’s over. We’ve got to worry about Purdue.”
On the difference on the DL attack the last two weeks: “It’s looked the way that we’ve wanted it to look.” They almost started from scratch after the Oregon game. They re-engineered the defense. They looked at what teams were doing to get them schemed up so they changed things there. “We’re doing a better job of putting our guys in position to be successful.” There’s a lot of football left and they’ve put a lot of football on film.
“I think Purdue’s offense is playing well. If our guys think they’re just gonna go out there and play this Saturday, they’re wrong. They’re a much better team than their record shows.”
How much has your presence helped on defense? There is a good system in place with coaches, but it was good to add in his own thoughts on what he was seeing as an offensive coach to make sure that everybody is on the same page. “I think the communication has been good.”
How has the energy been since the win on Saturday? They’ll find out today at practice and in the 2:30 meeting today. “A lot of football ahead of us.”
Why didn’t Jeremiah Smith score this week? Well, he had a chance, they just didn’t connect on it. It wasn’t for lack of trying. He didn’t flinch in that game.
On the first sneak on the last drive: They had to get away from the goal line for a number of reasons. To see the entire offensive line move the ball out to the five-yard line, “that’s what we needed in that moment.” The RBs ran hard in that game. “That’s gotta be who we are.”
How much does “leaving no doubt” matter in the CFP era? Is a win a win? “Yeah, a win is a win.” Can’t remember finishing a game like they did on Saturday. The need for style points is less important. The number of plays are down. Teams are huddling. It’s becoming more and more NFL-like in terms of that. It’s not necessarily just back and forth anymore like it used to be.
What goes into a goal-line stand? It starts with the guys up front. Those five guys holding the line. Then the next level of guys like Cody Simon and Sonny Styles. They pushed the pile on defense. It was a huge difference.
Caleb Downs is all over the field. “He’s having a huge impact on our defense.”
On the two missed deep passes, what happened? Carnell Tate did a great job off the line of scrimmage. Will Howard just needs to keep the ball more inside. On the throw to Jeremiah Smith, he felt like the safety depth meant that the ball wouldn’t be coming his way. They tell Will Howard that if the safeties are level with Smith to just throw it as far as he can.
They didn’t execute on offense as well as they’d like but they won it with physicality and toughness. But you can combine all of those things and make things even better.
Validation for Justin Frye: It was a big step in the right direction for sure. If they can keep building on this, it “would be a heck of a deal.” They have a level of confidence coming out of this game but it doesn’t matter if you don’t do it again this week.
How confident are you that Will Howard can take you to a championship level? I think what you saw at the end of the game gives you the confidence that he can finish a game. Having his legs and physicality made a difference. “He is the leader of this team and the guys believe in him. We know that we can win every game with Will Howard.” He is a winner.
What is Zen Michalski’s status? “Right now, we’re gonna stick with what we have.” He likely won’t be available this week.
Was there a drive on Saturday that fit your vision? The response after the interception. They went out there without any hesitation. There was a confidence level that impacted the entire game. The perimeter blocking needs to be better though.