Meyer: Ohio State not close to hitting ceiling
For the second year in a row, Ohio State escaped a major scare against Penn State with a one-point victory.
The latest thriller came on the road and included a rally similar to 2017, when Ohio State eked out a 39-38 victory. This time, the Buckeyes overcame a 12-point deficit in the final eight minutes to pull out a 27-26 win over the then-No. 9 Nittany Lions in State College, Pa.
Coach Urban Meyer called it “one of the great drives in Ohio State history.”
Ohio State fans will remember what happened the following week a year ago. The Buckeyes went on the road and were throttled 55-24 by unranked Iowa, a loss that ultimately kept the Buckeyes out of the college football playoffs.
Coach Urban Meyer said this week that last year’s debacle at Iowa will be discussed with the team before third-ranked Ohio State (5-0, 2-0 Big Ten) plays host to unranked Indiana (4-1, 1-1) in a Big Ten game on Saturday in Ohio Stadium.
But he’s pleased that the Buckeyes are 5-0 with road wins over two teams ranked at the time in the top 15 in the country. As a result, Ohio State moved up one spot in the Associated Press poll this week.
“I don’t know any school in the country that did that this year. We walked away with wins,” Meyer said. “Also, we lost one of the top football players in America on defense (injured defensive end Nick Bosa). We’re just coaching our tails off to make the guys better.”
And speaking of better, Meyer believes the team hasn’t come close to reaching its potential. That’s not good news for opponents such as Indiana.
“There is a tremendous ceiling on this, and we haven’t got close to it,” Meyer said.
Winning on the road in a difficult environment should elevate the Buckeyes’ confidence going forward. They just don’t want it to be overconfidence.
“We had adversity and we had to keep fighting and keep swinging,” Ohio State quarterback Dwayne Haskins said. “It wasn’t pretty for pretty much the whole game. But we had faith in each other and came out on top.”
The Buckeyes have plenty of faith in Haskins, who started slowly against Penn State but finished 22-of-39 passing for 270 yards and three touchdowns. He’s completing better than 70-percent of his passes this season and has thrown for 19 touchdowns with just two interceptions.
Haskins delivered two touchdown passes in the fourth quarter to cap the comeback at Penn State. The epic 96-yard drive for the go-ahead score included a key 35-yard screen pass to running back J.K. Dobbins.
Dobbins led Ohio State with 118 all-purpose yards in that game, but the sophomore didn’t really want to spend time reflecting on what it meant to beat Penn State.
“We’ve just got to keep building,” Dobbins said. “We’re going to move past this. We won the game. Time to move on.”