October 3, 2025 • 25 mins
Buckeye Weekly Podcast: Minnesota vs. Ohio State Preview
Join Tony Gerdeman and Tom Orr on the Buckeye Weekly Podcast as they preview Saturday night's prime time game between Minnesota and Ohio State at Ohio Stadium. Dive into the key aspects of the game, including Minnesota's run defense, Ohio State's running game dynamics, and the expected performance of both the Ohio State passing offense and Minnesota's young quarterback, Drake Lindsey. The hosts also discuss special teams, provide score predictions, and analyze the overall strengths and weaknesses of both teams. Don't miss this in-depth analysis ahead of the big game!
00:00 Introduction and Night Game Excitement
01:25 Minnesota's Run Defense Analysis
04:06 Ohio State's Running Back Situation
08:09 Ohio State's Passing Game Strategy
12:46 Minnesota's Offensive Challenges
20:33 Special Teams and Predictions
25:03 Conclusion and Sign-Off
Join Tony Gerdeman and Tom Orr on the Buckeye Weekly Podcast as they preview Saturday night's prime time game between Minnesota and Ohio State at Ohio Stadium. Dive into the key aspects of the game, including Minnesota's run defense, Ohio State's running game dynamics, and the expected performance of both the Ohio State passing offense and Minnesota's young quarterback, Drake Lindsey. The hosts also discuss special teams, provide score predictions, and analyze the overall strengths and weaknesses of both teams. Don't miss this in-depth analysis ahead of the big game!
00:00 Introduction and Night Game Excitement
01:25 Minnesota's Run Defense Analysis
04:06 Ohio State's Running Back Situation
08:09 Ohio State's Passing Game Strategy
12:46 Minnesota's Offensive Challenges
20:33 Special Teams and Predictions
25:03 Conclusion and Sign-Off
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, Tony?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
It is going to be a prometime game at Ohio
Stadium on Saturday night. Buckeye fans get their second straight
home night game. Everyone's gonna be clamoring. When can we
get another noon kickoff? I can feel it coming, Tony.
It's late, It's past my bedtime. Why am I up
so late? Why can't they play these games at new You.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Know, it's unfortunate that people have to stay up so
late at night to watch football. It could be even
more unfortunate if they were to ever be an eleven
pm kick way out West, which would be even worse.
So appreciate the daykicks when you get them, and tolerate
the seven thirty pm kicks when you have to go
(00:53):
through with those as well. But I'm sure you'll get
a drone show, You'll get some night game atmosphere. It's
going to be fun. PJ. Fleck, watching one of his
press conferences earlier in the week, He's like, I know,
Ohio State fans have been clamoring for more night games,
so I'm sure they'll be, you know, loud and in
there into the game, and he is absolutely correct. Minnesota
(01:16):
coming into this game three and one with a two
touchdown loss to cal of the ACC. And when I
look at this minnesot team, because I want to start
with the Ohio State running game, Minnesota's run defense has
been very good except for the one game that we
watched them, which is the Rutgers game. And that's how
(01:37):
I judged them. And they gave up some some serious
yards to the Rutgers starting running back in them for
like one hundred and fifty yards or so, And I
don't care about all of the other games that I
didn't see. When they held Buffalo to forty four yards rushing,
they held Northwestern State to nineteen yards rushing, they held
(01:59):
California to sixty one yards rushing, Rutgers went for one
hundred and thirty eight yards on them, and I know
you're thinking, well, that's not very much, but the bulk
of those were more of those were from the running
back Antoine Raymond, who rushed for one hundred and sixty
one yards six point two yards per carry. Then they
lost some yards via sack. So when I see Rutgers
(02:22):
putting those kind of numbers up on Ohio State or
on Minnesota. I'm thinking, well, this should be a game
that Ohio State can run the ball, right.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
You would certainly think so, because you would assume that
Rutgers or that Minnesota is going to do their very
best to contain the Ohio State passing offense. Because I
think you come into this game with the assumption that
Ohio State is probably going to try and establish the
run and show that they can run the ball. But also,
what is everyone clamoring for. They want them to throw
the ball down the field. Well, you're probably going to see,
(02:53):
you know, if you're thinking about what is Ohio State
going to want to show, They're going to want to
show they can throw the ball down the field. So
you figure that's probably going to be in the game
plan somewhere. So if Minnesota can, you know, I would
guess that will be Minnesota's first goal is to take
that away, which should therefore open things up to the
table to be you know, not necessarily run for three
(03:14):
hundred yards, but run the ball kind of consistently pick
up five and a half six yards of carry on average,
something like that. That this feels like a game where
Ohio State should be able to do that because Minnesota's
rush defense, the College Football Nerds model has Ohio State
with like a forty eight percent a plus forty eight
percent above their you know, normal performance kind of advantage
(03:38):
in this game compared to you know, looking at what
Minnesota has done against other teams rushing attacks compared to
what those teams have done against other opponents. So I
would expect that Ohio State should be able to run
the ball at least a decent amount here. Again, not
an enormous, you know, not an enormous number, but they
should be able to run the ball enough to then
(03:59):
make Minnesota have to come up and take the runaway
and then you maybe are able to take some shots downfield.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
And as to who will be running the ball for
the buck Eyes, we've seen James People's numbers go down
each week. His carries bo Jackson did not play against Texas,
nine carries against Grambling State, nine carries against Ohio, seventeen
against Washington. He has ascended. He had the most carries
last week on the road in a Big Ten opener,
(04:27):
what was a very important game for the buck Eyes. CJ.
