Buckeyes Will Need Elite Decision Making From Will Howard

Will Howard has nearly 30 career starts to his credit, but this Saturday will be his first at Ohio State.

He will be the most-experienced starting quarterback the Buckeyes have had since JT Barrett was behind center in 2016.

Howard has seen it all. He has won a Big XII Championship Game. He’s won and lost big games in large venues. With that kind of mileage and experience, more can eventually be asked of Howard. For now, OSU head coach Ryan Day just wants to see the offense operate as designed in game one.

“We want him to run the team and be clean,” Day said on Tuesday. “Get us in and out of the huddle. Get us up to the line of scrimmage. Be sharp, take care of the football. You’ve heard me say the term, ‘make the routine plays routinely.’ Play well on third down, red zone, and two-minute. I mean, that’s what we’re looking for out of our quarterback. But in particular, in that first game, it’s run a clean operation. That’s ball security, that’s cadence, that’s communication.”

Expectations and pressure will ramp up for Will Howard, but it’s not like he’s unfamiliar with it. The pressure may be higher, but he’s never been better equipped to handle it. Part of that is because of his maturity and part of that is because of the sheer amount of talent around him.

The best way to handle pressure is with a little help from your friends, after all.

Plus, it’s not like Howard was unaware of everything that came with his decision to transfer to Ohio State. There are national title expectations, and now he’s the quarterback that is supposed to make that happen.

How is he handling that portion of the job?

“Yeah, I expect him to be the same way he’s been since he arrived here,” Day said. “We went through the recruiting process there, and he knew what he was getting himself into here at Ohio State. And not to speak for him, but I think there was only maybe a couple places he would have considered other than going to the NFL, and this was it for him. He wanted to be here.

“I think a big part of that is he knew what came with it. And he’s really embraced that role. He’s been in here getting extra film work in this week already. He’s put a lot of work in this preseason. So we ask our quarterbacks to do a lot here, and he’s embraced that part of it. So he’s got a good look in his eye this week, and I think he wants to get on the field and get started.”

As Day said, the quarterbacks are asked to do a lot, which means they have to also do it well. The expectations each year are for Ohio State’s quarterback to play well enough to be a Heisman finalist and a future first-round NFL Draft pick.

Talent helps make that happen but it’s the decision making where the separation truly occurs. In Ryan Day’s offense — especially now with the addition of offensive coordinator Chip Kelly, there are always options. Obviously, every pass play has a thought process to it for the quarterback, but so do the run plays.

Which is one of the reasons Kelly has labeled the quarterbacks in this offense as “run-game coordinators.”

“Rarely in this offense do you just take the ball, hand it off, and move on,” Day explained. “There are some where you take a deep breath. But I think what Chip is getting at and kind of why we say a run-game coordinator is the decisions that have to be made. It’s not just in the pass game. It’s also in the run game, equating numbers, reading players, whether they’re linebackers, safeties, or on the line of scrimmage.”

So far, Will Howard has handled these tasks well, but that was practice. The games start on Saturday, so every decision made will have real consequences.

“He needs to be an expert,” Day said of Howard’s decision making. “He’s got to be the best in the country at that, because if he can do that, then — and again, not extraordinary — just routine plays, making them, then we’ll have an opportunity to continue to make first downs.”

Howard has embraced the expectations and performed in practice. He won the starting job and now the offense is in his hands.

He welcomes the responsibility and looks forward to the challenges ahead.

“Obviously the coaches can only do so much, but we’re the ones that are out there actually calling the shots, and I’m the one that’s got the chalk last on a lot of that stuff,” Howard said. “So it’s cool. It gives me a little more sense of responsibility about the offense. And it makes you as a quarterback — you’re always clued into something.

“When you’re a quarterback and you’re mentally taking plays off, that’s not a good thing. You should be locked and dialed in to every single play. ‘What’s my plan?’ I need to have a plan every single play. And Coach Kelly and Coach Day have done a really good job of instilling that in me.”