Slow and steady might have won the race against a hare like Maryland, but Penn State and Michigan will be less like rabbits and more like racecars.
Ohio State can’t afford to take its time. It will be left in the dust.
Thus, Ryan Day and company are trying to find the spark required to start the way the Buckeyes finished their contest against Maryland.
“We’ve got to figure out a way to do a little better on offense (early) so we can get a rhythm going for the whole team,” Day said at his press conference Tuesday. “That comes with preparation and putting it on the field, and we’ll try as coaches to get guys in the right plays early on to help with that. But they also have to take some ownership of it.”
The Buckeyes have stumbled out of the gates on multiple occasions offensively this season.
Though they scored on their first drive of the season against Indiana, another touchdown didn’t follow until the final two minutes of the third quarter in Bloomington Week 1.
Ohio State didn’t score at all in the first half against Notre Dame save for a field goal in the waning seconds of the second quarter, then won the game on another two-minute drill to score a go-ahead touchdown with one second left on the clock.
Then came Maryland, where the Buckeyes fell behind 10-0 and didn’t score an offensive touchdown until their opening drive of the second half. They botched a snap on a punt that gave the Terrapins prime field position to close their opening drive of the game, which was a three-and-out – or a four-and-out, technically.
“We missed a couple things early on,” Day said. “Then we had the botched snap, so I think it just kind of culminated there.”
"We’ll try as coaches to get guys in the right plays early on to help with that. But they also have to take some ownership of it.”– Ryan Day
At the very least, the lull didn’t last for Ohio State, who scored 27 unanswered points starting with that first offensive touchdown to take a 17-10 deficit and turn it into a three-possession 37-17 victory.
“We just executed better,” Kyle McCord said Saturday after the game. “I feel like there were definitely opportunities for us in the first half to go score. It wasn’t anything that we didn’t expect (from Maryland's defense), for the most part. It wasn’t anything that the coaches could have done better. I feel like as an offense, as the quarterback of the offense, I feel like we need to take initiative, and regardless of what they call, make it work.”
McCord feels that he also needs to start faster, and his numbers reflect that. He went a mere 2-for-7 in the first quarter before launching to a final stat line of 19-for-29 with 320 yards and two touchdowns.
“Early on I feel like I missed some opportunities or saw (things) a second late, so that’s nobody else but myself,” McCord said. “That’s just an area I have to continue to grow on and continue to find ways to start fast, because if we can replicate what we did in the second half and just do that in the first half, I think that’s a completely different game. And a lot of that starts with me.”
There’s still one element of Ohio State’s team that has both started and finished games strong, however – its defense.
The Buckeyes did allow a touchdown after the botched snap gave Maryland the ball on Ohio State’s 30-yard line, but after that, it held one of the Big Ten’s best quarterbacks, Taulia Tagovailoa, to under 200 yards passing. OSU intercepted two passes off Tagovailoa and stopped the Terrapins twice on fourth down.
Ohio State now possesses the No. 3 scoring and No. 8 total defense in the country.
“I don’t think the defense was slow,” Day said. “The first throw and catch (for a Maryland touchdown) was unbelievable. Davison (Igbinosun) was right there. Quarterback threw it on time and it was well-executed, put the defense in a tough spot. So I think the defense was ready to roll.”
A positive from the Buckeyes’ slow starts has been that they’ve given the team a chance to prove its poise. Team leaders kept their peers calm to respond to the early two-score deficit against the Terrapins and pull away, the same way they kept things together on the road and pulled out a literal last-second win against the Fighting Irish.
“Obviously you want to start fast and not put yourself in that position, but today that wasn’t the case. We didn’t have a fast start and the game was just tied going into halftime,” McCord said after the Maryland game. “I think that is a credit to a lot of the older guys, guys like Cade Stover on the offense. I think it was fiery at times when we needed to get going, and then other times it was like, ‘We’re good.’ We just needed to get the ball back and take a deep breath. So I think that’s the leaders, and I try to do that myself.”
Poise might be important, but a four-quarter effort will be required when Penn State comes to Ohio Stadium on Oct. 21.