Donaldson after having nineteen carries against Texas, had five against
Grambling State, which is whatever, and then nine and nine
against Washington. So it feels to me like what we
saw last week. I'm kind of expecting to see moving forward,
but not as many carries for Bo Jackson, but in
(04:49):
terms of like the hierarchy of carries like twelve, ten, eight,
something like that, if we're talking about thirty carries where
it's Bo Jackson, Don CJ. Donaldson, and then James People's
and Tom. I will have you know when I suggested
a few weeks ago that a couple weeks ago that
Bo Jackson was the first Ohio State player to ever
(05:10):
rush for one hundred yards in his first two games,
Ohio State did do that research for me and for
themselves and found that they could find no other person
who has ever done that. So that's pretty significant. Bo
Jackson to have a one hundred yards rushing in his
first two games and then eighty this past week now
currently has averaged way down to ninety nine yards rushing
per game twelve carries. If Bo Jackson gets twelve carries
(05:33):
in this one, I'd expect another maybe eighty yards or so, right.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I think twelve carries, yeah, because you're gonna if you
average five, that gets you to sixty and then you
have a thirty yarder or a twenty five yard or
something like that. Yeah, you get up to that eighty
eighty five.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Kind of range.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
That sounds you know, about right. But I I'm with
you that I think they're still splitting carries three. I
don't think this goes I don't think this turns into
and now it's just two guys. I think they want
to spread those carries out. Jackson in high school didn't
always stay healthy, and so I think you want to
you know, the number of seventeen carry games that he has,
you're gonna want to limit that a good amount. And
(06:16):
you don't want to have you don't want to give C. J.
Donalds at a bunch of seventeen carry games. I think
they're going to continue to spread it out, you know, twelve, ten,
eight or something in that. In that range, as you said,
is probably probably about right. And I think you're gonna
I don't think that's gonna be And you just see
James Peoples in the fourth quarter run they're up by
three touchdowns. I think you're gonna see all three guys
get carries in the first half because People's People's has
(06:37):
been solid. He's He's, i think, looked better the last
couple of games than he did at times early in
the season. So I think they're still sort of figuring
things out. But if you've got three running backs that
you can trust and you can hang on to the
ball and you can do all the other stuff with
pass pro and blitz pick up and all that kind
of stuff, that is an incredible luxury.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
And we saw James Peoples involved in the PAS game
as well last week at times, So there's as we've
said from day one, there's gonna be a role for
all three guys. And it'll be interesting to see how
Bo Jackson gets better and better as he gets more comfortable.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
C J.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Donaldson gets more and more effective, and more of the
short yardage stuff as long as he gets a little
bit lower. I'd be interested to see how bo Jackson
can do with some of those short yardage opportunities, to
see if he can be more effective there. But overall,
I this should be if this is a game that
Ohio State can't run the ball well or well enough,
(07:34):
then that would be another concern. Because they've not yet
really just run away with the game on the ground,
and of some of that is just the lack of
opportunities and lack of drives and series and things of
that nature. So it'll be interesting to see how that
goes based on which Minnesota defense are we gonna get
(07:57):
in this one. Is it gonna be the one that
stops dron or is it gonna be the one that
we saw against Rutgers. And maybe that's more about Antoine
Raymond than the Rutgers running back than anything else. But
I think Ohio State should be able to have some
success the passing game. Tom people are clamoring for it,
like that's okay. Yeah, Washington stayed back and didn't want
to have anything happen, and Ohio State was very patient
(08:18):
on that first drive. Random ball, random ball, random ball.
But then after that drive and the rest of the
first half, I think they were fifty. They were fifty
to fifty rushing and throwing in the first half after
that first drive, and then they opened up more in
the second half.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
What are you.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Expecting from the Ohio State passing game? Because I think
there's gonna be some aggression here, and we know they
want to stretch the field. They want some explosives. I
think the best way to do that is to draw
them up and then you know, start building them, like
execute the game plan and attack downfield. And if you
only hit two of three, I think that's still good.
(08:58):
Three or four, that's great, and just you've got to
go after it.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
I do think they're going to try and stretch the
field and show that they can do that because that's
how you keep the opposing defenses honest, and that that
probably opens things up in the run game a little more.
You've seen a lot of teams try and just you're
you're doubling Jeremiah Smith. You're keeping three safeties, right. Even
Ryan Walters, who basically only has played man for almost
(09:23):
all of his career as a defensive coordinator for what
you know and now at Washington he played a bunch
of three deep and you know, the multiple, multiple guys
deep kind of defenses. That feels like that is kind
of you know, the game plan against Ohio State for
everyone is sort of, well, make them be deliberate, try
and chew up the clock on offense, limit the number
(09:43):
of possessions. And it's kind of annoying I'm sure for
the Ohio State coaching staff, but also they have been
very disciplined about just okay, take what the defense is
giving you. And if you're if you're seeing a bunch
of guys deep, you know, if it's a light box,
you run the ball into a white box, or you throw,
you know, you pull on some of the RPOs and
you know, throw the quick hitters to Jeremiah Smith outside.
(10:05):
And if they're gonna give you eight yards, you're gonna
take the eight yards and you're gonna you know, it's
not exciting, it's not gonna make you show up on
college football final, but you're gonna take the eight yards
and you're gonna move on to second and two and
go from there. I do think, however, that they're in
a spot this is a game where it's not so
close and it's not you know, such a such a
tight matchup that you can't take a couple shots. And
(10:28):
I think they probably do want to see Julian saying,
take a couple shots downfield, and that's probably a you know,
if there's if it's one on one, they're open kind
of thing, like pull the trigger if you're not sure
and it's you know, it's kind of like, well, maybe
he's up and maybe he's not pull the trigger and
see what happens. I think you might they might be
(10:48):
willing to let him make a mistake or two in
this game because it's a home game. That's a team
that they should beat by their favor to beat by
what twenty four points or something like that. This is
this is a team where if you're up early, you
can make a mistake and it's not going to be
the end of the world. So I think that you're
going to I think you're going to see at least
a couple downfield shots in the first half, just to
(11:11):
just to try and keep everyone honest more than anything else.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
Yeah, I agree. And even if you have Minnesota trying
to do a little bit of what Washington did last week,
Julian saying saw it and he went back and saw
what he should have done if there were opportunities. And
I know you and Ross Fulton talked about this on
Buckeyster around morning about their opportunities to go downfield. Watching
that I kind of understood why Julian didn't necessarily wasn't
(11:37):
necessarily necessarily as aggressive at times because the pass rush
was there and to step into that throw that would
be needed. I don't know that he felt he had
time and it looked like there was suppression there at times,
or you know, a safety just too close to one side.
