DALLAS — As gold, black and yellow confetti poured out from the rafters of AT&T Stadium to officially signal Ohio State’s 42-20 win against Oregon in the first-ever College Football National Championship Monday night, Urban Meyer lifted the game’s trophy high and proud.
“The Chase,” he said, “is complete.”
And for the fourth-ranked Buckeyes (14-1), which ripped through the No. 2 Ducks, No. 1 Alabama and Wisconsin to reach this stage, it marks a triumphant climax after overcoming a season full of setbacks. Meyer said:
“This team wasn't supposed to do this, but they fought through adversity, they got stronger and stronger and stronger, and this is a great team. We finished the year a great team.”
Despite four turnovers, Ohio State controlled the game for most of the second half, amassed nearly 600 yards of total offense and won by almost three touchdowns. Meyer said:
“I don't want to get overdramatic, but it's as improved a football team, and I've watched football for a long time from Game 1 to Game 15. I've never seen anything like it.”
After all, when the Buckeyes, which were a young squad to begin with, lost star quarterback Braxton Miller to a season-ending injury 12 days before the opener, their championships hits took a considerable blow. And after a devastating loss to Virginia Tech at home in early September, it appeared life without Miller might capsize Ohio State’s season.
Instead, players like sophomore running back Ezekiel Elliott, who rumbled over the Ducks 246 yards and four touchdowns on 36 carries, Darron Lee, Eli Apple, J.T. Barrett, Cardale Jones and the entire offensive line blossomed after the loss to the Hokies. Meyer said:
“I certainly did not see that happening after spring practice and early in the season. But I undervalued — I didn't quite understand the improvement that these guys could make."
In particular, Elliott has emerged as a star lately and the Buckeyes’ run game, coupled with him and his blockers, looks nearly unstoppable. Elliott said:
“I knew going into the game that we wanted to run the ball. We knew that our O-line was bigger and more physical than their D-line, and we just had to punch them in the mouth, and the O line, they came out, they played their butts off and they paved the way for me. He was hitting, and he just kept feeding me the ball.”
It’s a moot point and it feels a million years ago, but junior tackle Taylor Decker said the loss to the Hokies, where Ohio State’s run game painfully floundered, awakened a team that perhaps thought it might be able to win by resting on its laurels and big-brand name:
“I think that game was a reality check for us. Just because we’re Ohio State, we’re not gonna win every game. We win because we outwork people and we’re tougher than they are … That game was the reality check that we needed.”
In any case, Ohio State got better each week before a monumental midseason win against Michigan State, the defending Big Ten champions, in early November before storming through the postseason.
The National Championship was a climax of “The Chase,” the name Meyer gave his team’s quest for a title after watching Alabama crush Ohio State as an ESPN analyst in 2012.
“I think I sat and watched it, and every one of these players and every support staff, everybody on the coaching staff, everybody associated with our program, I called our strength coach, I said I'm going to send you a text right now and I want everybody in their hands immediately, and that was The Chase, and that's when that big sign went up in a the facility, that's when we created an area for our players to go get extra work, and that was one of those wow moments when I saw a team that I thought -- obviously it was just dominated in the National Championship game, and they looked better than we did, so somehow we had to get to that level, and that was The Chase.”
Now it’s finished...at least for now.
Much like his introductory press conference, Meyer seemed well-aware of the moment and what it meant to his home state.
“I'm not shy about the love I have for this great state. Ashtabula, Ohio, is my hometown. I've got to travel all around the country and I realized how fortunate I am to grow up in a great town like that in a great state. I played college football here, and to bring now a national title to the great state of Ohio, it's almost surreal.”
Elliott outlined the key to repeating as champions:
“We've just got to stay a hungry team. We're losing some great seniors, but we have a lot of great young players that will step up, and this year was just a great year to learn a lot of things, and I think we'll be the same team next year, as long as we stay humble, we grind hard in the offseason, don't let our heads get too big, I think we'll be here next year.
