October 8, 2025 • 24 mins
Buckeye Weekly Podcast: Analyzing Illinois' Win Over USC and Implications for Ohio State
In this episode of the Buckeye Weekly Podcast, hosts Tony Gerdeman and Tom Orr discuss what they learned from Illinois' 34-32 win over USC two weeks ago. They delve into key takeaways and strategic insights ahead of the upcoming Illinois vs. Ohio State game. Topics include Illinois' defensive and offensive performances, individual player highlights, and key matchups to watch out for this Saturday between the Illini and the Buckeyes.
00:00 Introduction and Greetings
01:02 Recap of Illinois vs. USC Game
04:57 Ohio State's Offensive Opportunities
05:29 Concerns About Ohio State's Running Game
08:17 Illinois' Defensive Struggles
10:01 Luke Altmyer's Performance and Potential
16:29 Illinois' Offensive Strategy
20:25 Special Teams and Final Thoughts
23:45 Closing Remarks and Call to Action
In this episode of the Buckeye Weekly Podcast, hosts Tony Gerdeman and Tom Orr discuss what they learned from Illinois' 34-32 win over USC two weeks ago. They delve into key takeaways and strategic insights ahead of the upcoming Illinois vs. Ohio State game. Topics include Illinois' defensive and offensive performances, individual player highlights, and key matchups to watch out for this Saturday between the Illini and the Buckeyes.
00:00 Introduction and Greetings
01:02 Recap of Illinois vs. USC Game
04:57 Ohio State's Offensive Opportunities
05:29 Concerns About Ohio State's Running Game
08:17 Illinois' Defensive Struggles
10:01 Luke Altmyer's Performance and Potential
16:29 Illinois' Offensive Strategy
20:25 Special Teams and Final Thoughts
23:45 Closing Remarks and Call to Action
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Hello, everybody, Welcome to the Buckeye Weekly Podcast. I'm Tony
Gerdaman here as always with Tom or Tom. How's it going.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Tony just was thrown on a sweatshirt to come down
here and record the podcast. Had one that I had
more in a while, thought oh, this is a great
time to do that. The weather finally has turned no
longer summer, see you in hell. Summer twenty twenty five.
The cold front went through. It rained for like a
full day, and now the forecast for the foreseeable future
just as glorious. So I'm going to assume that's a
(00:33):
good good news. And you were saying just before we
hit record that in the honor of the Chicago Cubs,
you are Clark the cupping it for today's podcast, So
you know that's you know, that's you know, great great
news for both of us.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I guess great news and more great news. Love the
University of Toronto shout out there, even though it's under armour.
But I guess, you know, beggars cannot be choosers.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
I don't get to sign their deals, Tony. I just
get to go over there while I'm on vacation.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
So there you go. So we are here today to
talk about what we learned from watching Illinois's thirty four
thirty two win over USC back late September, two weeks
ago basically, and we both watched it, and I think
maybe we watched some of it live here and there,
(01:23):
but finally got to go back and fully digest that
and wanted to share some of our thoughts ahead of
the Illinois game on Saturday. And Tom, I gotta be honest,
try not you go behind or ahead. When Ryan Day says,
don't look at the Indiana game, like, I'm sorry, I
(01:45):
gotta look. I gotta at least look at the box score.
And when I see the Indiana rushes for over three
hundred yards on Illinois, like, you can't ignore that. Now,
USC did not do that, but they still had some success.
So all over this Illinois defense they did.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
And I did go back and watch, Like you know
when someone's like, well, don't, oh, don't look at that. No,
it's like, oh, well, now I was on the internet
in the nineteen eighty on the nineteen nineties, like that
makes me just go, well, all right, what does this
look like? And so I did go back and rewatch.
And the only notes I have on that game. So
we'll just we'll hit the the Illinois Indiana game very
(02:24):
quickly before we move on. My notes on the Indiana
game were just basically on, here's all the crap that
happened to Illinois, because it was it was like the
perfect storm of all the things happening, none of them good.
Running back Aiden Lowery, who was who was hurt for
that game, missed the game. They kept I think that
was a little bit of a surprise. The announcers kept saying, Oh,
(02:45):
we still haven't seen him yet, and he was he
didn't play baby, their hank Baby, their best receiver by
a million miles. He got hurt on the opening drive,
had only two catches for thirteen yards. They got a
hunt block for a touchdown. They had Miles Scott, who
is one of their safeties. They were missing Xavier Scott
(03:07):
who's out for the year, who's one of their corners.
Miles Scott, who's one of their team captains in a safety. Uh,
he was tossed early in the second quarter for targeting. Uh.
They had, you know, there were some that was some
of them they just got it kind of got rock
paper scissored where you know, they're they're running a blitz
and Indiana has a tight end delay screen. That's just
the perfect call. And then you know one of the
(03:29):
touchdowns right after halftime, mac Ressich, who was the the
safety who replaced Miles Scott, took a bad angle that
turned what should have been like a ten yard run
into a long touchdown run and then he got hurt
after that. By the end of the game, here was
the list of players who did not finish the Illinois game.
This is just the Illinois Indian game. This is just
(03:49):
from the Illinois secondary. Xavier Scott, who's out for the year.
He was he was completely you know, didn't play at all.