Just you understood it was understandable why he didn't necessarily
attack it. I think talking with my day, talking Billy
(12:00):
Faster and Bryan Hartline, they'll they'll go over and say, well,
you did have enough freewift if he did, and so
if they want to try to do what Washington did,
which was successful, even though he completed eighty percent of
his passes, he's had now experience against that, so he'll
be maybe a little bit more understanding of where that
aggression needs to be. By the way I'm looking at
(12:21):
stats here, Tom, it's pretty interesting the do you know
the only Big Ten team to not allow a touchdown
pass this year? Is it Minnesota? It is Nebraska? You
had eighteen guesses you wouldn't have gotten it.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
Well, I mean it probably probably would have gotten there eventually,
but it would not have been one of the first
three or four. So good, good for the Cornhuskers.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Good hanging your head on that one. That's a good job.
Cornhiskers to the other side of the ball, Minnesota. When
we did our Minnesota Rutgers rewatch, we both came away
very impressed with Minnesota quarterback Drake Lindsay right here, freshman,
big kid six five to twenty five, two thirty, confident,
it will throw the ball all over the place, was
able to attack the Rutgers defense pretty well. We both
(13:06):
like the what we saw from the Minnesota receivers. They
got some playmakers in that game. And how much of
that was the Rutgers defense, you know, we'll probably find out.
But I think Drake Lindsay is hopefully he's the future
of Minnesota football because he looks very very good. I
think Minnesota can try to attack downfield, but they're gonna
(13:31):
have to pass protect him very very well. And I
don't know how nimble he is. Certainly not as nimbos
Demond Williams.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
No, for sure, this is going to be by far
the least mobile quarterback that Ohio State has faced this year.
And that's probably not a great sign because if if
you look at how Ohio State rushed the pass or
last week against him, on Williams, it was you know,
job one was contained job two was attacked and they
were very very discipline and they really stayed in the
(14:01):
rush lanes and they didn't over pursue and you didn't
get behind the quarterback. It was very very good, technically
solid responsible pass rush. This week, he's you know, Drake
Lindsay's a nice pocket quarterback, but he's a six foot five,
two hundred and thirty pounds white guy. So I mean,
(14:23):
you've kind of got a picture of your head, and yeah,
he does have negative career rushing yardage. Thank you for asking.
And this is one where you still want to be disciplined,
but also you probably you don't need to dedicate r
VL Reese's a spy this week. You can probably just
like go get them. And this is that's gonna be.
(14:43):
What I think is a concern for me from Minnesota's
perspective is if you I don't think they're gonna be
able to run the ball very well because Darius Taylor
has a hamstring injury, so he's either gonna be limited
or not back. They were not able to run the
ball really at all against Rutgers, and if you're gonna
try and rely on I think they're going to have
(15:04):
to just try and get the ball out quickly and
hope you know, you can complete two out of three
passes and get six yards per completion and move the
sticks that way. I don't think they can sit back
in the pocket and run a bunch of double moves
because I don't. I don't think they're going to have
time for that, because with the way Ohio State has
rushed the passer this year and just the way that
(15:25):
this guise coverages, you're constantly you don't need to bring
six guys to get pressure because they've been confusing guys.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
You get a lot of.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
Offensive linemen blocking air because someone new all show blitz
and then back out, and so you get, you know,
one guy coming free and two guys standing there with
nothing to do. I think you might see a decent
amount of that against against Minnesota, and then Drake Lindsay's
got to get rid of the ball real quick.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
You bring up an interesting point about r VL Reeche,
who's going to be able to be more involved with
the defense in terms of attacking rather than just hang
out make sure everything is it's cool, Like there's no
hanging out now, it's like go and do get to
get the ball wherever it is or going to coverage,
whatever it is. Looking up. You know, Minnesotas give it
(16:10):
up seven sacks on the season, two sacks against Cal,
two sacks against Rutgers, two sacks against Buffalo, so like
they've not given up more than two, so they've done
well enough. They haven't really played a stout pass rushing defense.
This will be their the first opportunity and we'll see
how Ohio State does and how deep that defensive line goes.
(16:31):
But it will be interesting again to see r vel
Reese back on the attack and how much he does
there because he's had to spy at every single game
so far this season. As he said, they don't necessarily
need him to do that, although there are still some
things like not spying but delayed blitzing that that sort
of thing that they can do with him. That'll be
(16:51):
interesting to watch. And of course what they do with
everybody is always interesting to watch because it changes, and
the pictures will change, the fronts will change from snap
to snap. It's always fun to watch what this Ohio
State defense is doing that's going to impact the passing game.
The running game for Minnesota is not good. I don't
expect Darius Taylor to play. But again, you know, he's
(17:14):
a very good running back against average teams, and he
said one good game against a ranked opponent that was
last year against Illinois, he went off on them. Other
than that, he you know, maybe it's a product of, well,
now you're down, you know, twenty one points in the
third quarter at times, so we can't run the ball.
But he's he's never lit it up, and you know,
(17:35):
coming into this game, if he were to play, he's
still banged up a little bit. PJ. Fleck on Monday said,
you'll know two hours before the game, which I don't know. Tom.
Do you read into that that he's playing or that
he's not, Like what is what is the the play
there for Fleck to say, I'm not telling you.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Anything that to me suggests he's not played. And this
is not based on any great inside information. This is
just kind of reading the tea leaves. To me, it
makes sense if you're Minnesota and you're going on the
road and you're a twenty four point underdog, it would
be a lot of fun to win at Ohio Stadium.
