There is no doubt plenty of blame to go around following Ohio State's loss to Michigan State – just ask Zeke – from the playcalling (mostly) on down.
One troubling aspect in particular was how the Buckeyes generally lost the line of scrimmage when the team has leaned on the strength of the offensive line's run blocking and the overall stout play of the defensive front four.
Against the Spartans, an offensive line paving the way to 245 rushing yards per game entering the contest could only help produce 86 such yards on 29 carries. The math there adds up to 3.0 yards per carry and with just 132 total yards of offense on the day, the Buckeye offense averaged a dismal 2.9 yards per play.
With the wet and windy weather feeding into an already predictable and conservative game plan, the line simply couldn't create push up front and was often outnumbered. On the rare occurrences the staff did dial up a potential pass play, the scheme was to roll out – something the offense had done very little of this year – and it often led to offensive linemen simply getting out-quicked in space.
Throw in the fact Zeke was called on just 12 times in Ohio State's most important game this season and it became even harder to overcome the lack of holes up front.
The rolled up results of the perfect storm included five first downs and six three-and-outs in 11 possessions.
On the other side of the ball OSU's defensive line held Sparty to 2.2 yards per carry in the opening half but surrendered 166 rushing yards in the 2nd half on nearly five yards per carry. Spartan drives were also aided by three total offsides calls on the front four including two from Joey Bosa.
While not eye-poppingly bad, the numbers stung as Michigan State attempted just four passes over the final 30 minutes but the Buckeye front had no answer despite knowing what was coming.
With the offense taking up zero time during their empty possessions the defensive front (and the back seven too) wore down as the Buckeyes surrendered a 13 play, 75-yard touchdown drive that chewed up 6:30 of game clock immediately after Ohio State took a 14-7 lead thanks to a gift turnover from MSU deep in their own territory.
The defense did give up just 17 points total but in the context of playing against 2nd and 3rd string quarterbacks in an extremely predictable offense the defense needed to be better to give Ohio State a chance to escape.