Cornerback Caleb Patterson, quarterback Jehane Clark, cornerback Tory cop Safe,
mac Resige, safety Matthew Bailey, safety matt Miles Scott. So
you take seven players out of any one secondary tony
and they're not gonna look great. Now, all that to
(04:11):
say they didn't look great against USC either, but they
also didn't give up sixty three points to USC. So
you know, I think the Indiana game was a little
bit of a perfect storm. But there's at least a
poopy defense watch, if not a poopin defense warning for
Illinois this weekend.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Now, the injuries are legit because I still contend that
Ohio State's nineteen ninety four sixty three to fourteen loss
to Penn State may have been a toss up. Had
Eddie George gotten hurt early in that game, he may
have been the forty nine point difference one way or
the other in that. So give Illinois some credit. But yeah,
(04:51):
watching this one where you get to see USC and
Jaden mayav Of the quarterback throw it around, McKay lemon
their top receiver making plays, and I just see a
lot of opportunity for Ohio States offense to have some
very good success against Illinois, both running and throwing. And
(05:13):
you know USC rushed for in this one one and
twenty six yards, but ninety four yards for Wayman Jordan,
their top running back, four point seven yards for carry
along of just thirteen yards, So there's some consistency going
on there. And one of my top thoughts is if
Ohio State doesn't run the ball reasonably well, then I
(05:37):
am officially concerned about the Ohio State running game. And
what reasonably if you know, one hundred and fifty yards
is all I'm looking for.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Really Yeah, if they run for five yards of carry,
give or take you know, thirty thirty ish carries for
five yards of carry, twenty five for five point five
or whatever it is, that that's probably a reasonable number.
They should be able to run the ball reasonably well.
I think they're gonna have plenty of success in the
passing game as well. Some of this is going to
come down to what does Illinois decide they want to stop.
(06:06):
If they're going to throw the kitchen sink at stopping
the run game like Minnesota did, then you'll see that
manifest itself in a bunch of passing. But they should
be able to run the ball reasonably well against Illinois.
Illinois defense and Illinois defensive front. There are pieces here
for Illinois on the defense that are not bad. Gave
(06:28):
Akis which his last name is spelled Jacas, but d
J is silent, which I'm glad I watched a broadcast
because they would have definitely would not have been saying
that right. But gave Acus number seventeen really really impactful.
He's kind of like a Big ten All Conference kind
of caliber player. You felt him in the run defense.
He had at one point forced an intentional grounding penalty.
(06:50):
So that's number seventeen on the defensive line. That's that's
certainly someone to watch. James Thompson defensive Taciclely you saw
him a couple times, like there are some But at
the same time, this is you know, this is a
game where Ohio State should probably win on the line
of scrimmage on both sides of the ball. Not to
the degree they did against Grambling or anything, but they
(07:12):
should win the line of scrimmage on both sides of
the ball.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Yeah, akus last year thirteen tackles for lost, eight sacks.
One of the top edge guys. And he's a pretty
big guy too. He's like two hundred and seventy five
and seventy pounds or so. So he plays this you know,
three four outside linebacker edge guy that I don't know
there are there are no labels anymore, just edge like
(07:36):
a jack you mean, no, no, no, don't say the
J word around here.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Sorry, he's the act.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Sorry fair enough, but overall, like if you're if you
contain him as I'm taking all these notes and not
a lot of not a lot of defensive names are
popping up for me. Rosiaic the linebacker. He had a
big hit and he had a big interception on RPO
(08:04):
kind of maybe baited Jade Mayava a little bit into
making the throw and then he you know, made to
play on the interception on that RPO. Over All, like
the fact that just when we when we do these,
you're looking for names and guys that continue to flash
and pop up, and really I didn't have much from
(08:26):
the Illinois defense doing that one way or the other.
And maybe it's because they rotated a lot, so you
can't blame everything on one particular guy. But there was
nothing there defensively that makes thing makes me think like
this is gonna be like a twenty to seventeen kind
of game.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
No, I think Ohio State's going to score more than
that for sure. Yeah. And Dylan Rosiack, the number twenty eight,
the linebacker. He was the only other guy whose name
I had written down in the front seven, and he's
you know, he was You saw him around the ball
a lot in the Indiana game. He was second on
the team and tackles in that game. But there were
a lot of opportunities for tackles in the Indiana game.
(09:03):
So there's just you know, there's not a guy on
this team that you look and you're like, man, that's
their version of Caleb Downs, Like, there's not they don't
have that. On defense. The defense is the defense is
kind of fine. This is just it's someone on our
board kind of compared them to Washington in a lot
of ways, where they've got some playmakers on offense, the
(09:24):
defense is kind of just okay. And I thought that
was a pretty apt comparison, where we watched the Washington
defense for a couple of games and it was kind
of like, yeah, I've got a couple names written down
and they're okay, but there's not there's not like a
real difference maker. I don't think on the defense. No.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
I mean they're bottom five, bottom six in most defensive
categories in the Big Ten, you know, rush defense, yards
per play, total defense's scoring defense. They gave up twenty
seven I think to Purdue just you know, Ohio State
should be able to score enough to win this. The
(10:02):
thing that will decide that ultimately, I think is Luke
Altmeyer and the Illinois offense. And one of the things
that I really like about Luke Altmeyer is, for one,
they respond very well and they can take a punch
and then punch right back. I think that's a Brett
Blms staple. You know, he's very punchable, we know that,
(10:22):
but also he will punch right back. Luke Altmeyer when
he got to Illinois, everybody remembers his four interception game
at home against Penn State back in twenty twenty three.
It was like the second or third game of the season,
like one game or two games after that, he threw
another interception at home. Since then, he has not thrown
(10:44):
an interception at home. He's like thrown like twenty four
touchdowns in one interception since that at home, since that
four interception game, Like he is a he is not
that player that we all saw, just like Graham Mertz
is not that player that we also have five touchdowns, like, oh,
you know, this is the guy al Luke Altmeyer has.
