Will Howard Thankful For Second Chance At The Ducks

There’s a lot that runs through a quarterback’s mind during a game — like how to keep a defensive lineman from running through his face.

When the game is on the line and every second matters, all eyes are on the quarterback, and if a play doesn’t get made, he’s going to get the blame. That was the situation the first time Ohio State and Oregon met earlier this season in Eugene.

Buckeye quarterback Will Howard played one of his best games of the year, but slid down too late as time expired as he was getting his team into field goal range. The clock hit zero and the final score read 32-31 Oregon.

It was a controversial play, and one that Howard has relived over and over again in his mind.

“It’s like, how much do you focus on that, but not let it affect you?” he said earlier this week. “Man, I still have nightmares about that play. I still run it over in my head. What could I have done better?”

The wouldas, couldas, and shouldas were rampant. But now, Howard and the Buckeyes have an opportunity to move completely past that October heartbreaker. They have a rematch with Oregon, and the winner moves on to the College Football Playoff semifinals.

This is not an opportunity that Will Howard is taking lightly.

“I get a chance to go out there and right the wrong from that game,” he said. “You don’t get second chances a lot in life. It just doesn’t happen. I’m thankful that we even get a chance to go out there and play these guys again. And it really has nothing to do with me, man. It’s about this team and the way that we lost that game, you know? It still hurts. Still hurts all of us. So we’re excited for another crack at these guys. “

The loss to Oregon was a pivotal moment for this Ohio State football team. It shook up the Buckeye defense, forcing some changes in operation and scheme. It also knocked them down a peg. And it took them a while to get over that loss — especially with an open week immediately afterward.

In other words, this loss stayed with the team longer than most. Which is one of the reasons Will Howard has watched that game over and over again. “More times than I can count,” he said. The other reason is that they’re the next team up.

“We’ve got the game playing in the facility here, so nobody’s forgot about it,” Howard said. “I watched it quite a few times during that bye week afterwards. You know, how could I fix it? And then at the same time, you want to flush it and get away from it. But now that they’re back, they’re the squad we’re playing.”

The loss hurts Howard especially because when he rewatches the game, he sees the different ways the Buckeyes let the game get away.

“There were so many opportunities for us to win that game,” he said. “Looking back at it, we just didn’t play our best ball that day. And it makes you excited because we got another chance at it. And like I said, you don’t get a lot of second chances in life and God’s blessed us with one, so we’ve got to make sure we take advantage of it.”

As to the matchup ahead of the Buckeyes, this will not be the same Oregon team they faced over two months ago. Both teams are different. Both teams have grown.

The team that wins this one will have earned it once again.

“It’s a hell of a team. I mean, Oregon’s a great team,” Howard said. “They do some really good stuff, man. It’s not going to be easy, but we’ve got to go in there and do our thing and take what they give us and impose our will, because that’s the only way we can do it from here on out.”

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