Are you gonna win at Ohio Stadium? Probably not as
(18:17):
likely as you are to win against Nebraska or Iowa
or Purdue the next three weeks. So in my mind,
give Darius Taylor another week to get healthy, to heal up,
and then put him out there when you're trying to
you have a better chance to win games. He's got
some of those. At two of the three are at
home Purdue. You know, Purdue is very beatable. Iowa and
Nebraska are both games where Minnesota is probably a touchdown
(18:41):
ish underdog maybe, So those are games you can you
can win. You steal one of those and you're you
know that's those are two rivalry trophies, one for a pick,
one for a broken chare so you you know, those
are games are going to want to win. To me,
it makes a lot of sense to just sort of
sit him another week and just kind of go, look,
we're not gonna be able to run the ball. That's fine,
(19:02):
get out of here as healthy as you can, and
move on to the games that you might win later
in the season. If he's not playing, then I don't
think they're gonna be able to run the ball at all,
and I think I think they might have a very
bad time on offense, and Ohio State might have more
snaps on offense, just because I think the defense gets
off the field a lot earlier Washington last last week,
(19:23):
you know, strung together not incredibly long drives, but you know,
ten plays sixty nine yard, the love and plays forty
eight yards, ten plays twenty five yards, they'd play sixty
five yards. You know, those are all drives. They had
won for five for six yards. It was three forty
off the clock. I mean they were able to sort
of keep the Ohio State offense on the sideline. I
think you might see more three and outs this week
(19:43):
for Minnesota and you know, get the get the Ohio
State offense on the field, because I just I don't
see a lot of ways that Minnesota is going to
be able to stream together ten play drives this week.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
Yeah, and if that running game isn't able to go,
which we don't expect it to, and then you start
to becoming a little bit pass happy like they were
last week. What was like forty one passes to like
eighteen rushes. They were fortunate to win that game against Rutgers.
Forty one passes is going to lead to a lot
a lot of pass rush. In my opinion, Minnesota is
(20:13):
the number four team in a big ten in terms
of time of possession time. I know it's the most
important stat in the whole college football sphere. Ohio State
much much worse number eight and time of possession. So
it's a surprising that Ohio State is favored by over
three touchdowns in this one, frankly given given the time
of possession stats. As we know, special teams like I
(20:34):
don't you know coy perrich safety is dangerous as a returner.
He has not yet returned to touchdown, returned to punt
or a kick for a touchdown in his two year career.
But he's a very talented player. He's good special teams.
Brian Day says he wants it to be a strength.
I think as long as it's not a weakness, then
you're gonna come out of head ahead in this one eventually. Though,
(20:57):
it would be nice if this was a strength for
Ohio State.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah. The talent is there, certainly, and so you would,
you know, at some point you would expect the talent
to shine through. But you would have said that for
years And they haven't returned to kickoff for a touchdown
since twenty ten, and they returned to punt for a
touchdown for the first time last year in ten years.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
So it's a you know, that's not.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
That's not what you would sort of expect based on that.
But Ohio State has really not had to use they've
not had to use the special teams to move the ball.
They've just sort of been able to rely on, Hey,
the defense is really good, or hey the offense is
really good, or hey, the offense and defense are both
really good. Just get the ball back, don't make a mistake,
and get the ball back to the offense and sort
of move on with play. Minnesota special teams eighty eighth
(21:46):
in FBI right now, that's not great in special teams FBI.
Ohio State's fiftieth, but Minnesota's special team last week against Rutgers.
We watched this game, and I think on the recap show,
I think I said their special teams were eventful. That's
the best use word to use for them, because they
blocked a field goal, but then they missed a field goal,
they missed a fifty yard er right at halftime, they
(22:06):
almost blocked a punt, they almost got a punt blocked.
It's like, wow, lots of stuff almost happened. But you know,
and and and Paras who you mentioned, had a long
kick return that was like over fifty yards across the
across the across midfield that set up a long field
goal attempt before half time that they missed. But then
the next time, right after halftime, like three plays later,
(22:28):
he catches the opening kickoff for the second half and
then just kind of like trips and balls down and
so then you got terrible field possessions position. So it
was just kind of, oh, wow, their special teams are
pretty good. Look they blocked a field. Go. Oh, their
special teams are bad. Look they they did this. Oh look,
oh this is good. Up, No, this is bad. And
it just it's not you look at that. It's kind
(22:48):
of like, well, unless they get significantly better, unless they
can do all the good stuff and none of the
bad stuff against Ohio State, that's you know, I don't
love their defense against Ohio State. I really don't love
their offense against Ohio State. And special teams don't feel
like they're probably going to be a difference maker either.
So like we're running out of phases of the game, Tony,
what do you think their coin toss strategy is?
Speaker 1 (23:10):
Defer heads defer, And that's about all the advice I
can give them, because that's that's the only way, that's
the only place that's going to be an even matchup
is the coin toss. On this one, I have not
yet sent in my score prediction, and I'm just I'm
writing some numbers down now, and I'm if cal and
(23:33):
Rutgers are scoring twenty seven and twenty eight points respectively,
then my initial thought of thirty four is not enough,
so I'm going to go thirty eight. And I can't
decide between three or seven, So I will say I've
(23:54):
really liked this red zone defense. I'll say thirty eight
three Ohio State.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Well, my first thought was thirty eight seven, and then
I thought, I'm guessing I'm constantly high on these score
projections because they're just not getting as many possessions as
they used to. So I'm gonna trend this down a
little bit and I'm gonna say thirty one. And then
I was between seven and three, and I thought, I'm
gonna go thirty one to three Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
All right, there you go, tom Way way low on
this number, putting the Ohio State offense right in there
with Rutgers in California. Of the acc wow. Whereas I
have them at thirty eight, higher than anybody that Minnesota
has played all this year, class amongst themselves, all by themselves,
(24:38):
which is what you would expect from the number one
team in the nation. So there you go. Tom has
them thirty one to three. I have a thirty eight
to three. Not a lot of respect, no, no, the
proper respect for the Minnesota offense, just even more respect
for the Ohio State defense. Is that correct? Is that
a better way to say it.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
That's a better way to say it.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yes, Tom has less respect for the Ohio State offense
than iety. So that'll do it. If you can hit
the thumbs up on YouTube, we would always appreciate that,
don't you know. Don't let Tom's negative scores get you down.