(11:05):
He does a lot of good things. He gets a
little wild at times, but in this one he was
twenty of twenty six for three hundred and twenty eight
two touchdowns along with sixty four yards, which, let's be honest,
was just a little swing pass to a two hundred
and fifty five pound running back that ran down the sidelines.
And USC couldn't catch him. So good job there, I guess.
(11:25):
But Altmeyer is a quality, quality quarterback, a veteran guy.
I don't think he's going to be like I don't
think this game will be too much for him. The
defense might be too much for him, just because of
how good it is, but I don't see him as
being a guy that gets is going to be rattled.
He might be the product may not look great because
(11:49):
of the defense, but I see him as a guy
that's going to keep fighting.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well they went in this game. He went down the
field right after USC had taken a one point lead
with less than two minutes to play, went right down
the field, boom boom, boom, boom boom, and was looked
completely in control. Like sometimes those even when those two
minute drill kind of drives work, they'll look a little
harried or a little frazzled. He looked completely in control,
(12:16):
went right down the field. They kicked the game winning
field goal in this one. Even in the Indiana game,
they were down twenty eight to seven or something like that,
maybe thirty five to seven, and they got the ball
right before the half, and the roof has like very
clearly like it's not falling in. It has collapsed all
around them, and he gets the ball with you know,
maybe a minute and a half left in the first half,
(12:37):
at a point when you're wondering, is Bielama just going
to sort of take a knee and just get out
of there and just say like, well, not our night.
And he went right down the field and led him
to a field goal there as well. So you know,
even when stuff is really not going well, he's he's solid.
He's a solid player. He's not demand Williams where he's
going to go sixty yards. He's you know, he's probably
(12:57):
a better scrambleer than Drew Aller, but he's you know,
he's not going to go he's not going to like
outrun people. You know. He's not one of those guys
who's like, oh, he's faster than he is on film, Like, no,
he's exactly as speediest. But he's he can get he
can move around in the pocket. He'd be a little
bit elusive in the pocket. He can pick up some
first downs with his legs. Just to give you an
idea of his athleticism, he did something for Illinois that
(13:20):
no one since Kurt Kittner the hallowed days of Kurt
Kittener in nineteen ninety nine. Did he ran for a touchdown,
caught a touchdown on a Philly special in this game,
and also threw for a touchdown. No one had done
that since Kurt Kittenner in nineteen ninety nine. But you know,
as you said, he actually had two sixty yard completions.
One was like that swing pass or screen pass whatever
(13:40):
it was to the running back. Another one was like
a short curl where a corner just missed a tackle
and the guy took off and had had a long touchdown.
So you know, it was two, you know, sixty yard completions,
not the way that Julian Sayin had had forty yard
completions last week. But you know, they do have some
players on offense, which I think brings me to Hank Batty,
(14:02):
who is their slot receiver number eighty. He's probably the
single most impactful guy on the Illinois offense. He threw
the touchdown pass on that Philly special. He was a
wildcat quarterback at one point running a sweep. You know,
he caught a screen pass and turned it into a
nice game, caught a long pass downfield. He's right among
(14:23):
you mentioned Makaya Lemon for USC, he's leading the Big
Ten in receiving yards right now. I believe Hank Baty
is second in the Big Ten in receiving yards. So
he's he's someone that's going to be someone that Ohio
State is going to have to maybe focus focus some
attention on that. I think that him against Lorenzo Styles
is going to be I think a really interesting matchup
to watch in this game.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And Lorenzo Styles has been very, very good this year.
He did give up one of He's given up half
of Ohio State's touchdowns this year, so that is that
is a check mark against him when you're giving up
half of your team total touchdowns over five games, Like, boy,
how many touchdowns have you given up? Actually it's just one,
but still Hank Betty one of He's the first player,
(15:05):
I don't know if you saw this graphic, the first
player since Steve Preston in two thousand and three to
have a touchdown, catch, a touchdown, rush, a pass, and
a punt return in the same season. Gonna go all
the way back to Stevie Preston in two thousand and three,
and he's he's very good and that's gonna be a
really fun matchup to watch. And then Colin Dixon was
(15:26):
the the other outside these they're top outside guy. He
had four for ninety including that sixty to one yard.
He's the kind of a bigger guy like six two
sixty three, two fifteen, kind of rough and tumble and
and and can break a tackle if if you're not
serious about it. This was luk Altmeyer's seventh fourth quarter
(15:49):
game winning drive game of his career, so that also
tells you quite a bit about him. I view him
as a guy that can run. He rushed for I
think he had like four carries for thirty six yards,
lost a nine on a sack. He's coming into this
game with negative yards rushing though, to give you an
idea of the pass protection not being there this year,
(16:09):
and perhaps that's not great news for the game against
Ohio State and how they will attack him, but I
do expect them to. There'll be some spying I think
of him, and then you can turn that spy loose
to go get him, and I don't see him being
able to get away from RVL Reese or Sunny styles
in that spy mode. They are going to run the
(16:31):
ball as they're going to certainly try to run the
ball against Ohio State, slow the game down or I
guess speed it up, speed the clock up. They went
for one hundred and seventy one yards on thirty five attempts,
and they controlled the game long long rush of thirteen yards,
but they average four point nine yards per carry, So
(16:51):
that's like basically just getting five yards every time they
ran the ball. And it's Juice Williams left. Juice Williams
right not to bring up some bad memories to people,
but that that's basically kind of what that offense can
do when they're just they're happy just getting six yards
and then let's go to second and four and see
what we get there, and and they're just they're going
(17:15):
to try to establish that run Wi State. It's been
very good this year so far. The running backs don't
really stand out as anything special to me other than
the Fagan kid is like Cadan Fagan's like six three
two fifty five and Khalil Valentine kind of a faster guy,
(17:35):
a little quite a bit slighter, and then you mentioned
the Loftrey kid. They did also fumbled the ball twice
or turned the ball over twice inside like their own
ten yard line, So this could have been a much
uglier game. But I do expect them to try and run.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
The ball on Saturday. Yeah, the running backs were kind
of fine. They were eventful. This is This is like
when I talked about Minnesota's special team last week and
said they were eventful. Caden Fagan's game was he had
a took a handoff and looked like he was trying
to throw a running back pass and the running but
the receiver wasn't open, so he didn't throw it. He
had a fumble right at the goal line where you know,
(18:12):
like going in to the end zone. He fumbled at
about the one yard line. Then he was the one
who had the sixty four yard touchdown reception against Purdue.
