Wow. I have not been that wrong in a while. About anything. Ohio State's defense shut Virginia down so badly that it was getting painful to watch after halftime. Virginia fell into a familiar trap to Ohio State football fans and pulverized itself against the strongest part of Ohio State's defense.

I mentioned it in the game thread, but Virginia tried to make its offense go by attacking against the strongest part of the Ohio State defense, the poles, and consistently dodging them with its attackmen. And, as we saw, Virginia had basically no success. All of the Buckeyes' close defenders cover dodgers very, very well. The Buckeyes do not rotate well, failing to fill after the initial slide.

By constantly attacking long poles, Virginia shrank its opportunities to stuff the ball inside. All game long, Ohio State's poles were swatting down passes, forcing bad shots, and disrupting what Virginia wanted to do. I saw a few comments online from Virginia fans that their offensive middies aren't good. After today, it's hard to argue.

On the flip side, Ohio State had great success using big-little picks at X, along with dodges against Virginia's defenders. Both Garrett Haas and Shane O'Leary had great dodging success all game long, with O'Leary showing more against Virginia than he had all year.

While Alex Marinier failed to score on 4 shots, everyone else picked up the slack. Even the defense. Cullen Brown had 8 groundballs, an insane number for a close defender, and the Buckeyes caused 9 turnovers.

Caleb Fyock registered 12 saves, crushing Virginia every time it looked like the Cavs were going to get something going. At 70%, Big Tasty was Big Time.

Virginia utterly dominated the faceoff, but it didn't matter. Ohio State bullied the Cavs all day, and Virginia couldn't do anything against the middies.

Special shout-out to Ari Allen, who is developing quickly into a decent SSDM option. Football at IMG really helped shape him, and Allen crushed McCabe Millon at the end of the game.

Allen was unlucky that his hands weren't together, otherwise the hit would have been pretty clean. Millon stayed down a while, which almost started a fight.

Never want to see an injury, or barking afterwards. Ohio State made a statement today. It was a drubbing of Virginia, the Buckeyes' second ever win, and easily the biggest. What does it mean?

Honestly? Nothing. Ohio State played the best game it could have hoped for today. This is their first ranked win in years, most likely. The defense is absolutely for real. But all the issues from last year didn't fade away. The Buckeyes had a hard time getting their shots on net. The Buckeyes are going to be really bad at faceoffs this season in games that matter. Virginia actually outshot Ohio State, 39-38. Teams aren't going to get less than 50% of shots on net all season. And the Buckeyes aren't always going to beat defenders with relative ease.

I am incredibly pleased and impressed with this win. The Buckeyes showed more grit and toughness in this game than they have in years. This win takes way more pressure off the Notre Dame game in two weeks. And sets up for a very exciting Denver matchup.

I am not saying the season is over by any stretch, or that the Buckeyes are locks for the national postseason. But let's be realistic. Ohio State away is much different from Ohio State at home. And Ohio State has major problems. Utah's blowout win didn't make the Utes a good team. This one doesn't mean Ohio State is either.

But it sure as hell makes the Buckeyes a far more intriguing team than they were two weeks ago. And this all just. Got. Interesting.

If Ohio State can scrap to 50% on faceoffs, and get All-american play from Fyock all season, the Buckeyes are in good position. I sure as hell hope they do it.

I'm a lot more optimistic now than I was 5 hours ago.

Also, for 2025, we can definitely say it takes Buckeyes to beat Buckeyes. Should have recruited Ohio, Lars!

Go Bucks! Beat Bryant!