I can understand why you’d ask, but that would be completely out of character for how OSU has handled this season.
They didn’t need those players against MSU. They will need them For Bama.
Nice post, Happy New Year and welcome to Tidefans! We are all looking forward to this game and glad it is competing with you guys. We have a couple of regular OSU posters here and they are all class. Thanks for stopping by and feel free to engage is some real football talk. This is the best place to do it...not a whole lot of smack just bigtime college football fans that love the Tide.Greetings from Ohio, and Happy New Year. Hoping you won't mind this Buckeye interloper taking up a few paragraphs in your conversation. After watching OSU and CU I headed over here to see what the Bama fans were saying about the upcoming NC matchup. I honestly had no idea what to expect, but was pleasantly surprised to simply find a group of real, observant football junkies that know their stuff. I also found out that perhaps OSU did favors beyond the Ohio border by smashing Dabo and the orange in their deserving mouths. To that, we can lift a brew. I promise I won't be a nuisance here and might not post again. A couple of observations:
- Even here, where Buckeye football is king, we haven't heard a peep about how JF is doing. Like most observers, I wouldn't think he'll be feeling anywhere near 100% within a week.
- What we saw against Clemson is the team we all expected up here this year. Note that JF threw only 3 interceptions all year last year, so we've seen a couple of games we hope are anomalies. I honestly think there's been a lack of continuity with the missed COVID games, and not sure we handled those unexpected gaps well.
- I agree with some of the posters that say we seem to have treated CU like a championship game. And from a fan perspective, I can't begin to describe how satisfying it was.. Ha! We'll see how good Day is at getting the team to move on. He's Urban's handpicked guy and in most aspects is like a clone of him. We'll see...
- I echo some of the posters here that believe the right 2 teams are in the championship game. Feels like a real big boy game.
- Of the players missing the game against CU, getting our starting guard and d-end will be the biggest bounce. There were a few on the unavailable list that will be nice to have if we need them.
You're team is dang good, as is NS. We ALL know that up here, make no mistake. Anybody calling for a blowout (on either side) doesn't really know football, although it's possible one team could win handily. If the Buckeyes step it up like last week we hopefully get a game for all of us to remember. In the meantime, best of luck to you and your Bama team, and all due respect from up North!
Nice post Buckeye and you are quite welcome here. We really like engaging with fans of other teams so stick around and have fun. Gonna be a great game indeed!
Is it your LBs that give you concern? From what I can tell about your LBs is what they might lack in overall athleticism they make up for in knowing exactly where they need to be. That said, I do hope that using Najee in the pass game something we can lean on some Monday night....he’s a tough match up for even the more athletic LBs.
As a Buckeye fan for ~30 years, I do feel more confident going into this game than I did in 2015. I think this team is better than the 14-15 version of Ohio State. That being said, if Ohio State plays perfect like they did Friday, I think they win this game a little over half the time.
Can't speak regarding your team but IMO, this Alabama team is FAR superior to the 2014 team on offense and even superior on defense. In retrospect, it's almost a surprise that they even made the playoff. IMO, the 2014 team is the worst Bama team since 2010 (gave up 44 to AU in BDS, could have been 60). And the in-game coaching vs you was poor - LK seemed to be bored with running Henry. OTOH, OSU didn't just win the game, they seemed physically superior.
Its odd. In 2014 Kiffin gets most of the blame when Kirby was the greatest liability the whole season. Yet in 2018 many want to blame Lupoi and Golding while we had an offensive coordinator that was too stubborn to change the offense to something suitable for a generational quarterback.
The decision to not run Henry 30 times did not cost you the game by itself, but it did cost you any chance of winning the game given the known weaknesses on defense. You not only have to play to your strengths, but your play has to help cover your weaknesses.
But here is the thing... very few want to acknowledge he totally whipped Venerables the next year while Kirby yet again was skull drug. My point is criticism has to be more consistent. If you are going to harp on him for losing a game then you also need to acknowledge his contributions towards winning as well.
Our front 7 is solid and really coming into their own since the end of the Indiana game. Justin Hilliard is a man on a mission and I think or linebackers can slow Harris.
Actually, my criticism for 2014 is directed more toward Saban that Kiffin. Henry was not the starting RB - Yeldon was - and that is because of Saban's hard headed loyalty toward players with more time in the program back then.
The question - can we get pressure on Mac when only sending 4 while also stopping Najee? Because if we can't do both then we have to choose - Najee or Smith. That is the problem that no defense had solved to date, and Alabama has faced 2 defenses as good or better than ours.
Typical Kirby defense those years was as follows, 3rd and 1 = 5 yard loss and a punt, 3rd and 17 = 18 yard gain or more.
I was at WV, Auburn, Mizzou, and tOSU in 2014 and I almost went bald with how infuriating it was to watch that defense. Golding’s defense is easier to watch