Thumbs up and we would appreciate the end the five
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(25:19):
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Hello, everybody, Welcome to the Buckeye Weekly Podcast. I'm Tony
Gerdaman here as always with Tom or Tom. How's it going, Tony?
Speaker 2 (00:11):
It is going to be a prometime game at Ohio
Stadium on Saturday night. Buckeye fans get their second straight
home night game. Everyone's gonna be clamoring. When can we
get another noon kickoff? I can feel it coming, Tony.
It's late, It's past my bedtime. Why am I up
so late? Why can't they play these games at new You.
Speaker 1 (00:33):
Know, it's unfortunate that people have to stay up so
late at night to watch football. It could be even
more unfortunate if they were to ever be an eleven
pm kick way out West, which would be even worse.
So appreciate the daykicks when you get them, and tolerate
the seven thirty pm kicks when you have to go
(00:53):
through with those as well. But I'm sure you'll get
a drone show, You'll get some night game atmosphere. It's
going to be fun. PJ. Fleck, watching one of his
press conferences earlier in the week, He's like, I know,
Ohio State fans have been clamoring for more night games,
so I'm sure they'll be, you know, loud and in
there into the game, and he is absolutely correct. Minnesota
(01:16):
coming into this game three and one with a two
touchdown loss to cal of the ACC. And when I
look at this minnesot team, because I want to start
with the Ohio State running game, Minnesota's run defense has
been very good except for the one game that we
watched them, which is the Rutgers game. And that's how
(01:37):
I judged them. And they gave up some some serious
yards to the Rutgers starting running back in them for
like one hundred and fifty yards or so, And I
don't care about all of the other games that I
didn't see. When they held Buffalo to forty four yards rushing,
they held Northwestern State to nineteen yards rushing, they held
(01:59):
California to sixty one yards rushing, Rutgers went for one
hundred and thirty eight yards on them, and I know
you're thinking, well, that's not very much, but the bulk
of those were more of those were from the running
back Antoine Raymond, who rushed for one hundred and sixty
one yards six point two yards per carry. Then they
lost some yards via sack. So when I see Rutgers
(02:22):
putting those kind of numbers up on Ohio State or
on Minnesota. I'm thinking, well, this should be a game
that Ohio State can run the ball, right.
Speaker 2 (02:31):
You would certainly think so, because you would assume that
Rutgers or that Minnesota is going to do their very
best to contain the Ohio State passing offense. Because I
think you come into this game with the assumption that
Ohio State is probably going to try and establish the
run and show that they can run the ball. But also,
what is everyone clamoring for. They want them to throw
the ball down the field. Well, you're probably going to see,
(02:53):
you know, if you're thinking about what is Ohio State
going to want to show, They're going to want to
show they can throw the ball down the field. So
you figure that's probably going to be in the game
plan somewhere. So if Minnesota can, you know, I would
guess that will be Minnesota's first goal is to take
that away, which should therefore open things up to the
table to be you know, not necessarily run for three
(03:14):
hundred yards, but run the ball kind of consistently pick
up five and a half six yards of carry on average,
something like that. That this feels like a game where
Ohio State should be able to do that because Minnesota's
rush defense, the College Football Nerds model has Ohio State
with like a forty eight percent a plus forty eight
percent above their you know, normal performance kind of advantage
(03:38):
in this game compared to you know, looking at what
Minnesota has done against other teams rushing attacks compared to
what those teams have done against other opponents. So I
would expect that Ohio State should be able to run
the ball at least a decent amount here. Again, not
an enormous, you know, not an enormous number, but they
should be able to run the ball enough to then
(03:59):
make Minnesota have to come up and take the runaway
and then you maybe are able to take some shots downfield.
Speaker 1 (04:06):
And as to who will be running the ball for
the buck Eyes, we've seen James People's numbers go down
each week. His carries bo Jackson did not play against Texas,
nine carries against Grambling State, nine carries against Ohio, seventeen
against Washington. He has ascended. He had the most carries
last week on the road in a Big Ten opener,
(04:27):
what was a very important game for the buck Eyes. CJ.
Donaldson after having nineteen carries against Texas, had five against
Grambling State, which is whatever, and then nine and nine
against Washington. So it feels to me like what we
saw last week. I'm kind of expecting to see moving forward,
but not as many carries for Bo Jackson, but in
(04:49):
terms of like the hierarchy of carries like twelve, ten, eight,
something like that, if we're talking about thirty carries where
it's Bo Jackson, Don CJ. Donaldson, and then James People's
and Tom. I will have you know when I suggested
a few weeks ago that a couple weeks ago that
Bo Jackson was the first Ohio State player to ever
(05:10):
rush for one hundred yards in his first two games,
Ohio State did do that research for me and for
themselves and found that they could find no other person
who has ever done that. So that's pretty significant. Bo
Jackson to have a one hundred yards rushing in his
first two games and then eighty this past week now
currently has averaged way down to ninety nine yards rushing
per game twelve carries. If Bo Jackson gets twelve carries
(05:33):
in this one, I'd expect another maybe eighty yards or so, right.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
I think twelve carries, yeah, because you're gonna if you
average five, that gets you to sixty and then you
have a thirty yarder or a twenty five yard or
something like that. Yeah, you get up to that eighty
eighty five.
Speaker 1 (05:52):
Kind of range.
Speaker 2 (05:53):
That sounds you know, about right. But I I'm with
you that I think they're still splitting carries three. I
don't think this goes I don't think this turns into
and now it's just two guys. I think they want
to spread those carries out. Jackson in high school didn't
always stay healthy, and so I think you want to
you know, the number of seventeen carry games that he has,
you're gonna want to limit that a good amount. And
(06:16):
you don't want to have you don't want to give C. J.
