Welcome back, Buckeyes.
After a brief haitus, the real Ohio State team returned to action Saturday night at Ohio Stadium.
The Buckeyes scored on both sides of the ball (twice on defense) and had great special teams play in a 62-3 win over Nebraska in a nationally televised game that is sure to impress the College Football Playoff committee.
Ohio State set the tone early with a 36-yard pick-six by Damon Webb on the game’s third play and cruised to a 31-3 halftime lead. The Buckeyes scored on every first-half possession, and put the exclamation point on a near-perfect half with a 1-yard jump pass from QB J.T. Barrett to Curtis Samuel with just three seconds left.
Barrett completed 26 of 38 passes for 290 yards and four touchdowns in about three quarters of action. Samuel ended with eight catches for 137 yards and a pair of scores and five rushes for 41 yards. K.J. Hill was the second-leading receiver with five catches for 66 yards.
Running back Mike Weber added 11 carries for 72 yards and a score. Demario McCall took advantage of some late playing time and led OSU with 73 yards on 16 carries.
The Buckeyes kept Nebraska in guessing mode all night. Ohio State stretched the Cornhusker defense deep, dinked the ‘Huskers with short passes and bulldozed over and through the defensive line.
Kicker Tyler Durbin even joined the party, tackling the Nebraska returner on the kickoff following a 29-yard field goal that extended the lead to 24-3 midway through the second.
In all, the Buckeyes (8-1, 5-1 Big Ten East) had 590 total yards, compared to 204 for the 7-2 Cornhuskers, who dropped to 4-2 in the Big Ten West. OSU had 352 yards passing and 238 rushing.
About the only thing that went wrong was Dontre Wilson’s fumble on a punt with 7:23 left in the first half. That led to a scary moment a few minutes later when QB Tommy Armstrong was tackled on the OSU sideline and appeared to hit his head and/or land on the ball. He was motionless for a while and eventually was taken off on a stretcher and into an ambulance.
The ‘Huskers moved to the OSU 15 but couldn’t convert a fourth-and-one. OSU took over with less than four minutes left and drove down the field to set up the jump pass.
Armstrong returned later in the game but Nebraska never did.
Following the early pick-six, the Cornhuskers cut the score to 7-3 on a Drew Brown 20-yard field. But OSU answered with a 7-yard TD pass to Terry McLaurin to lead 14-3 after the first quarter, and then had a 23-yard TD run from Weber before Durbin’s field goal and the last-second TD pass.
Just in case fans still had their doubts, Coach Urban Meyer unleashed Samuel on the first drive on the second half and he caught a 75-yard TD pass. He beat the defender then broke the tackle attempt on the 35 and jogged the final 25 yards into the end zone.
The Buckeyes added another score on a 6-yard TD pass to Noah Brown to cap an 87-yard drive, just seconds before Armstrong jogged back to the sideline.
OSU had another 29-yard FG from Durbin and then Malik Hooker notched a 48-yard interception return for a touchdown off a pass tipped by a teammate.
Joe Burrow added a late score, running for a 12-yard TD with 7:19 left to make it 62-3.
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