Game two kicks off on Saturday against the University of Central Florida Knights.
Is it Golden Knights?
:google search:
Nope, it’s just the Knights, although the mascot is golden which is the source of my confusion.
As you can tell by my sidetracked second sentence, UCF isn’t the kind of team that I lose sleep over as the Buckeyes prepare this week.
With that said, and I base this next statement on almost no facts or research- the Knights should provide a bigger test than the Miami Redhawks did in week 1.
The Knights will provide a nice bump in competition as the Buckeyes prepare for Cal next week and the first BIG test against Michigan State on the 28th.
The team can’t look ahead, but I can.
I have a Phil Steele magazine that I will open up in a bit as I continue to write this preview, but first I’d like to continue providing analysis without doing any research.
That’s more fun.
I am also building my resume to work for ESPN. Just saying things based on my gut and nothing else is the best way to do that.
That’s a joke, everyone knows you can’t get a job working for ESPN by saying nice things about the Ohio State.
So, here are some things I think about this game with some nice things thrown in about OSU, my career as a sports writer be damned.
UCF’s quarterback won’t be as good as what the Silver Bullets faced last week.
I came away extremely impressed with Dysert’s play last Saturday. He was an experienced field general who made all the right throws early and often. Even in the face of increased pressure later in the game he found the open receivers more often than not.
Although those receivers didn’t always cooperate and held Dysert back somewhat with plenty of dropped passes, I wouldn’t be surprised if Ohio State doesn’t face a passing QB of that caliber for the rest of the season.
Looking ahead to this Saturday’s game, UCF’s QB is more mobile by reputation, so that will provide a new challenge for the front seven. I highly doubt the secondary will be tested nearly as much through the air, however.
UCF will run the ball more this week.
That won’t be hard to do given how little Miami tried to establish a ground game (and why would they with such a good QB?), but in UCF’s dominating first win they primarily used a power running attack to steamroll the Zips.
If they are smart, the Knights will throw a few more wrinkles into their game plan, especially with a mobile QB, but at the most fundamental level it will be a new challenge for the Silver Bullets.
Fortunately for the Buckeyes, UCF’s power running plays right into Ohio State’s biggest strengths up front on defense.
After a relatively quiet first week from the linemen, I expect them to be much more active and visible on the stat sheet this week against a more run based offense.
While I fully expect UCF’s offense to get shut down, the mobile QB is the wildcard which may reduce the number of sacks once again and cause some problems.
This will be especially true if there are any lingering early-in-the-year assignment breakdowns that open up running lanes.
Optimistically, Ryan Shazier will be fun to watch as he tracks the QB down outside of the pocket all afternoon… if that becomes necessary. Otherwise, the line should take care of business without much trouble and the LBs will be able to roam and make tackles at will.
UCF will run a relatively basic defense which should be exploitable.
That is according to some of the statements made by Ohio State’s coaches this week. The biggest key will be making adjustments quickly and exploiting any weaknesses in the base defense UCF shows.
Last week those adjustments took exactly one quarter to put in place. It would be nice to see that timeline sped up a little bit this time around.
Since the new offensive coaching staff will have a week of experience under their belts, I am hopeful that, like the players, they will continue to improve from week to week
Either way, the offense needs to get rolling again; the sooner the better.
FACTS.
This is the part where I actually look at stats and magazines to find some things out about UCF.
As it turns out, their starting QB is named Blake Bortles (rSO 6’4″ 221 lbs.) and from what I can tell he probably isn’t “mobile”… or at least doesn’t appear to be based on his stats (1 rush for 9 yards, 1 sack for -7 yards, 2 yards net rushing last week).
I’m not sure where I picked that impression up from.
Missouri transfer Tyler Gabbert is also in the mix, although he barely saw the field last week- perhaps he is more of a scrambler.
I don’t really feel like looking that up.
So, it seems like you can take that “wild card” out of my initial impression.
I am very confident that Bortles won’t be as successful as Dysert throwing the ball, and without having the threat of a scrambling QB, that plays into Ohio State’s hands even more.
The other main thing that sticks out to me after briefly perusing UCF’s team is that they have 16 returning starters- that is quite a few.
Those returning starters went 5-7 last year, however, so that might not be as positive for them as it would first appear.
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In short, UCF will not be able to test Ohio State’s secondary as much as last week and their bread and butter ground attack will play right into the Buckeye’s biggest strength on defense.
On the flip side, Ohio State’s offense needs to get rolling and continue the momentum they built in the final three quarters last week.
UCF might be able to slow down the offense initially with solid fundamentals out of their base formations, but it is hard to envision them slowing down Ohio State’s offense the whole game.
The more experience Buckeye players and coaches get under their belts running the new system, the better they should get at executing the offense and cracking defenses.
As always, it is about getting better each and every week.
I am optimistic about seeing improvement against the Knights on both sides of the ball.
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