Displaced Cleveland Fan

The Buckeyes opened their Big Ten schedule at home against Illinois by beating the Illini 30-0.

A rainy first half finished with Ohio State leading 13-0. The Buckeyes had zero passing yards for the half. But they were able to move the ball effectively on the ground. They rushed for 236 yards in the game, led by Brandon Saine (81 yards) and Dan Herron (75 yards and 2 TDs).

This offense is continuing to prove that it can rush the ball effectively, even without Chris Wells in the backfield. They’ve run for 483 yards in the last two games. This is a good sign. As Terrelle Pryor matures and the passing game improves, this will be a very tough offense.

Speaking of Pryor, after throwing 0/2 in the rain in the first half, he came out in the second half and threw 8/11 with 82 yards and a touchdown.

The defense was impressive again, shutting out the opponent for the second week in a row. They held Illinois to 170 total yards and came up with 3 interceptions.

As this week kicked off the Big Ten conference schedule, here’s what happened in the other games:

• Wisconsin stayed perfect (4-0) by beating Michigan State, 38-30. The Spartans continue to struggle and are now 1-3 overall for the season.
• Minnesota beat Northwestern, 35-24. Sorry, this game just didn’t seem that important.
• Michigan had a scare against Indiana. Hosting the Hoosiers, the Wolverines needed a touchdown in the final minutes and some help from a very questionable call that awarded them an interception on what could have been Indiana’s game-winning drive. Michigan held on to win 36-33.
• Purdue plays a non-conference game against Notre Dame this evening.
• Also this evening, Iowa’s on the road facing #5 Penn State. Penn State should win, but it won’t necessarily be an easy game for them.

The Buckeyes entered this week ranked #13. As they look to move up in the polls, these are the teams ahead of them that lost:

• On Thursday night, #4 Ole Miss lost 16-10 to unranked South Carolina. #4 was probably a little high for them anyway. They’ll drop, possibly below the Buckeyes.
• #6 California was embarrassed by unranked Oregon, losing 42-3 to the Ducks. They will almost certainly fall below Ohio State in the new polls.
• In the highly anticipated matchup between #9 Miami and #11 Virginia Tech, the Hokies beat up the Hurricanes, 31-7. This was the Miami team that the voters moved up 11 spots last week. Looks like their top-10 ranking was premature after all.

Assuming non of the ranked teams lose in the late games, look for the Buckeyes to be ranked about at #10-11 next week.

**UPDATE**

#5 Penn State lost at home to Iowa, 21-10. This is big for two reasons. First, the Nittany Lions should fall out of the top-10 in the new polls, leaving a spot open for the Buckeyes to move up to #9 or #10. Second, the landscape of the Big Ten now changes. Not only does this hurt Penn State’s chances of winning at least a share of the conference title, but Iowa is now in the hunt for it. Ohio State’s last three games of the season are against Penn State, Iowa, and Michigan. Should be interesting.

Tags: Brandon Saine, Dan Herron, Illinois, Ohio State Buckeyes, Terrelle Pryor

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 26th, 2009 at 7:23 pm and is filed under Ohio State Buckeyes. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.