You are looking at a six-year old photograph.
That's nearly 80,000 joyous Badger fans celebrating Bret Bielema's lone victory over the Buckeyes in six attempts. Ohio State had been the top-ranked team in the country for one fleeting week, and this would be the only time it would lose that season. It's the one game from 2010 the NCAA didn't eventually vacate from history. Dicks.
But there's something still fresh about this picture however dated it may seem. It represents the last time Ohio State lost on someone else's home turf without any asterisks involved, as one endless offseason after this photo was taken the incapacitated Buckeyes lost four of their five road games.
The parade of Ls began at Miami, which averages slightly less attendance than a typical Bible study. It continued at Nebraska on an evening that gave us a passing chart for the ages. After falling in West Lafayette, the punchless Buckeyes lost in Ann Arbor for the second time this century and the sixth time that season. Reminder - they've lost four games total since then.
OHIO STATE HAS BEEN UNBEATEN AND IN NATIONAL CHAMPIONSHIP CONTENTION IN 9 OF ITS PAST 10 TRIPS TO MADISON.
Ohio State was unranked that September and stayed out of the polls until Urban Meyer returned to coaching. Nobody had any illusions about the strength of the Buckeye team they were beating up on in 2011 (except Purdue which stormed the field after winning in OT when Ohio State couldn't make a game-winning extra point, because Purdue).
The only host team that failed to topple the eventual 6-7 Buckeyes that season was managed by Ron Zook, which means literally every coach who failed to beat Ohio State on their home turf in 2011 was fired. So yes, that old photo from Madison represents the last time a fully-operational Ohio State team dropped a true road game.
But there's another reason the Buckeyes visiting Madison always seems to make you nervous: Saturday marks the 10th time Ohio State has gone to Wisconsin since college football installed a formal national championship process in 1992. See if you can spot a trend.
| DATE | OSU UNBEATEN? | WIN STREAK | OSU RANK | UW RANK | GAME RESULT |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 10/3/92 | YES | 3 | #12 | NR | UW 20, OSU 16 |
| 11/6/93 | YES | 8 | #3 | #15 | OSU 14, UW 14 |
| 10/14/95 | YES | 5 | #4 | #21 | OSU 27, UW 16 |
| 10/7/00 | YES | 4 | #8 | #24 | OSU 23, UW 7 |
| 10/19/02 | YES | 7 | #4 | NR | OSU 19, UW 14 |
| 10/11/03 | YES | 19 | #3 | #11 | UW 17, OSU 10 |
| 10/4/08 | 1 LOSS | 2 | #14 | #18 | OSU 20, UW 17 |
| 10/16/10 | YES | 12 | #1 | #18 | UW 31, OSU 18 |
| 11/17/12 | YES | 10 | #6 | NR | OSU 21, UW 14 OT |
| 10/15/16 | YES | 7 | #2 | #8 | SATURDAY |
This is the stuff anxiety attacks are made of. Ohio State is almost always undefeated whenever it visits Madison, and it has played there no earlier than October.
Despite being the Big Ten's fake empire for most of the current century Wisconsin is the conference's sneakiest underdog. The last time it was a home underdog? Scroll up. That picture happened. This is a program that recently won the Big Ten and went to the Rose Bowl after posting a 4-4 conference record. It is capable of anything.
An Ohio State winning streak of considerable size is regularly on the line whenever the Badgers host the Buckeyes. This time around the visitors are attempting to tie the 1984-88 Miami Hurricanes with a 20th consecutive true road win, which would be good for the third-longest streak since WWII.
The lowest poll ranking Ohio State has taken into Madison -- in 25 years -- is #14 nationally. On top of that, there are exactly two Big Ten stadiums where things get inexplicably weird for the Buckeyes (the other is built on an ancient burial ground in Champaign) and on Saturday they're taking a 53-point scoring average onto a field where they've averaged just over 18 points during that span.
Nineteen of Wisconsin's 22 starters were in Indy when OSU gave them that historic beating. Most of Ohio State's roster was still in high school.
Just to prepare you for the inevitable: They are not scoring 53 on Saturday (this isn't Lucas Oil Stadium). The Buckeyes haven't been able to score even 30 in Madison since 1990, when the Badgers finished 1-10. Current trends involving ESPN College Gameday do not favor Ohio State's chances either. That probably matters less.
What matters more is 19 of Wisconsin's 22 current starters were on the roster when the Buckeyes gave them that historic humiliation in the 2014 B1G title game, while most of Ohio State's current roster was still in high school. That transforms Saturday's game into Two Years of Pent-Up Vengeance versus A Bunch Kids Playing Their Second Collegiate Road Game Ever. You can find the adult diapers in aisle 8. Wear two just to be safe.
That photo at the top represents one of exactly two possible outcomes for Saturday night's game. Six years ago the Badgers returned the opening kickoff for a TD (don't click that) and never looked back. This game, however strange it may sound, has no bearing on Ohio State's ability to get back to the B1G championship game. The prize for winning in Madison just might end up being a rematch in Indianapolis.
But in the meantime there's another winning streak and yet one more unblemished record at stake for Ohio State. And for Wisconsin - among many things - the unique opportunity to update and refresh an historic photograph.
