Going Through the Motions

OSU 35, Bowling Green 7

So this afternoon officially began the "afternoon nap" portion of the Ohio State football season. Today's 35-7 win for the Buckeyes really never felt like anything more than just a Varsity-JV scrimmage, as the Bucks had this one under wraps once they received the opening kickoff.

As I'm writing this, I'm really trying to find inspiration for this blog, but there really isn't any. My buddy AR and I left by halftime today, and were betting beers on the over/under of total plays for Buckeye scoring drives. That's what kind of day it was in The Horsehoe and what kept us interested through the first half.

So in what was a pretty vanilla OSU game today, I guess we can take Troy Smith's 17 for 20 and be happy with it. He did have 3 touchdown passes, but I was mostly impressed by his scramble for a first down on a 3rd and long late in the 1st quarter. However, the 85 percent completion percentage was the 3rd best passing efficiency for an OSU QB.

I was kind of surprised that Antonio Pittman didn't have a better day. His 13 carries for 61 yards and 2 TDs was efficient, but I thought that Tress might feed it to him a little more. Today's game was mostly about just getting a win, staying healthy, and then cutting BG a giant check for coming down and enjoying a 28 point drubbing on a beautiful day in central Ohio.

Stats that caught my eye:
OSU was 7 of 12 on 3rd down conversions
Ted Ginn Jr had 10 catches for 122 yards, including a late 57 yard TD reception
BG averaged 25.2 net yards per punt. They were kicking it out of bounds so Ginn couldn't return them. 25 yards an attempt? Why not just go for it?


Since I'm pretty disenchanted by the weak OSU stats, I'm just going to toss out random College Football thoughts for the rest of this blog.

• Florida State was beaten 24-20 by N.C. State on Thursday night. The Wolfpack is a team that is starting to mature nicely. Their young QB Daniel Evans and their talented RB (can't remember his name) are starting to play very well. I'm really enjoying the FSU as a football powerhouse demise.
• Arkansas beat No. 2 Auburn 27-10 today. Arkansas played very, very well today and they proved that with a good, young QB in freshman Mitch Mustain and sophomore RB Darren McFadden, they're for real and will be another tough team to beat in the SEC. Speaking of number two, that's what Auburn played like. They weren't good at all today. This will be one of at least 2 or 3 losses for Auburn this year.
• Tennessee showed quite a bit of heart tonight. Their 51-33 beatdown of Georgia was semi-impressive. I'd be concerned if I gave up 33 to a not very good Georgia offense, though.
• Cal beat Oregon 45-24 this afternoon. Cal has been playing with quite the chip on their shoulder since they got handled by Tennessee the first game of the season. Nate Longshore had a nice 189 yards passing with 3 TDs in a Troy Smith-esque performance. The Marshawn Lynch injury will bear watching, however.
• Florida is looking tough. They got by LSU 23-10 today in The Swamp, but I see at least one loss for the Gators as they make their way through the that treacherous SEC schedule.
• Clemson looked weak today, and should've been beaten by Wake Forest. Clemson won 27-17 thanks to a strong 4th quarter in which they scored 24 points, which was keyed by 66 yd fumble return for a touchdown by Gaines Adams. Wake Forest head coach Jim Grobe is one of the most underrated coaches in D-I football, and I'm surprised that his team could play that poorly in the 4th quarter. Quite the balanced attack by Clemson, who had 214 yards passing and 214 yards rushing. Nice performance by Clemson Senior QB Will Proctor, who had 214 yards passing, one touchdown and 3 interceptions. Another game like that and Clemson won't be residing in the top 25 anymore.
• Welcome back, Iowa. The Hawkeyes had an impressive 47-17 win over Purdue today. Junior RB Damian Sims had 155 yards rushing on 20 carries, which included 2 touchdowns. I was never really too impressed with Albert Young, and it appears that he's probably lost his job to the very talented Sims. For the rest of this season and next, Sims will be behind Pittman and Michigan RB Mike Hart as the best back in the Big Ten.

That's all I've got for tonight. Pretty tired after a long day of tailgating, so I bid farewell to you until the middle of the week.