Donalds at a bunch of seventeen carry games. I think
they're going to continue to spread it out, you know, twelve, ten,
eight or something in that. In that range, as you said,
is probably probably about right. And I think you're gonna
I don't think that's gonna be And you just see
James Peoples in the fourth quarter run they're up by
three touchdowns. I think you're gonna see all three guys
get carries in the first half because People's People's has
(06:37):
been solid. He's He's, i think, looked better the last
couple of games than he did at times early in
the season. So I think they're still sort of figuring
things out. But if you've got three running backs that
you can trust and you can hang on to the
ball and you can do all the other stuff with
pass pro and blitz pick up and all that kind
of stuff, that is an incredible luxury.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
And we saw James Peoples involved in the PAS game
as well last week at times, So there's as we've
said from day one, there's gonna be a role for
all three guys. And it'll be interesting to see how
Bo Jackson gets better and better as he gets more comfortable.
Speaker 2 (07:13):
C J.
Speaker 1 (07:14):
Donaldson gets more and more effective, and more of the
short yardage stuff as long as he gets a little
bit lower. I'd be interested to see how bo Jackson
can do with some of those short yardage opportunities, to
see if he can be more effective there. But overall,
I this should be if this is a game that
Ohio State can't run the ball well or well enough,
(07:34):
then that would be another concern. Because they've not yet
really just run away with the game on the ground,
and of some of that is just the lack of
opportunities and lack of drives and series and things of
that nature. So it'll be interesting to see how that
goes based on which Minnesota defense are we gonna get
(07:57):
in this one. Is it gonna be the one that
stops dron or is it gonna be the one that
we saw against Rutgers. And maybe that's more about Antoine
Raymond than the Rutgers running back than anything else. But
I think Ohio State should be able to have some
success the passing game. Tom people are clamoring for it,
like that's okay. Yeah, Washington stayed back and didn't want
to have anything happen, and Ohio State was very patient
(08:18):
on that first drive. Random ball, random ball, random ball.
But then after that drive and the rest of the
first half, I think they were fifty. They were fifty
to fifty rushing and throwing in the first half after
that first drive, and then they opened up more in
the second half.
Speaker 2 (08:36):
What are you.
Speaker 1 (08:37):
Expecting from the Ohio State passing game? Because I think
there's gonna be some aggression here, and we know they
want to stretch the field. They want some explosives. I
think the best way to do that is to draw
them up and then you know, start building them, like
execute the game plan and attack downfield. And if you
only hit two of three, I think that's still good.
(08:58):
Three or four, that's great, and just you've got to
go after it.
Speaker 2 (09:02):
I do think they're going to try and stretch the
field and show that they can do that because that's
how you keep the opposing defenses honest, and that that
probably opens things up in the run game a little more.
You've seen a lot of teams try and just you're
you're doubling Jeremiah Smith. You're keeping three safeties, right. Even
Ryan Walters, who basically only has played man for almost
(09:23):
all of his career as a defensive coordinator for what
you know and now at Washington he played a bunch
of three deep and you know, the multiple, multiple guys
deep kind of defenses. That feels like that is kind
of you know, the game plan against Ohio State for
everyone is sort of, well, make them be deliberate, try
and chew up the clock on offense, limit the number
(09:43):
of possessions. And it's kind of annoying I'm sure for
the Ohio State coaching staff, but also they have been
very disciplined about just okay, take what the defense is
giving you. And if you're if you're seeing a bunch
of guys deep, you know, if it's a light box,
you run the ball into a white box, or you throw,
you know, you pull on some of the RPOs and
you know, throw the quick hitters to Jeremiah Smith outside.
(10:05):
And if they're gonna give you eight yards, you're gonna
take the eight yards and you're gonna you know, it's
not exciting, it's not gonna make you show up on
college football final, but you're gonna take the eight yards
and you're gonna move on to second and two and
go from there. I do think, however, that they're in
a spot this is a game where it's not so
close and it's not you know, such a such a
tight matchup that you can't take a couple shots. And
(10:28):
I think they probably do want to see Julian saying,
take a couple shots downfield, and that's probably a you know,
if there's if it's one on one, they're open kind
of thing, like pull the trigger if you're not sure
and it's you know, it's kind of like, well, maybe
he's up and maybe he's not pull the trigger and
see what happens. I think you might they might be
(10:48):
willing to let him make a mistake or two in
this game because it's a home game. That's a team
that they should beat by their favor to beat by
what twenty four points or something like that. This is
this is a team where if you're up early, you
can make a mistake and it's not going to be
the end of the world. So I think that you're
going to I think you're going to see at least
a couple downfield shots in the first half, just to
(11:11):
just to try and keep everyone honest more than anything else.
Speaker 1 (11:14):
Yeah, I agree. And even if you have Minnesota trying
to do a little bit of what Washington did last week,
Julian saying saw it and he went back and saw
what he should have done if there were opportunities. And
I know you and Ross Fulton talked about this on
Buckeyster around morning about their opportunities to go downfield. Watching
that I kind of understood why Julian didn't necessarily wasn't
(11:37):
necessarily necessarily as aggressive at times because the pass rush
was there and to step into that throw that would
be needed. I don't know that he felt he had
time and it looked like there was suppression there at times,
or you know, a safety just too close to one side.
Just you understood it was understandable why he didn't necessarily
attack it. I think talking with my day, talking Billy
(12:00):
Faster and Bryan Hartline, they'll they'll go over and say, well,
you did have enough freewift if he did, and so
if they want to try to do what Washington did,
which was successful, even though he completed eighty percent of
his passes, he's had now experience against that, so he'll
be maybe a little bit more understanding of where that
aggression needs to be. By the way I'm looking at
(12:21):
stats here, Tom, it's pretty interesting the do you know
the only Big Ten team to not allow a touchdown
pass this year? Is it Minnesota? It is Nebraska? You
had eighteen guesses you wouldn't have gotten it.
