B1G Time: Ohio State had its worst offensive performance in the Ryan Day era and won anyway

No. 3 Ohio State opened its season with a 14-7 win over No. 1 Texas on Saturday, and was rewarded with a new spot atop the AP Top 25 on Tuesday.

And they did it all despite having the worst offensive performance of the Ryan Day Era.

You probably didn’t realize that, did you? You were so lost in The Dialogue about how horrible Arch Manning was, and whether or not he set the quarterback position (if not humanity as a whole) back 250 years, that you didn’t take the time to think about how Ohio State’s offense performed.

Ryan Day has been Ohio State’s full-time head coach for 78 games, and Saturday’s win was only the third time in those 78 games that the Buckeyes scored fewer than 17 points in a game. It was the first time they won while doing so. The first instance was a 14-3 loss to Missouri in the 2023 Cotton Bowl that saw Ohio State play without most of its stars. Who will ever forget Lincoln Kienholz (who lost this year’s QB battle with Julian Sayin) completing six of his 17 passes for 86 yards? Not me! The other instance was last year’s 13-10 loss to Michigan, which Ohio State quickly made a distant memory by charging to a national title.

But that’s just points scored. There are so many more stats we could look at. In fact, we could make a table!

The most interesting stat to me is Ohio State’s 3.7% explosive play rate. As you see in the table, it’s the lowest explosive rate the Buckeyes offense has had in a game under Day. The second-worst? A 7.0% explosive rate in last year’s 28-14 win over Texas in the Cotton Bowl. So if we’ve learned anything here today, it’s to bet the under on Ohio State’s team total any time it plays Texas or in the Cotton Bowl.

Another fun stat is that Ohio State went three-and-out on 54.5% of its possessions against Texas, the second-highest rate under Day, behind only last season’s 21-17 win over Nebraska (66.7%!). It’s only the third time the Buckeyes have gone three-and-out on at least half their possessions in a game under Day (the third was also last year’s Michigan loss, 50%). For perspective, Ohio State has played nine games under Day without going three-and-out a single time. Amazingly, one of them was last year’s national title game against Notre Dame.

So what’s the great takeaway here? Well, I’m not sure there is one, but if you’re asking me to come up with one anyway, I’d say it’s this.

Ohio State had the worst offensive performance of the Ryan Day Era, and it still won against the No. 1 team in the country. It’s highly unlikely the Buckeyes’ offense will play worse in any game this season, and there’s also a chance the Buckeyes won’t face a better team this season.

Good luck, everyone.

Ohio State’s new monster

While the offense struggled, at least the Buckeyes were able to show off a new monster on defense that they can use to terrorize opponents. Saturday’s game wasn’t Arvell Reese’s debut, as he’d played in 24 games over the last two seasons, including 16 last year with 43 tackles, 3.5 tackles for loss and half a sack.

Saturday was his first time as a featured player, though, and Reese didn’t disappoint. The linebacker had 9 tackles in the game, including a sack, and looks to be filling the role of another Swiss Army Knife in this unit. Last year, Jim Knowles found all sorts of different ways to use the versatile Caleb Downs, and if Saturday was a hint, it looks like new defensive coordinator Matt Patricia has some ideas for Reese.

A huge test for Michigan

If you didn’t watch Michigan’s season-opener against New Mexico, you need some context when you see the final score. Yes, Michigan only beat New Mexico 34-17. No, the fact that the Wolverines’ defense allowed 17 points to the Lobos is not cause for panic. New Mexico coach Jason Eck is a remarkably difficult man to gameplan for, as he finds new and interesting ways to put points on the board.

It also needs to be noted that Jason Eck coached at Idaho last season. The same Idaho that gave Oregon all it could handle and more in a 24-14 game to open last season. Oregon seemed to do just fine afterward, rolling through the regular season undefeated and winning the Big Ten. Whether Michigan can follow suit, who knows, but that’s not important right now.

Michigan has much bigger problems on its hands this week when it goes on the road to play Oklahoma. The Sooners smacked Illinois State around in a 35-3 win, but it wasn’t as dominant a performance as the score suggests. John Mateer had plenty of fun in his Oklahoma debut, but on the whole, the Sooners couldn’t run the ball. The offensive line struggled to get push against Illinois State. If they couldn’t do it against the Redbirds, what should the expectations be against the Wolverines?

