Urban Meyer doesn't lose bowl games very often, but when he does, he avenges the losses with a national championship season.
Before now, Urban Meyer has dealt with a bowl loss just twice in his career – once at Florida after his Gators were defeated by Michigan in the 2008 Capital One Bowl, and once at Ohio State after the Buckeyes fell to Clemson in the 2013 Orange Bowl.
Both times, Meyer responded from the losses in the best possible way: by winning a national title the following season.
Now after a 31-0 shutout loss to Clemson, Meyer is again facing the same challenge of responding to a season-ending loss in a bowl game and is obviously hoping for a similar result to follow.
Optimistically for the Buckeyes, they are in a remarkably similar position as both of those teams. Let's take a closer look at those similarities and see if Meyer is in a position to bounce back in a big way yet again.
Coaching Changes
Both the 2013 Buckeyes and the 2007 Gators had absurd offensive firepower. Both teams had prolific, record-breaking offenses featuring some of the nation's top weapons. Both teams' defenses, however, were the opposite of prolific.
A year after winning the 2006 national title thanks in no small part to its defense, Florida rolled out its worst defense since 1971 the following season. The 2013 Buckeyes were similarly bad on the defensive end, allowing their opponents to score 30 points or more in six of 13 games, including their final three.
While Florida's struggles were primarily due to an exodus of talent following the previous season as opposed to scheme, both teams saw new coaches at the defensive end that seemed to help put the team over the edge the following season.
Florida did not make any major changes at coordinator, but it did add cornerbacks coach Vance Bedford, who was most recently the defensive coordinator at Texas, as well as defensive line coach Dan McCarney, who was most recently the head coach at North Texas. Ohio State responded by hiring Chris Ash to coach the secondary, which turned out to be a home run hire. Both schools saw improvement the following season.
Unlike 2013 or 2007, Meyer's problems this past season had nothing to do with defense. In fact, the Buckeyes had arguably the top defense in the country in 2016 and it kept them competitive in big games. The offense – particularly the passing game – was what ailed Ohio State.
Like the previous seasons though, Meyer and the Buckeyes made the necessary hires to fix the the issues. Ohio State brought on former Indiana head coach Kevin Wilson to replace Ed Warinner and former Eagles and 49ers quarterbacks coach Ryan Day to replace Tim Beck.
With those two additions, the Buckeyes will hope to display a new-look, high-powered offense in 2017.
Returning Core
Perhaps the biggest similarity between this Ohio State team and Meyer's 2008 and 2014 squads is the amount of returning talent.
Meyer lost just two players to the NFL Draft in 2007 – defensive end Derrick Harvey and wide receiver Andrew Caldwell – and returned nearly all of its prolific offense, including Heisman Trophy winner Tim Tebow, as well as its young defense.
In 2013, the exodus of talent was a bit larger as seven Buckeyes were taken in the NFL Draft – Ryan Shazier, Bradley Roby, Carlos Hyde, Jack Mewhort, Corey Linsley and Christian Bryant (who was injured most of the year). Still, Ohio State returned the bulk of its defense, many of its offensive weapons and its quarterback (well, not really).
In 2017, the Buckeyes will be without a handful of 2016 contributors, seven of which will likely be drafted in April, but return their core. Ohio State returns starting quarterback J.T. Barrett, 4/5ths of its starting offensive line, its entire defensive line and two starting linebackers.
Much like the 2014 Buckeye team, there are obvious holes that need filling, but Ohio State is in a similarly great position to fill the holes as well.
Up-and-Coming Talent
Nothing eases the pain of a loss quite like a look at a bright, bright future. Meyer had that source of optimism following the 2007 season as well as the 2013 season and now has it again with an absurd influx of new talent.
The 2008 Gators were bolstered by two recruiting classes: the 2007 class, which was the nation's top class and featured Chris Rainey, Major Wright, Aaron Hernandez and Joe Haden, and the 2008 class, which was the nation's No. 6 class and included names like Janoris Jenkins, Jeff Demps and Will Hill.
Similarly, the 2014 Buckeyes were bolstered by young talent from two top-five recruiting classes. The famous 2013 class, who were sophomores during the title season, was loaded with talent, featuring names like Joey Bosa, Ezekiel Elliott, Eli Apple, Vonn Bell and J.T. Barrett. The 2014 class included players like Raekwon McMillan, Marshon Lattimore, Curtis Samuel and Jamarco Jones.
The 2017 Ohio State team has its fair share of up-and-coming talent, having just brought in back-to-back top-five classes. The 2015 class was the nation's fourth-best and featured names like Michael Jordan, Nick Bosa, Demario McCall, Jordan Fuller and Binjimen Victor – all of whom saw plenty of action last season. And of course, the 2017 class was the nation's No. 2 class and was Meyer's best ever on a per-recruit basis.
In addition to the freshmen, the Buckeyes have a pair of talented transfers at their disposal in 2017: offensive lineman Malcolm Pridgeon and cornerback Kendall Sheffield. Pridgeon was expected to start in 2016, but an injury ended his season resulting in Isaiah Prince earning the starting spot. Meanwhile, Sheffield, an Alabama transfer, is expected be a frontrunner for one of the team's open cornerback spots.
2017 may not bring Ohio State another national title, and perhaps it's merely chance that a national title season has followed each of Meyer's bowl losses, but something about a loss in a meaningful game seems to bring about his best coaching – both on the field and off – and with the coaching changes, the returning talent and the recruiting successes, the Buckeyes seem poised to make a run at the title this coming season.
Once is an accident, twice is a coincidence — let's see if Urban Meyer can make it a pattern.