Speaker 2 (12:35):
Well, I mean it probably probably would have gotten there eventually,
but it would not have been one of the first
three or four. So good, good for the Cornhuskers.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Good hanging your head on that one. That's a good job.
Cornhiskers to the other side of the ball, Minnesota. When
we did our Minnesota Rutgers rewatch, we both came away
very impressed with Minnesota quarterback Drake Lindsay right here, freshman,
big kid six five to twenty five, two thirty, confident,
it will throw the ball all over the place, was
able to attack the Rutgers defense pretty well. We both
(13:06):
like the what we saw from the Minnesota receivers. They
got some playmakers in that game. And how much of
that was the Rutgers defense, you know, we'll probably find out.
But I think Drake Lindsay is hopefully he's the future
of Minnesota football because he looks very very good. I
think Minnesota can try to attack downfield, but they're gonna
(13:31):
have to pass protect him very very well. And I
don't know how nimble he is. Certainly not as nimbos
Demond Williams.
Speaker 2 (13:39):
No, for sure, this is going to be by far
the least mobile quarterback that Ohio State has faced this year.
And that's probably not a great sign because if if
you look at how Ohio State rushed the pass or
last week against him, on Williams, it was you know,
job one was contained job two was attacked and they
were very very discipline and they really stayed in the
(14:01):
rush lanes and they didn't over pursue and you didn't
get behind the quarterback. It was very very good, technically
solid responsible pass rush. This week, he's you know, Drake
Lindsay's a nice pocket quarterback, but he's a six foot five,
two hundred and thirty pounds white guy. So I mean,
(14:23):
you've kind of got a picture of your head, and yeah,
he does have negative career rushing yardage. Thank you for asking.
And this is one where you still want to be disciplined,
but also you probably you don't need to dedicate r
VL Reese's a spy this week. You can probably just
like go get them. And this is that's gonna be.
(14:43):
What I think is a concern for me from Minnesota's
perspective is if you I don't think they're gonna be
able to run the ball very well because Darius Taylor
has a hamstring injury, so he's either gonna be limited
or not back. They were not able to run the
ball really at all against Rutgers, and if you're gonna
try and rely on I think they're going to have
(15:04):
to just try and get the ball out quickly and
hope you know, you can complete two out of three
passes and get six yards per completion and move the
sticks that way. I don't think they can sit back
in the pocket and run a bunch of double moves
because I don't. I don't think they're going to have
time for that, because with the way Ohio State has
rushed the passer this year and just the way that
(15:25):
this guise coverages, you're constantly you don't need to bring
six guys to get pressure because they've been confusing guys.
Speaker 1 (15:31):
You get a lot of.
Speaker 2 (15:31):
Offensive linemen blocking air because someone new all show blitz
and then back out, and so you get, you know,
one guy coming free and two guys standing there with
nothing to do. I think you might see a decent
amount of that against against Minnesota, and then Drake Lindsay's
got to get rid of the ball real quick.
Speaker 1 (15:49):
You bring up an interesting point about r VL Reeche,
who's going to be able to be more involved with
the defense in terms of attacking rather than just hang
out make sure everything is it's cool, Like there's no
hanging out now, it's like go and do get to
get the ball wherever it is or going to coverage,
whatever it is. Looking up. You know, Minnesotas give it
(16:10):
up seven sacks on the season, two sacks against Cal,
two sacks against Rutgers, two sacks against Buffalo, so like
they've not given up more than two, so they've done
well enough. They haven't really played a stout pass rushing defense.
This will be their the first opportunity and we'll see
how Ohio State does and how deep that defensive line goes.
(16:31):
But it will be interesting again to see r vel
Reese back on the attack and how much he does
there because he's had to spy at every single game
so far this season. As he said, they don't necessarily
need him to do that, although there are still some
things like not spying but delayed blitzing that that sort
of thing that they can do with him. That'll be
(16:51):
interesting to watch. And of course what they do with
everybody is always interesting to watch because it changes, and
the pictures will change, the fronts will change from snap
to snap. It's always fun to watch what this Ohio
State defense is doing that's going to impact the passing game.
The running game for Minnesota is not good. I don't
expect Darius Taylor to play. But again, you know, he's
(17:14):
a very good running back against average teams, and he
said one good game against a ranked opponent that was
last year against Illinois, he went off on them. Other
than that, he you know, maybe it's a product of, well,
now you're down, you know, twenty one points in the
third quarter at times, so we can't run the ball.
But he's he's never lit it up, and you know,
(17:35):
coming into this game, if he were to play, he's
still banged up a little bit. PJ. Fleck on Monday said,
you'll know two hours before the game, which I don't know. Tom.
Do you read into that that he's playing or that
he's not, Like what is what is the the play
there for Fleck to say, I'm not telling you.
Speaker 2 (17:56):
Anything that to me suggests he's not played. And this
is not based on any great inside information. This is
just kind of reading the tea leaves. To me, it
makes sense if you're Minnesota and you're going on the
road and you're a twenty four point underdog, it would
be a lot of fun to win at Ohio Stadium.
Are you gonna win at Ohio Stadium? Probably not as
(18:17):
likely as you are to win against Nebraska or Iowa
or Purdue the next three weeks. So in my mind,
give Darius Taylor another week to get healthy, to heal up,
and then put him out there when you're trying to
you have a better chance to win games. He's got
some of those. At two of the three are at
home Purdue. You know, Purdue is very beatable. Iowa and
Nebraska are both games where Minnesota is probably a touchdown
(18:41):
ish underdog maybe, So those are games you can you
can win. You steal one of those and you're you
know that's those are two rivalry trophies, one for a pick,
one for a broken chare so you you know, those
are games are going to want to win. To me,
it makes a lot of sense to just sort of
sit him another week and just kind of go, look,
we're not gonna be able to run the ball. That's fine,
(19:02):
get out of here as healthy as you can, and
move on to the games that you might win later
in the season. If he's not playing, then I don't
think they're gonna be able to run the ball at all,
and I think I think they might have a very
bad time on offense, and Ohio State might have more
snaps on offense, just because I think the defense gets
off the field a lot earlier Washington last last week,
(19:23):
you know, strung together not incredibly long drives, but you know,
ten plays sixty nine yard, the love and plays forty
eight yards, ten plays twenty five yards, they'd play sixty
five yards. You know, those are all drives. They had
won for five for six yards. It was three forty
off the clock. I mean they were able to sort
of keep the Ohio State offense on the sideline. I
think you might see more three and outs this week
(19:43):
for Minnesota and you know, get the get the Ohio
State offense on the field, because I just I don't
see a lot of ways that Minnesota is going to
be able to stream together ten play drives this week.
