All Darron Lee could do was let out a brief, sarcastic chuckle.
“Shocker,” he said when the fact Ohio State was an underdog for the third-straight game was brought up at the team’s media day Tuesday. “That’s a shock that we’re the underdogs again even after we beat the No. 1 team in the nation.”
Lee and the Buckeyes are are 6.5-point underdogs on most sites for Monday’s national championship against second-ranked Oregon.
Alabama was favored by more than a touchdown in the Sugar Bowl over Ohio State. The Buckeyes won, 42-35. Three weeks earlier, in the Big Ten championship game, Ohio State was a 4.5-point underdog to Wisconsin in the first start of Cardale Jones’ career. In that game, the Buckeyes routed the Badgers, 59-0.
“Hey, it’s whatever,” Lee said.
Ohio State hasn’t been the underdog much throughout Urban Meyer’s first 40 games as head coach — just six times, in fact — but this is the fourth time that’s been the case this season. The other time this year the Buckeyes were underdogs this year they beat Michigan State in East Lansing, 49-37.
So, what’s Meyer’s secret? How does he continue to get his teams ready to play games they’re not supposed to win?
“Motivation, he’s a huge motivator,” Lee said. “He knows how to get the message across to the entire team.”
It’s not something Meyer beats into his team’s brains, though. He doesn't have a scripted speech he gives to his team every time he finds himself in this role. Or so he says.
“We don’t do that until it gets close to game time,” he said. “I don’t like pull out my underdog script that we have in my file there. It’s what kind of team you’ve got, who we are playing.”
The kind of team Meyer’s got has been a resilient one. The Buckeyes have had an answer for everything that’s been thrown their way so far this season.
As a result, they’re one win away from a national championship — the program’s first since the 2002 season. An opportunity to win a national title is plenty enough motivation for this Ohio State.
“It’s kind of an unsaid feeling, a vibe that we all get. It kind of goes to the hunger we have as a team,” senior wide receiver Evan Spencer said. “We’re so hungry and we play with a chip on our shoulder and we do everything for each other and that hunger is for each other.”
“Them putting us as underdogs, let them, I don’t care,” Spencer continued. “We play so well as underdogs, I don’t really care what they predict the score to be because I know what we’re going to go out there and do and what we’re going to go out there and stop them from doing. Let’s go play ball.”
