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Football
Kicking Game Has to Improve, Tressel Says
By Brandon Castel

CHICAGO — Jim Tressel is worried about his kicking game, and not just because of last year.

With his Buckeyes picked to repeat as Big Ten champions as the consensus preseason No. 2 team in the country, Tressel could not hide his concern for the 2010 season during the Big Ten Media Kickoff Luncheon in Chicago Tuesday.

 “No. No, we're not good enough or where we need to be,” Ohio State’s 10th-year head coach said when asked about his kicking and punting games heading into the start of fall camp Thursday.

A long-time believer in the importance of special teams, Tressel knows it takes all three legs of the tripod to make a championship team stand strong. The Buckeyes were tremendous defensively once again last season, finishing fifth in the country in both scoring defense and total defense. They improved steadily on offense, rushing the ball for 230 yards a game in November before out-gaining Oregon 419-260 in the Rose Bowl.

The one area that never quite seemed to come around for the Buckeyes in 2009 was their special teams. They finished in the bottom half of the Big Ten in field goal percentage, punt average and kick return average. The only part of their special teams that had any type of success last season was punt return, but that changed when Ray Small was suspended for the Rose Bowl.

Senior Aaron Pettrey got hurt in week nine against New Mexico State, but even before that he was struggling to hit kicks from inside of 40 yards (7-of-9 from 40+, 7-of-11 inside 40). Devin Barclay took over for Pettrey and kicked the game-winning field goal against Iowa in overtime, but he didn’t have the leg to hit anything over 40 yards (7-of-8 inside 40, 0-of-2 from 40+).

The Rose Bowl seemed to be the perfect setup, with Barclay hitting all three of his kicks inside the 40 and Pettrey returning in time to knock down his one try from 45 yards. Even punter John Thoma averaged 43.7 yards per attempt against the Ducks, but still finished 10th in the Big Ten with an average of 37.93 yards per attempt on the season.

“We've got to get a lot better,” Tressel said.

Devin Barclay
Photo by Jim Davidson

Pettrey and Thoma are both gone, as are returners Small and Lamaar Thomas, but the Buckeyes are searching for answers on special teams. Barclay returns as the team’s place kicker in 2010, but he doesn’t have the leg to hit from 40+, something he confirmed during the team’s kick scrimmage in the spring.

“I think Devin hit 92 percent of all of his kicks this past spring from 42 yards and in, and maybe 62 percent outside 42,” Tressel said.

“Whereas Drew hit about 80 percent outside the 45, or maybe 70 percent.”

Tressel is referring to true freshman Drew Basil, who enrolled early for spring practice and showed off a remarkably strong leg during the 15 practices back in April. Not only did he show an ability to hit field goals from outside of 40 yards, but Tressel saw enough in the spring to list Basil as his top kick off guy as well.

“I would say if we had a game tomorrow, Ben (Buchanan) would punt, Drew would kickoff, Devin would kick the field goals once we crossed the 25-yard line and Drew would kick them behind the 25,” Tressel said.

“And that's the way we'd go in.”

Ben Buchanan
Photo by Jim Davidson

Redshirt sophomore Ben Buchanan will almost certainly be the team’s punter in 2010, but he’s also in contention for the long-range field goal tries as well as kickoffs. He looked good in his one game punting the ball against Toledo last season (42.8 average on 4 tries) when Thoma was out with the flu and Tressel would prefer not to tire out his leg on kickoffs.

“Based on the numbers we have right now, that's the way we'd go,” Tressel said.

“But yeah, we've got a lot of work to do.”

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