Speaker 1 (19:53):
Yeah, and if that running game isn't able to go,
which we don't expect it to, and then you start
to becoming a little bit pass happy like they were
last week. What was like forty one passes to like
eighteen rushes. They were fortunate to win that game against Rutgers.
Forty one passes is going to lead to a lot
a lot of pass rush. In my opinion, Minnesota is
(20:13):
the number four team in a big ten in terms
of time of possession time. I know it's the most
important stat in the whole college football sphere. Ohio State
much much worse number eight and time of possession. So
it's a surprising that Ohio State is favored by over
three touchdowns in this one, frankly given given the time
of possession stats. As we know, special teams like I
(20:34):
don't you know coy perrich safety is dangerous as a returner.
He has not yet returned to touchdown, returned to punt
or a kick for a touchdown in his two year career.
But he's a very talented player. He's good special teams.
Brian Day says he wants it to be a strength.
I think as long as it's not a weakness, then
you're gonna come out of head ahead in this one eventually. Though,
(20:57):
it would be nice if this was a strength for
Ohio State.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
Yeah. The talent is there, certainly, and so you would,
you know, at some point you would expect the talent
to shine through. But you would have said that for
years And they haven't returned to kickoff for a touchdown
since twenty ten, and they returned to punt for a
touchdown for the first time last year in ten years.
Speaker 1 (21:18):
So it's a you know, that's not.
Speaker 2 (21:23):
That's not what you would sort of expect based on that.
But Ohio State has really not had to use they've
not had to use the special teams to move the ball.
They've just sort of been able to rely on, Hey,
the defense is really good, or hey the offense is
really good, or hey, the offense and defense are both
really good. Just get the ball back, don't make a mistake,
and get the ball back to the offense and sort
of move on with play. Minnesota special teams eighty eighth
(21:46):
in FBI right now, that's not great in special teams FBI.
Ohio State's fiftieth, but Minnesota's special team last week against Rutgers.
We watched this game, and I think on the recap show,
I think I said their special teams were eventful. That's
the best use word to use for them, because they
blocked a field goal, but then they missed a field goal,
they missed a fifty yard er right at halftime, they
(22:06):
almost blocked a punt, they almost got a punt blocked.
It's like, wow, lots of stuff almost happened. But you know,
and and and Paras who you mentioned, had a long
kick return that was like over fifty yards across the
across the across midfield that set up a long field
goal attempt before half time that they missed. But then
the next time, right after halftime, like three plays later,
(22:28):
he catches the opening kickoff for the second half and
then just kind of like trips and balls down and
so then you got terrible field possessions position. So it
was just kind of, oh, wow, their special teams are
pretty good. Look they blocked a field. Go. Oh, their
special teams are bad. Look they they did this. Oh look,
oh this is good. Up, No, this is bad. And
it just it's not you look at that. It's kind
(22:48):
of like, well, unless they get significantly better, unless they
can do all the good stuff and none of the
bad stuff against Ohio State, that's you know, I don't
love their defense against Ohio State. I really don't love
their offense against Ohio State. And special teams don't feel
like they're probably going to be a difference maker either.
So like we're running out of phases of the game, Tony,
what do you think their coin toss strategy is?
Speaker 1 (23:10):
Defer heads defer, And that's about all the advice I
can give them, because that's that's the only way, that's
the only place that's going to be an even matchup
is the coin toss. On this one, I have not
yet sent in my score prediction, and I'm just I'm
writing some numbers down now, and I'm if cal and
(23:33):
Rutgers are scoring twenty seven and twenty eight points respectively,
then my initial thought of thirty four is not enough,
so I'm going to go thirty eight. And I can't
decide between three or seven, So I will say I've
(23:54):
really liked this red zone defense. I'll say thirty eight
three Ohio State.
Speaker 2 (23:58):
Well, my first thought was thirty eight seven, and then
I thought, I'm guessing I'm constantly high on these score
projections because they're just not getting as many possessions as
they used to. So I'm gonna trend this down a
little bit and I'm gonna say thirty one. And then
I was between seven and three, and I thought, I'm
gonna go thirty one to three Ohio State.
Speaker 1 (24:18):
All right, there you go, tom Way way low on
this number, putting the Ohio State offense right in there
with Rutgers in California. Of the acc wow. Whereas I
have them at thirty eight, higher than anybody that Minnesota
has played all this year, class amongst themselves, all by themselves,
(24:38):
which is what you would expect from the number one
team in the nation. So there you go. Tom has
them thirty one to three. I have a thirty eight
to three. Not a lot of respect, no, no, the
proper respect for the Minnesota offense, just even more respect
for the Ohio State defense. Is that correct? Is that
a better way to say it.
Speaker 2 (24:56):
That's a better way to say it.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
Yes, Tom has less respect for the Ohio State offense
than iety. So that'll do it. If you can hit
the thumbs up on YouTube, we would always appreciate that,
don't you know. Don't let Tom's negative scores get you down.
Thumbs up and we would appreciate the end the five
star writing interview. If you listen to this via your
(25:19):
podcast platform of choice, and as always, come say I
let you us there on the Buckey Huddle message board
presented by Jeffreybies Clubus Buckeyehuddle dot Com. Would love to
see you there. Thank you all for tuning in, and
we'll talk to you all later.
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