He had just sixteen yards rushing but two touchdowns, so
that kind of gives you an idea that he's sort
of their goal line guy but does other stuff as well.
Laffery has missed several weeks in a row, so we'll see.
(18:33):
He was supposedly a game time decision last week and
didn't play, so you would expect that he would be
ready to go this week. We'll see. And then the
other one was Khalil Valentine, who also had a fumble
at the goal line. He's someone who runs really hard
but got stripped at the ball, punched out on about
(18:56):
the three yard line and fumbled into the end zone
and Gus Johnson just about just about reach Defcon zero
trying to call that play and get any coherent English
words out as that ball was loose in the end zone,
USC fell on it. That's that kind of gives you
an indication like Illinois was good enough that they won
the game, even though they had two touchdowns that were,
(19:19):
you know, like they're going into the end zone and
one yard or less away from going in for the
en zone and fumbled the ball and lost it. USC
also had a touchdown wiped off the board on a
trick play where they had their backup center in and
he was It was the first ineligible man downfield call
I've seen all year, and it was a guy who
was like one yard out too far downfield and not
(19:39):
blocking anyone and had just sort of like wandered off
like a little lost child at the mall, and that
wiped out a USC touchdown. It was a it was
a weird game like you watch you watch USC and
Illinois playing and it's a conference game, and it's like
nothing about this is right, Like what are the USC
fans from southern California. They get on a plane at
(20:00):
LAX and they fly out and they're in Champagne, Illinois
and it's like, so, guys, what do you think? And
it's like, man, this is this is where we belong
at conference game all the way it was. The whole
game just kind of fit that vibe. It was just
kind of like, yeah, this is this is a weird,
weird football game.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
Yeah, I do feel bad for those three USC fans. Yes,
you're correct. I think one of the last things for
me is they kicked a forty one yard field goal
to win it. Their kicker, had David Alano, had a
forty five yard and a third and a forty one
yarder at the end, so he's he's proven at this point.
He also handles their kickoffs. They only punted once in
(20:43):
this game. They only forced one punt in this game.
I would I would assume we'll see more punts for
for Illinois this week. Nothing nothing special there, but anything
else that you wanted to touch on before we get
out of here.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
The Illinois offense line. It's a veteran offensive line. They
have the second most starts of any team in the
nc DOUAA in terms of offensive line. But it's just
kind of like, so they're they're good. It's like, well,
they've been there a long time. They're they're fine. Like
Klatt on the game said, you know, well, if they
(21:19):
can just go straight ahead, they'll be you know, that's
what they're looking to do. They're going to look at
it straight ahead because they're not athletic. They're not going
to go sideline to sideline. They would just like to
just straight up downhill, run, you know, one gap, just boom, block,
go and move on with life. So it feels like
that might be an offensive line that Ohio State can
maybe beat with quickness. Josh Kroutz, who is the center,
(21:42):
number sixty four, he had an injury. He missed some
time in the In the Indiana game, he was like
wildly unimpressive. So you know that that might be a
watch this space. It might be a Caden McDonald game
if Illinois center is not great. And then the only
other thing that I had is Illinois. You know, you
mentioned Brett Bilima and Brett Bielama. I have come to
(22:05):
love Brett Bielahma and really enjoy talking ab Brett bilmat
big ten media days every year. But also you can
absolutely see why he gets underneath people's skin because Illinois
is doing these like real late subs and really taking
their time getting off the field when they're on defense
and USC like there's the official still standing over the
ball and there's like five seconds on the play clock
(22:26):
and Lincoln Riley is absolutely losing his mind, and so
you know, I the way to avoid that is you
just don't sub, keep your personnel in and just go.
And you know, I think Ohio State running tempo would
probably get Illinois like way out of what Illinois wants
to do in this kind of game, So I wouldn't
be surprised to see that. But yeah, just prepare yourself
(22:46):
if Ohio State subs, just prepare yourself for Illinois defensive.
Why I'm in very slowly leaving the field.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Well, and we've seen talk that raps are going to
be like they won't they won't stand for it for
too long.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
But well, this game was This game was two weeks ago,
so they were standing for it then.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
So yeah, and you're seeing like Jade Mayava like clap
as quickly as possible once that ref would move like, hey,
we got to go. In terms of the Illinois offensive line,
I agree, they've got a great personality. You know. The
last thing they they will change up their fronts defensively.
