Ohio State football: 5 reasons the Buckeyes will beat Michigan State
By Alec Hartman
1. The Spartans won’t be able to take advantage of the Buckeyes’ weakness against tight ends.
One of the most glaring areas Ohio State struggled with last weekend was their inability to defend the tight end position.
Their offense picked apart the Bucks’ defense by exploiting every poor match up opportunity they could. This was mostly by moving their tight ends around the formation to get the best match ups possible.
Hawkeyes’ tight ends Noah Fant and T.J. Hockenson shredded the Buckeyes’ defenders to pieces as they combined for nine receptions for 125 yards and four touchdowns. The linebackers and defensive backs who were assigned to the coverage couldn’t seem to figure out how to account for either one of them.
The inability to cover tight ends and even fullbacks for that matter has been an ongoing trend for the Buckeyes. A major factor in the first loss against Oklahoma was leaving fullback Dimitri Flowers almost completely uncovered all game leading to seven receptions for 98 yards and a touchdown.
Penn State’s star tight end Mike Gesicki had some big catches as well as led the team with six catches for 57 yards.
The Spartans don’t have a major threat at the tight end position which should benefit Ohio State greatly. Also, the Spartans don’t have a great receiver out of the backfield either as Scott isn’t frequently utilized with just 91 total receiving yards.
The positive side of this is that it’s just the small things that the Buckeyes needs to clean up in order to be successful. Their defense is already very good right now so fixing the issue of missing assignments would put them over the top to become a great defense.
Expect Ohio State to get back on track defensively against a less dynamic Spartans offense.