Of course, there’s another side to this. Bryce Underwood looked as promising as you could ask him to be in his debut. He completed 21 of 31 passes for 251 yards and a touchdown and didn’t turn the ball over. But playing well at home against an overmatched opponent is a much different ask than going on the road and taking on one of the best defenses in the country. Yeah, while Oklahoma’s run game struggled, its defense looks every bit as good as advertised.

Oh, and the Wolverines will be without Jaishawn Barham for a half due to a targeting penalty that was so bad even Tony Petitti said it was horrible, but there’s nothing he can do about the suspension.

So there are a lot of unknowns heading into this one, but if the Wolverines can go on the road and pick up a win, it will certainly cause everyone to readjust their thinking about how the Big Ten will play out this year. And, you know, road wins against SEC opponents are never a bad thing to have on the resume if you don’t win the league.

Speaking of promising starts

Malik Washington certainly wasn’t the freshman QB garnering the most attention for his debut last week, but he had one of the better performances among his peers. Washington completed 27 of his 43 passes for 258 yards and three touchdowns. He didn’t turn the ball over, and he didn’t take any sacks, which is not something a lot of quarterbacks do in their first start.

Yes, it was Florida Atlantic, but it was promising all the same. And this is a Maryland team that could use all the reasons to be optimistic it can get! The Terps are coming off a 4-8 season that saw them lose five straight to finish the year, and seven of their last eight after a 3-1 start. You know every Terps fan in the world went into Saturday with a pit in the bottom of their stomach thinking about what would happen if the team struggled against FAU.

But they didn’t, and Malik Washington was a big reason why. With Northern Illinois this week, and Towson to follow, the Terps have a chance to continue building confidence before their Big Ten opener at Wisconsin on Sept. 20.

B1G Question of the Week

Whither Makhi Hughes?

Hughes was one of the bigger gets in Oregon’s transfer class. The running back rushed for 1,401 yards and 15 touchdowns with Tulane last season, and was projected to be a significant contributor for the Ducks this year. He still could be, but he certainly wasn’t a large part of the gameplan against Montana State.

Returning back Noah Whittington got the start and saw the most action, playing 24 snaps and getting 10 carries for 68 yards and a touchdown. The large freshman, Jordon Davison (listed at 236 pounds), scored three touchdowns and served as a short-yardage back. Another freshman, Dierre Hill, had 5 carries for 48 yards.

Hughes? He played 12 snaps but received only one carry for two yards. That’s the same rushing output as tight end Kenyon Sadiq had in the game. Hughes also caught a pass for four yards. It was a very quiet day for somebody expected to do a lot more. Was it a disciplinary issue? Is Oregon so deep at running back that Hughes is struggling to earn playing time in practice? Or was Oregon saving him for a bigger opponent like Oklahoma State this week?

I suppose we’ll have to wait until Saturday to find out.

Going with my gut

Every week I pick the Big Ten games against the spread based on nothing but my gut reaction to the number. No digging into numbers — just vibes, baby. I even track my record to embarrass myself publicly. Any game not included is due to there not being a posted line at time of publishing.

No. 15 Michigan at No. 18 Oklahoma: As I wrote, this will be a very tough test for the Wolverines, but it’s not an impossible task. While John Mateer lit up Illinois State, there were still a lot of open receivers he didn’t see, something that was one of his flaws while at Washington State, too. When I’ve seen Mateer against better teams he’s shown a tendency to panic and make mistakes. He could very well do that here. The problem is, I try not to make a habit of betting on young, inexperienced QBs going on the road to face elite defenses. Last week provided plenty of examples of how that often works out. Oklahoma -4.5

Northern Illinois at Maryland (Friday) — Maryland -17.5
FIU at No. 2 Penn State — FIU +42.5
No. 11 Illinois at Duke — Duke +2.5
Iowa at No. 16 Iowa State — Iowa +3.5
Kennesaw State at No. 23 Indiana — Indiana -35.5
Oklahoma State at No. 6 Oregon — Oregon -28.5
Miami OH at Rutgers — Miami OH +16.5
Middle Tennessee at Wisconsin — Wisconsin -28.5
Akron at Nebraska — Nebraska -35
Georgia Southern at USC — USC -28.5
Boston College at Michigan State — Michigan St -3.5
UCLA at UNLV — UCLA +2.5

Last Week: 9-9