They started out by rushing four and they're in a
four to five. Then they'll go to an odd front
(23:30):
and have a you know, a three three five. Then
you'll see like five guys and kind of the Penny
look that we've talked about. So multiple fronts. Nothing that
Julian saying hasn't seen to this point. He sees it
every single day in practice. So there you go. That
will do it. If you're watching on YouTube, please hit
the thumbs up. We would appreciate that, and of course
continue to UH five star rating and review us there
(23:52):
at whatever your podcast platform of choice, and as always,
you can find us at Buckeye Huddle dot com where
we are talking about this game, we are talking about season.
There's a little bit of Penn State talk, you know,
you know, it's always fun to talk about James Franklin
as we know, and other things as well, So find
us there at the Bucket hud a message board presented
by Jeffreymy's Columbus So thank you all for tuning in
(24:12):
and we'll talk to you all later
Hello, everybody, Welcome to the Buckeye Weekly Podcast. I'm Tony
Gerdaman here as always with Tom or Tom. How's it going.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
Tony just was thrown on a sweatshirt to come down
here and record the podcast. Had one that I had
more in a while, thought oh, this is a great
time to do that. The weather finally has turned no
longer summer, see you in hell. Summer twenty twenty five.
The cold front went through. It rained for like a
full day, and now the forecast for the foreseeable future
just as glorious. So I'm going to assume that's a
(00:33):
good good news. And you were saying just before we
hit record that in the honor of the Chicago Cubs,
you are Clark the cupping it for today's podcast, So
you know that's you know, that's you know, great great
news for both of us.
Speaker 1 (00:47):
I guess great news and more great news. Love the
University of Toronto shout out there, even though it's under armour.
But I guess, you know, beggars cannot be choosers.
Speaker 2 (00:57):
I don't get to sign their deals, Tony. I just
get to go over there while I'm on vacation.
Speaker 1 (01:02):
So there you go. So we are here today to
talk about what we learned from watching Illinois's thirty four
thirty two win over USC back late September, two weeks
ago basically, and we both watched it, and I think
maybe we watched some of it live here and there,
(01:23):
but finally got to go back and fully digest that
and wanted to share some of our thoughts ahead of
the Illinois game on Saturday. And Tom, I gotta be honest,
try not you go behind or ahead. When Ryan Day says,
don't look at the Indiana game, like, I'm sorry, I
(01:45):
gotta look. I gotta at least look at the box score.
And when I see the Indiana rushes for over three
hundred yards on Illinois, like, you can't ignore that. Now,
USC did not do that, but they still had some success.
So all over this Illinois defense they did.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
And I did go back and watch, Like you know
when someone's like, well, don't, oh, don't look at that. No,
it's like, oh, well, now I was on the internet
in the nineteen eighty on the nineteen nineties, like that
makes me just go, well, all right, what does this
look like? And so I did go back and rewatch.
And the only notes I have on that game. So
we'll just we'll hit the the Illinois Indiana game very
(02:24):
quickly before we move on. My notes on the Indiana
game were just basically on, here's all the crap that
happened to Illinois, because it was it was like the
perfect storm of all the things happening, none of them good.
Running back Aiden Lowery, who was who was hurt for
that game, missed the game. They kept I think that
was a little bit of a surprise. The announcers kept saying, Oh,
(02:45):
we still haven't seen him yet, and he was he
didn't play baby, their hank Baby, their best receiver by
a million miles. He got hurt on the opening drive,
had only two catches for thirteen yards. They got a
hunt block for a touchdown. They had Miles Scott, who
is one of their safeties. They were missing Xavier Scott
(03:07):
who's out for the year, who's one of their corners.
Miles Scott, who's one of their team captains in a safety. Uh,
he was tossed early in the second quarter for targeting. Uh.
They had, you know, there were some that was some
of them they just got it kind of got rock
paper scissored where you know, they're they're running a blitz
and Indiana has a tight end delay screen. That's just
the perfect call. And then you know one of the
(03:29):
touchdowns right after halftime, mac Ressich, who was the the
safety who replaced Miles Scott, took a bad angle that
turned what should have been like a ten yard run
into a long touchdown run and then he got hurt
after that. By the end of the game, here was
the list of players who did not finish the Illinois game.
This is just the Illinois Indian game. This is just
(03:49):
from the Illinois secondary. Xavier Scott, who's out for the year.
He was he was completely you know, didn't play at all.
Cornerback Caleb Patterson, quarterback Jehane Clark, cornerback Tory cop Safe,
mac Resige, safety Matthew Bailey, safety matt Miles Scott. So
you take seven players out of any one secondary tony
and they're not gonna look great. Now, all that to
(04:11):
say they didn't look great against USC either, but they
also didn't give up sixty three points to USC. So
you know, I think the Indiana game was a little
bit of a perfect storm. But there's at least a
poopy defense watch, if not a poopin defense warning for
Illinois this weekend.
Speaker 1 (04:29):
Now, the injuries are legit because I still contend that
Ohio State's nineteen ninety four sixty three to fourteen loss
to Penn State may have been a toss up. Had
Eddie George gotten hurt early in that game, he may
have been the forty nine point difference one way or
the other in that. So give Illinois some credit. But yeah,
(04:51):
watching this one where you get to see USC and
Jaden mayav Of the quarterback throw it around, McKay lemon
their top receiver making plays, and I just see a
lot of opportunity for Ohio States offense to have some
very good success against Illinois, both running and throwing. And
(05:13):
you know USC rushed for in this one one and
twenty six yards, but ninety four yards for Wayman Jordan,
their top running back, four point seven yards for carry
along of just thirteen yards, So there's some consistency going
on there. And one of my top thoughts is if
Ohio State doesn't run the ball reasonably well, then I
(05:37):
am officially concerned about the Ohio State running game. And
what reasonably if you know, one hundred and fifty yards
is all I'm looking for.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
Really Yeah, if they run for five yards of carry,
give or take you know, thirty thirty ish carries for
five yards of carry, twenty five for five point five
or whatever it is, that that's probably a reasonable number.
