Driving down the field to score the go-ahead touchdown Saturday, Ohio State was faced with a typical dilemma: Can you score too quickly and give the ball back to your opponent with too much time? Should you even worry about that?
Urban Meyer did not, and the Buckeyes scored with 1:48 left on the clock and failed on a two-point conversion to keep the score at 39-38 OSU. At the time, I was convinced that they left too much time on the clock for Penn State’s offense with all three timeouts left. To make matters worse, Ohio State was so freaked out by Saquon Barkley’s kickoff return for a touchdown that they kicked off short for the rest of the game. Penn State was gifted with great field position — starting the drive at the Ohio State 41 with 1:45 to play.
1:45 left to play with three timeouts left is an eternity. You obviously need some urgency, but there’s no need to play it like you’re backed up deep in your own end with no way to stop the clock. Penn State’s kicker has a career long of 47 yards. The offense needed to move the ball 30 yards to get him in that range. Never an easy task, but it’s hard to start a game-winning drive in a better spot than that.
Oh, and they have the most explosive player in college football. PSU offensive coordinator Joe Moorhead deservedly gets a lot of credit for finding different ways to get the ball in Barkley’s hands — direct snaps, read options, screen passes. In a big spot, you like to have the best player on the field, and Penn State did in that moment. But for some inexplicable reason, the ball never touched his hands once.
This low-percentage checkdown on first down was as close as Barkley got to getting the football on the entire drive. Ohio State rushes four, but #77 gets completely torched on a defensive switch and Trace McSorely is forced to run for his life and essentially throw the ball away in Saquon’s direction.
Ohio State brings five guys this time, but the pressure getting to McSorely actually comes from Penn State’s strong side. This time #70 gets beat and McSorely doesn’t even have time to look down field before he’s sacked. After this point, it should become clear that OSU’s talented defensive line is too much for McSorely to drop straight back and still find time to throw (if that hadn’t become clear throughout the game). Take a timeout and draw something up quick that gets Saquon some space to run right? It’s four-down territory, so there’s no need to get all 15 yards back in one play.
Nope. They go with a quick throw, which was barely quick enough after both defensive ends got beat. Mike Gesicki is a great target, but he’s not superman. Again, this throw was self-preservation from McSorely and did nothing to help ease PSU into a manageable situation on 4th down.
At this point, we could all probably predict what was going to happen if McSorely dropped back. Barkley is out in the flat here with only one man on him, but Penn State gave up its ability to throw short after third down. Also, this is a bad look.
I usually don’t like to be the guy playing armchair offensive coordinator, but it was pretty disappointing and baffling to watch this final drive play out. Credit obviously goes to Ohio State’s defensive front. However, for Penn State to not even get the ball into the hands of their many talented weapons, including the best running back in college football, with the time and timeouts remaining, is a serious failure. Astonishingly, Penn State used just 18 seconds of game clock over these four plays. This is a bitter loss for Penn State, one that probably ends their playoff hopes. That we don’t get to see Saquon Barkley on the biggest stage sucks for everyone (unless you root for Ohio State), but not even giving themselves a chance to win late like they did against Iowa this year, is all on them.