Ohio State’s players and coaches refrain from using the word ‘Michigan’ when referring to their archrival. Inside the walls of the Woody Hayes Athletic Center, Michigan is simply known as ‘The Team Up North.’
But after the Buckeyes claimed the national title following a storybook 2014 season, there’s another word that has been vacated from Ohio State’s vocabulary: repeat.
“Repeat is not a conversation,” head coach Urban Meyer says.
Meyer doesn’t want to talk about it. As a coach who has been through the process of defending a national championship twice before, that’s easy to understand. He insists the Buckeyes have turned the page and are solely focused on the 2015 campaign, which officially began last week when fall camp kicked off.
But the reality of the situation is Ohio State is dealing with exactly that: It’s trying to win back-to-back national championships. That last happened in 2012 when Alabama won its second-straight national title. Before that, it hadn’t been done since USC in 2004. Even then, the Trojans’ title in 2003 was split with LSU.
Repeating is hard. It doesn’t happen often in college football. But the Buckeyes, who return quite a bit of talent from last year’s title team, are faced with that exact daunting task.
Let’s dive a little deeper into how Meyer’s two previous teams coming off a national title performed the following season.
2007 Florida
Meyer won his first national championship during the 2006 season when his Florida team, ironically, routed Ohio State, 41-14. He had reached the zenith of college football in just his second season with the Gators.
Florida lost quite a bit of experienced talent from that national championship team — quarterback Chris Leak, wide receiver Dallas Baker, defensive end Jarvis Moss and defensive back Reggie Nelson just to name a few — but the Gators did return Tim Tebow at quarterback and a bevy of young, dynamic playmakers.
There were some growing pains for that young Florida team in 2007, though, as Meyer and Co. led the team to a 9-4 season. Tebow won the Heisman Trophy that year in what was one of the greatest single-season efforts in college football history, throwing for 3,286 yards and 32 touchdowns while also rushing for 895 yards and 23 additional scores.
The Gators struggled defensively, though, and a pair of back-to-back losses to Auburn and LSU early in the season derailed any hopes of a repeat. The Gators wound up playing on New Year’s Day in the Capital One Bowl, but fell to Michigan, 41-35.
2009 Florida
All that young talent which was still getting accustomed to the college level in 2007 absolutely flourished in 2008 when Meyer and the Gators claimed their second national title in three seasons.
Florida was dominant that 2008 season with Tebow operating Meyer’s potent offense and Percy Harvin emerging as one of college football’s best players. The Gators went 13-1 on the year with their lone loss coming 31-30 at the hands of Ole Miss. Florida defeated Oklahoma for the national title, 24-14.
The majority of the talent from that 2008 team returned in 2009 and made the Gators the prohibited No. 1 team in the country from the get-go — much like Ohio State is this year in 2015.
Florida rolled through its regular-season. The Gators only had one game — a 23-20 win over Arkansas — decided by less than 10 points. Things were all set up for a shot at going back-to-back if Florida was able to defeat Alabama in the national championship game, but the Crimson Tide obliterated Meyer’s Gators, 32-13.
In what was Meyer’s best chance to repeat as national champion, Florida finished that year 13-1 after a 51-24 victory over Cincinnati in the Sugar Bowl.
The 2015 version of Ohio State is more comparable to the 2009 Florida team than the 2007 one. The Buckeyes are heavy favorites to win the national title, even after winning the previous one, because of the amount of guys they have who came back.
Expectations are high, and Meyer said during the spring he planned talk to some fellow coaches about the art of repeating.Sunday at Ohio State's Media Day, however, he retracted those comments.
"I thought I would go do that, but every team is different and I don't think there's a cookie-cutter way of going about your world," Meyer said. "The one guy I do talk to is Lou Holtz, and not that he's repeated a championship, but he's a guy that I have great confidence in and we can talk."
Things are a bit different for Meyer this year, though, as opposed to that 2009 season in Gainesville when he was dealing with health issues. He says he's in a better place now, physically, but his desire to win another title is as as it has ever been.
"I'm not out there playing Muirfield right now," Meyer joked when asked about the balance in his life.
The joking stops now, though, for Meyer. It's all business from here on out as Ohio State is set to enter a week with eight practices including three two-a-days.
Meyer won't say it. The team won't say it. But the Buckeyes are zeroed in on winning back-to-back national titles.