They should be able to run the ball reasonably well.
I think they're gonna have plenty of success in the
passing game as well. Some of this is going to
come down to what does Illinois decide they want to stop.
(06:06):
If they're going to throw the kitchen sink at stopping
the run game like Minnesota did, then you'll see that
manifest itself in a bunch of passing. But they should
be able to run the ball reasonably well against Illinois.
Illinois defense and Illinois defensive front. There are pieces here
for Illinois on the defense that are not bad. Gave
(06:28):
Akis which his last name is spelled Jacas, but d
J is silent, which I'm glad I watched a broadcast
because they would have definitely would not have been saying
that right. But gave Acus number seventeen really really impactful.
He's kind of like a Big ten All Conference kind
of caliber player. You felt him in the run defense.
He had at one point forced an intentional grounding penalty.
(06:50):
So that's number seventeen on the defensive line. That's that's
certainly someone to watch. James Thompson defensive Taciclely you saw
him a couple times, like there are some But at
the same time, this is you know, this is a
game where Ohio State should probably win on the line
of scrimmage on both sides of the ball. Not to
the degree they did against Grambling or anything, but they
(07:12):
should win the line of scrimmage on both sides of
the ball.
Speaker 1 (07:15):
Yeah, akus last year thirteen tackles for lost, eight sacks.
One of the top edge guys. And he's a pretty
big guy too. He's like two hundred and seventy five
and seventy pounds or so. So he plays this you know,
three four outside linebacker edge guy that I don't know
there are there are no labels anymore, just edge like
(07:36):
a jack you mean, no, no, no, don't say the
J word around here.
Speaker 2 (07:42):
Sorry, he's the act.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Sorry fair enough, but overall, like if you're if you
contain him as I'm taking all these notes and not
a lot of not a lot of defensive names are
popping up for me. Rosiaic the linebacker. He had a
big hit and he had a big interception on RPO
(08:04):
kind of maybe baited Jade Mayava a little bit into
making the throw and then he you know, made to
play on the interception on that RPO. Over All, like
the fact that just when we when we do these,
you're looking for names and guys that continue to flash
and pop up, and really I didn't have much from
(08:26):
the Illinois defense doing that one way or the other.
And maybe it's because they rotated a lot, so you
can't blame everything on one particular guy. But there was
nothing there defensively that makes thing makes me think like
this is gonna be like a twenty to seventeen kind
of game.
Speaker 2 (08:43):
No, I think Ohio State's going to score more than
that for sure. Yeah. And Dylan Rosiack, the number twenty eight,
the linebacker. He was the only other guy whose name
I had written down in the front seven, and he's
you know, he was You saw him around the ball
a lot in the Indiana game. He was second on
the team and tackles in that game. But there were
a lot of opportunities for tackles in the Indiana game.
(09:03):
So there's just you know, there's not a guy on
this team that you look and you're like, man, that's
their version of Caleb Downs, Like, there's not they don't
have that. On defense. The defense is the defense is
kind of fine. This is just it's someone on our
board kind of compared them to Washington in a lot
of ways, where they've got some playmakers on offense, the
(09:24):
defense is kind of just okay. And I thought that
was a pretty apt comparison, where we watched the Washington
defense for a couple of games and it was kind
of like, yeah, I've got a couple names written down
and they're okay, but there's not there's not like a
real difference maker. I don't think on the defense. No.
Speaker 1 (09:40):
I mean they're bottom five, bottom six in most defensive
categories in the Big Ten, you know, rush defense, yards
per play, total defense's scoring defense. They gave up twenty
seven I think to Purdue just you know, Ohio State
should be able to score enough to win this. The
(10:02):
thing that will decide that ultimately, I think is Luke
Altmeyer and the Illinois offense. And one of the things
that I really like about Luke Altmeyer is, for one,
they respond very well and they can take a punch
and then punch right back. I think that's a Brett
Blms staple. You know, he's very punchable, we know that,
(10:22):
but also he will punch right back. Luke Altmeyer when
he got to Illinois, everybody remembers his four interception game
at home against Penn State back in twenty twenty three.
It was like the second or third game of the season,
like one game or two games after that, he threw
another interception at home. Since then, he has not thrown
(10:44):
an interception at home. He's like thrown like twenty four
touchdowns in one interception since that at home, since that
four interception game, Like he is a he is not
that player that we all saw, just like Graham Mertz
is not that player that we also have five touchdowns, like, oh,
you know, this is the guy al Luke Altmeyer has.
(11:05):
He does a lot of good things. He gets a
little wild at times, but in this one he was
twenty of twenty six for three hundred and twenty eight
two touchdowns along with sixty four yards, which, let's be honest,
was just a little swing pass to a two hundred
and fifty five pound running back that ran down the sidelines.
And USC couldn't catch him. So good job there, I guess.
(11:25):
But Altmeyer is a quality, quality quarterback, a veteran guy.
I don't think he's going to be like I don't
think this game will be too much for him. The
defense might be too much for him, just because of
how good it is, but I don't see him as
being a guy that gets is going to be rattled.
He might be the product may not look great because
(11:49):
of the defense, but I see him as a guy
that's going to keep fighting.
