All Billy Price could do was shrug. A reporter asked about what life is like when Ohio State's football team scores 77 points, sets a school record for offense and yet you come to work and hear from your coaches that it should have been even better.
"We're always chasing perfection," Ohio State's right guard said Monday.
Price is an integral part to his team's success on offense, a three-year starter and someone that grew into a force as the Buckeyes ran over Wisconsin, Alabama and Oregon on its way to a national championship two seasons ago. However, he had never been part of an offensive performance like the one Ohio State put on Bowling Green on Saturday. The Buckeyes won 77-10, recorded 776 yards of total offense and picked up 41 first downs. The 77 points were the most Ohio State ever scored under Meyer in what is now his fifth season.
The thing is, those inside the program saw holes.
"I think it was good. It wasn't great. It was good," Urban Meyer said. "Some disappointments that — I think Corey Smith should be better than he is. I think he didn't play great. He's dealing with some injuries. And I don't think that the technique of our wideouts was where it needs to be, even though they did make some very good plays.
"I thought our tailback played good. Offensive line, obviously when you only have one guy grade champion, they didn't play very good. So they have to get much better."
“It's time to move on. I would not take anything more than the guys played pretty good.”– Urban Meyer
J.T. Barrett connected on six touchdown passes to four different receivers. K.J. Hill and Noah Brown caught their first scores of their young careers and Mike Weber ran for 136 yards in his first start. But Barrett threw an interception that Bowling Green returned for a touchdown early in the first quarter, Ohio State committed nine penalties and the Buckeyes claim they missed more opportunities for big plays because of mental errors.
"There were some times when we had some missed assignments out there, which we could have scored," Barrett said Monday. "It was kind of like — I guess it was bad timing. So when they had their MAs, there were opportunities to score when those times happened."
Price, a student in the Fisher College of Business, likened it to his curriculum. The Buckeyes won't ever achieve perfection. That won't stop them from trying.
"Being a business student, we talk about it being a process. You always want to improve the process," Price said. "With that, anytime there's slack or waste as we call it in the business world, you just gotta improve on it. So the waste is I had a bad step, I need to continue to improve the process and then the grand scheme of things, improve the offense."
Still, Ohio State's offense looked much more efficient and explosive on Saturday than it did at any point last season when it had four future NFL Draft picks at its disposal. However, the coaching staff only graded center Pat Elflein a champion from the offensive line. Only a handful of skill players on offense earned the same distinction.
Meyer wants more from his wide receivers even though Barrett threw for a career-high 349 yards to go with those six touchdowns.
The Buckeye defense held the Falcons to 16 first downs and only 244 yards while intercepting three passes and allowing just three points. An excellent start for essentially a brand new roster but not the ceiling Meyer sees.
Whether it is a mental game used to motivate or the fact the Buckeyes played a porous defense in their season opener, Meyer doesn't care. He set a championship standard with 50 wins in four seasons.
"I thought our guys played pretty good," he said. "We had a code green around here as far as getting guys game ready to knock the rust off the old guys and then also to get them to breathe normally instead of, what do you call that, hyperventilate, which most young people do before you play in that great stadium."
The only guy who's performance Meyer described as "exceptional" was Curtis Samuel, who owned Bowling Green's defense for 261 total yards and three touchdowns. Ohio State rotated 10 wide receivers, a number that grows to 12 if you consider Samuel and Dontre Wilson, two hybrid backs, in the same breath.
"Our objective, obviously need to get first downs to do that, but we want to play fast, play a lot of people certainly (at the) receiver position," Meyer said.
That was easily apparent against Bowling Green. Touchdowns kept flocking to the scoreboard and the deficit grew and grew some more. So if it's correcting a step here, not committing a penalty or cutting off a route better so Barrett has a better lane to throw the ball down the field, Ohio State claims its performance against the Falcons didn't meet expectations.
The Buckeyes host Tulsa on Saturday at 3:30 p.m., who beat San Jose State 45-10 to start its season on the right note. The Golden Hurricane racked up 512 total yards and scored on offense, defense and special teams. Dane Evans and Keevan Lucas fit well into head coach Philip Montgomery's high-scoring attack which he brought over from his time as Baylor's offensive coordinator.
"It's time to move on. I would not take anything more than the guys played pretty good," Meyer said. "We've got a tough one coming up this week, a team that beat San Jose soundly from the get-go. And very talented receivers, two NFL prospects at wide receiver, a returning veteran at quarterback. And a D coordinator that used to coach here at Ohio State.
"I think this will be more of a test Saturday."
