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Football
Careful Offense Wins Jersey Scrimmage
By Tony Gerdeman

Only in the Jim Tressel Modified Scoring System can a a defense hold an offense to a single touchdown and still lose a game 53-48. But that's exactly what happened on Saturday as Ohio State held their annual Jersey Scrimmage in Ohio Stadium under a dripping, cloud-filled sky.

It has often been said about the jersey scrimmage that if the offense doesn't turn the ball over, it's going to be very hard for the defense to win, and that was the case today. Pitting ones against ones, twos against twos, and threes against threes for the most part, the offense (adorned in the white jerseys of failure), built a lead on a collection of first downs and field goals.

The offense did, however, have a turnover when Brandon Saine bobbled a pitch and linebacker Andrew Sweat snatched the ball out of the air. Other than that, though, the offense protected the ball and played a very safe game against a very dangerous defense.

“It's great that they didn't turn the ball over a lot,” admitted an all-for-one attitudinal Brian Rolle.

“They threw the ball away a lot, and that's good. It shows maturity.

"You don't have to force the ball and hope somebody catches it. We got one turnover, and that's still good. But that shows that our defense still has a little more to work on, like stripping the ball when you've got a guy up, or going for interceptions instead of the big hit.”

Quarterback Terrelle Pryor started the game slowly, missing on his first four passes. He did have a very nice play on his third series when the ball was snapped over his head and he unsuccessfully tried to pick the ball up, giving up about 25 yards before scrambling and picking up twelve yards and a first down.

Joe Bauserman was the second quarterback in, but he quickly gave way to Kenny Guiton after going five and out.

Guiton took possession of the offense with the ball at his own 20-yard line, and splitting the carries between himself, Bo DeLande and Jaamal Berry, they drove down the field to the defense's 41-yard line before stalling. That led to a 58-yard field goal attempt by Drew Basil which fell short.

Pryor then came back in and led a scoring drive which ended in a 25-yard field goal by Devin Barclay, somehow making the score 12-9 Gray. The drive featured two near interceptions, however. The first came from safety Jermale Hines, who read a Pryor pump fake, but didn't bite on it. The pass sailed into the endzone intended for Devier Posey but was a bit overthrown. Had it been catchable, it may have been intercepted. The second near interception was simply a drop by cornerback Travis Howard on a Pryor rollout. Howard had the ball hit him in the numbers, and he just dropped it.

The defense had their way the next few series, keeping the offense far away from any scoring opportunities. Defensive tackle Garrett Goebel was in the backfield a couple of times, forcing quarterbacks out of the pocket.

The next time Pryor came in to lead an offense he led a short scoring drive that ended in a 54-yard field goal from Devin Barclay that was absolutely crushed. Brandon Saine had 14 yards rushing on the 19-yard scoring drive.

Taylor Graham led the next possession and was buoyed by the running of sophomore Jordan Hall who had 22 yards rushing on the drive. Perhaps the play of the series came from cornerback Donnie Evege, who was unfortunate enough to have fullback Zach Boren bearing down on him after catching a swing pass in the flats. Evege attacked the challenge head on—literally, and took Boren down. The pass came on third and seven, and Boren was stopped after only a four-yard gain. The drive ended in a 46-yard field goal for Drew Basil, making the score 23-13.

Even though there wasn't much production to speak of, Jaamal Berry was fun to watch on the next drive. He only rushed for four yards on four carries, but he did make quite a bit of an impression in those four carries. The first run was an easy stop for linebacker Jordan Whiting (team-high 12.5 tackles), who followed Jaamal Berry around all day long like a private investigator trying to catch a cheating husband. The second carry was a loss of four yards, but would have been even worse had Berry not broken free and spun out of the first wave of tacklers. But this being an Ohio State defense, the second wave was not far behind. The third carry came on a wide toss, and Berry showed the speed we have expected, but he also showed the power that we haven't gotten to see. He delivered a blow at the point of contact, and didn't simply accept being tackled. The fourth carry only netted two yards, but there isn't much room for a person to run when they've got 6'7” defensive lineman Darryl Baldwin waiting for them.

The play of the afternoon came soon afterward when the first-teamers were on the field. Terrelle Pryor threw up a jump ball for Devier Posey down the sideline, and Posey went up and over Travis Howard, stealing it from him for a 27-yard gain. By all rights, Howard should have caught the ball. It was underthrown and Posey had to come back for it, and then jump over Howard while avoiding interfering with him. It was a play that you would have expected to see from Randy Moss in his heyday. The drive ended, however, when Devin Barclay missed a 42-yard field goal wide left, keeping the score 28-18 for the Gray.