Speaker 2 (11:53):
Well they went in this game. He went down the
field right after USC had taken a one point lead
with less than two minutes to play, went right down
the field, boom boom, boom, boom boom, and was looked
completely in control. Like sometimes those even when those two
minute drill kind of drives work, they'll look a little
harried or a little frazzled. He looked completely in control,
(12:16):
went right down the field. They kicked the game winning
field goal in this one. Even in the Indiana game,
they were down twenty eight to seven or something like that,
maybe thirty five to seven, and they got the ball
right before the half, and the roof has like very
clearly like it's not falling in. It has collapsed all
around them, and he gets the ball with you know,
maybe a minute and a half left in the first half,
(12:37):
at a point when you're wondering, is Bielama just going
to sort of take a knee and just get out
of there and just say like, well, not our night.
And he went right down the field and led him
to a field goal there as well. So you know,
even when stuff is really not going well, he's he's solid.
He's a solid player. He's not demand Williams where he's
going to go sixty yards. He's you know, he's probably
(12:57):
a better scrambleer than Drew Aller, but he's you know,
he's not going to go he's not going to like
outrun people. You know. He's not one of those guys
who's like, oh, he's faster than he is on film, Like, no,
he's exactly as speediest. But he's he can get he
can move around in the pocket. He'd be a little
bit elusive in the pocket. He can pick up some
first downs with his legs. Just to give you an
idea of his athleticism, he did something for Illinois that
(13:20):
no one since Kurt Kittner the hallowed days of Kurt
Kittener in nineteen ninety nine. Did he ran for a touchdown,
caught a touchdown on a Philly special in this game,
and also threw for a touchdown. No one had done
that since Kurt Kittenner in nineteen ninety nine. But you know,
as you said, he actually had two sixty yard completions.
One was like that swing pass or screen pass whatever
(13:40):
it was to the running back. Another one was like
a short curl where a corner just missed a tackle
and the guy took off and had had a long touchdown.
So you know, it was two, you know, sixty yard completions,
not the way that Julian Sayin had had forty yard
completions last week. But you know, they do have some
players on offense, which I think brings me to Hank Batty,
(14:02):
who is their slot receiver number eighty. He's probably the
single most impactful guy on the Illinois offense. He threw
the touchdown pass on that Philly special. He was a
wildcat quarterback at one point running a sweep. You know,
he caught a screen pass and turned it into a
nice game, caught a long pass downfield. He's right among
(14:23):
you mentioned Makaya Lemon for USC, he's leading the Big
Ten in receiving yards right now. I believe Hank Baty
is second in the Big Ten in receiving yards. So
he's he's someone that's going to be someone that Ohio
State is going to have to maybe focus focus some
attention on that. I think that him against Lorenzo Styles
is going to be I think a really interesting matchup
to watch in this game.
Speaker 1 (14:44):
And Lorenzo Styles has been very, very good this year.
He did give up one of He's given up half
of Ohio State's touchdowns this year, so that is that
is a check mark against him when you're giving up
half of your team total touchdowns over five games, Like, boy,
how many touchdowns have you given up? Actually it's just one,
but still Hank Betty one of He's the first player,
(15:05):
I don't know if you saw this graphic, the first
player since Steve Preston in two thousand and three to
have a touchdown, catch, a touchdown, rush, a pass, and
a punt return in the same season. Gonna go all
the way back to Stevie Preston in two thousand and three,
and he's he's very good and that's gonna be a
really fun matchup to watch. And then Colin Dixon was
(15:26):
the the other outside these they're top outside guy. He
had four for ninety including that sixty to one yard.
He's the kind of a bigger guy like six two
sixty three, two fifteen, kind of rough and tumble and
and and can break a tackle if if you're not
serious about it. This was luk Altmeyer's seventh fourth quarter
(15:49):
game winning drive game of his career, so that also
tells you quite a bit about him. I view him
as a guy that can run. He rushed for I
think he had like four carries for thirty six yards,
lost a nine on a sack. He's coming into this
game with negative yards rushing though, to give you an
idea of the pass protection not being there this year,
(16:09):
and perhaps that's not great news for the game against
Ohio State and how they will attack him, but I
do expect them to. There'll be some spying I think
of him, and then you can turn that spy loose
to go get him, and I don't see him being
able to get away from RVL Reese or Sunny styles
in that spy mode. They are going to run the
(16:31):
ball as they're going to certainly try to run the
ball against Ohio State, slow the game down or I
guess speed it up, speed the clock up. They went
for one hundred and seventy one yards on thirty five attempts,
and they controlled the game long long rush of thirteen yards,
but they average four point nine yards per carry, So
(16:51):
that's like basically just getting five yards every time they
ran the ball. And it's Juice Williams left. Juice Williams
right not to bring up some bad memories to people,
but that that's basically kind of what that offense can
do when they're just they're happy just getting six yards
and then let's go to second and four and see
what we get there, and and they're just they're going
(17:15):
to try to establish that run Wi State. It's been
very good this year so far. The running backs don't
really stand out as anything special to me other than
the Fagan kid is like Cadan Fagan's like six three
two fifty five and Khalil Valentine kind of a faster guy,
(17:35):
a little quite a bit slighter, and then you mentioned
the Loftrey kid. They did also fumbled the ball twice
or turned the ball over twice inside like their own
ten yard line, So this could have been a much
uglier game. But I do expect them to try and run.
Speaker 2 (17:51):
The ball on Saturday. Yeah, the running backs were kind
of fine. They were eventful. This is This is like
when I talked about Minnesota's special team last week and
said they were eventful. Caden Fagan's game was he had
a took a handoff and looked like he was trying
to throw a running back pass and the running but
the receiver wasn't open, so he didn't throw it. He
had a fumble right at the goal line where you know,
(18:12):
like going in to the end zone. He fumbled at
about the one yard line. Then he was the one
who had the sixty four yard touchdown reception against Purdue.
He had just sixteen yards rushing but two touchdowns, so
that kind of gives you an idea that he's sort
of their goal line guy but does other stuff as well.
Laffery has missed several weeks in a row, so we'll see.
(18:33):
He was supposedly a game time decision last week and
didn't play, so you would expect that he would be
ready to go this week. We'll see. And then the
other one was Khalil Valentine, who also had a fumble
at the goal line. He's someone who runs really hard
but got stripped at the ball, punched out on about
(18:56):
the three yard line and fumbled into the end zone
and Gus Johnson just about just about reach Defcon zero
trying to call that play and get any coherent English
words out as that ball was loose in the end zone,
USC fell on it. That's that kind of gives you
an indication like Illinois was good enough that they won
the game, even though they had two touchdowns that were,
(19:19):
you know, like they're going into the end zone and
one yard or less away from going in for the
en zone and fumbled the ball and lost it. USC
also had a touchdown wiped off the board on a
trick play where they had their backup center in and
he was It was the first ineligible man downfield call
I've seen all year, and it was a guy who
was like one yard out too far downfield and not
(19:39):
blocking anyone and had just sort of like wandered off
like a little lost child at the mall, and that
wiped out a USC touchdown. It was a it was
a weird game like you watch you watch USC and
Illinois playing and it's a conference game, and it's like
nothing about this is right, Like what are the USC
fans from southern California. They get on a plane at
(20:00):
LAX and they fly out and they're in Champagne, Illinois
and it's like, so, guys, what do you think? And
it's like, man, this is this is where we belong
at conference game all the way it was. The whole
game just kind of fit that vibe. It was just
kind of like, yeah, this is this is a weird,
weird football game.
Speaker 1 (20:20):
Yeah, I do feel bad for those three USC fans. Yes,
you're correct. I think one of the last things for
me is they kicked a forty one yard field goal
to win it. Their kicker, had David Alano, had a
forty five yard and a third and a forty one
yarder at the end, so he's he's proven at this point.
He also handles their kickoffs. They only punted once in
(20:43):
this game. They only forced one punt in this game.
I would I would assume we'll see more punts for
for Illinois this week. Nothing nothing special there, but anything
else that you wanted to touch on before we get
out of here.
Speaker 2 (20:58):
The Illinois offense line. It's a veteran offensive line. They
have the second most starts of any team in the
nc DOUAA in terms of offensive line. But it's just
kind of like, so they're they're good. It's like, well,
they've been there a long time. They're they're fine. Like
Klatt on the game said, you know, well, if they
(21:19):
can just go straight ahead, they'll be you know, that's
what they're looking to do. They're going to look at
it straight ahead because they're not athletic. They're not going
to go sideline to sideline. They would just like to
just straight up downhill, run, you know, one gap, just boom, block,
go and move on with life. So it feels like
that might be an offensive line that Ohio State can
maybe beat with quickness. Josh Kroutz, who is the center,
(21:42):
number sixty four, he had an injury. He missed some
time in the In the Indiana game, he was like
wildly unimpressive. So you know that that might be a
watch this space. It might be a Caden McDonald game
if Illinois center is not great. And then the only
other thing that I had is Illinois. You know, you
mentioned Brett Bilima and Brett Bielama. I have come to
(22:05):
love Brett Bielahma and really enjoy talking ab Brett bilmat
big ten media days every year. But also you can
absolutely see why he gets underneath people's skin because Illinois
is doing these like real late subs and really taking
their time getting off the field when they're on defense
and USC like there's the official still standing over the
ball and there's like five seconds on the play clock
(22:26):
and Lincoln Riley is absolutely losing his mind, and so
you know, I the way to avoid that is you
just don't sub, keep your personnel in and just go.
And you know, I think Ohio State running tempo would
probably get Illinois like way out of what Illinois wants
to do in this kind of game, So I wouldn't
be surprised to see that. But yeah, just prepare yourself
(22:46):
if Ohio State subs, just prepare yourself for Illinois defensive.
Why I'm in very slowly leaving the field.
Speaker 1 (22:57):
Well, and we've seen talk that raps are going to
be like they won't they won't stand for it for
too long.
Speaker 2 (23:04):
But well, this game was This game was two weeks ago,
so they were standing for it then.
Speaker 1 (23:07):
So yeah, and you're seeing like Jade Mayava like clap
as quickly as possible once that ref would move like, hey,
we got to go. In terms of the Illinois offensive line,
I agree, they've got a great personality. You know. The
last thing they they will change up their fronts defensively.
They started out by rushing four and they're in a
four to five. Then they'll go to an odd front
(23:30):
and have a you know, a three three five. Then
you'll see like five guys and kind of the Penny
look that we've talked about. So multiple fronts. Nothing that
Julian saying hasn't seen to this point. He sees it
every single day in practice. So there you go. That
will do it. If you're watching on YouTube, please hit
the thumbs up. We would appreciate that, and of course
continue to UH five star rating and review us there
(23:52):
at whatever your podcast platform of choice, and as always,
you can find us at Buckeye Huddle dot com where
we are talking about this game, we are talking about season.
There's a little bit of Penn State talk, you know,
you know, it's always fun to talk about James Franklin
as we know, and other things as well, So find
us there at the Bucket hud a message board presented
by Jeffreymy's Columbus So thank you all for tuning in
(24:12):
and we'll talk to you all later
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com