The offense went dormant for a few drives, and that was mostly due to the defense, who stepped it up quite a bit. They did so well, in fact, that they closed the score to 31-24 via stops on third downs and who knows what else.

“Overall, I think we saw a lot of good things on defense,” said Dexter Larimore. “I saw a lot of guys stepping up, especially on the defensive line. So that's all good things. Obviously there were some bad things out there, but luckily we have a week and a half to polish that up and get ready for Marshall.”

The turning point for the defense, however, nearly came with the fumble by Saine. After the fumble, the Scarlet took the lead 32-31 and looked like they had finally broken through Jim Tressel's offensively-weighted scoring system.

After a few unsuccessful drives, the coaches went back to Taylor Graham who immediately came in and hit tight end Ricky Crawford for 26 yards to get the ball down to the Scarlet's 34-yard line. Shortly after that, Graham showed off his ball skills by pulling off a beautiful play-action fake and finding Zach Boren in the flats for 14 more yards. The drive stalled at the one-yard line and the Gray had to settle for an 18-yard field goal from Drew Basil, giving them a 38-37 lead.

“Whenever you get in the redzone, you want to score touchdowns,” said Justin Boren, happy to have the Scarlet jerseys, but not entirely thrilled with the overall performance.

“You definitely don't want to kick field goals. There's some stuff we've got to work on with our protection. There were some communications issues when they were bringing more guys than we could handle, but other than that I think we did alright.”

The first units came out for the next series, which saw the ball spotted on the defense's 44-yard line. Cornerback Dominic Clarke made a tremendous late play on a deep ball to save a big gain on second down, but he could do nothing about the next pass, which hit Taurian Washington in stride from 25-yards out for the only touchdown of the afternoon. The pass was threaded between cornerback Corey Brown and Jermale Hines, and came via the fake option and dropback that Troy Smith made famous. After the touchdown and extra point, the offense led 47-38.

The Gray would only manage one other scoring drive, which also ended at the one-yard line and led to another 18-yard field goal, giving the Gray the 53-41 lead. The defense would get a couple of more stops, but couldn't secure the turnover that they would have needed to ultimately win the game. At the end of the scrimmage, the scoreboard read Gray 53 – Scarlet 48.

Most likely just as Jim Tressel had intended.

While Tressel may have been pleased with the outcome, not everybody shared his rosy outlook.

“I'm mad,” said senior Cameron Heyward. “I haven't lost those jerseys since my freshman year.”

“I think they ran a little bit on us, and that's where they hurt us the most,” said Devon Torrence, giving the post-mortem.

“But defensively, I think we did a very good job of stopping the pass and our tackling was very good. There were a lot of good things out there even though we didn't win.”

“I think the scrimmage is set up in the offense's favor,” admitted Torrence.

“But defensively those are the disadvantages you're going to have and you've gotta work through them and just try to come out on top. And we have for the past two years, so we'll give them this one this year.”

How charitable of them.

Remarkably Unofficial Statistics

Passing
Terrelle Pryor 10-25-149 with a touchdown (25 yards)
Joe Bauserman 2-7-13
Kenny Guiton 5-15 44
Taylor Graham 6-8-55
Justin Siems 1-1-8

Rushing
Brandon Saine 5-22
Boom Herron 8-30
Jordan Hall 10-38
Jaamal Berry 17-64
Bo DeLande 9-25
Kenny Guiton 7-45 (not including yards lost on sacks)
Tony Harlamert 1-1
Philly Brown 1-1

Receiving
Zach Boren 3-27
Boom Herron 2-19
Brandon Saine 2-18
Jaamal Berry 1-10
Bo DeLande 2-1
Devier Posey 5-65
Chris Fields 1-8
Taurian Washington 1-25 (TD)
Joe Cech 1-9
Jake Stoneburner 2-33
Ricky Crawford 3-43
Adam Homan 1-1

Field Goals
Drew Basil 2-5 (made 18, 46; missed 58, 59, 54)
Devin Barclay 3-5 (made 33, 25, 54; missed 42, 54)

Sacks
Adam Bellamy 2.5
Andrew Sweat 1.0
Dexter Larimore 0.5
Cameron Heyward 1.0
Melvin Fellows 1.0
Jonathan Hankins 1.0

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