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Football
Defense Dominates to Retain Scarlet Jerseys.
By Brandon CastelCOLUMBUS — With nine starters back on the offensive side of the ball, this was supposed to be the year where Terrelle Pryor and the offense finally had its way with their defensive counterparts.
It was supposed to be.
The Buckeyes lost five starters on defense this off-season, but it didn’t show one bit Saturday. Jim Heacock and his defense held on to the coveted Scarlet practice jerseys with a 78-24 thumping of the offense in the spring jersey scrimmage.
“That’s probably the most lopsided jersey scrimmage score that I’ve ever seen,” said Head Coach Jim Tressel, who is in his 10th spring at Ohio State.
“I think offensively, we had some issues with the quarterback-center exchange and when you have turnovers in our scoring system that can range anywhere from three to 12 points. You’re going to have a tough time catching up.”
It was a botched exchange that led to the only touchdown of the game when Michael Brewster’s shotgun snap slipped through Pryor’s cold hands around the goal line. Pryor tried to scoop it up, but he was slammed to the turf as if he wasn’t wearing the no-contact black jersey, and defensive tackle John Simon recovered the fumble in the end zone for a touchdown.
The defense was so dominant, particularly on the line of scrimmage where the defensive line had its way, that even Tressel’s usual tactics for keeping these events close was futile.
“I’ve been accused of manipulating scrimmages, but never to that degree,” Tressel said with a smile.
Tressel Not Concerned with Pryor Struggles
Wideout DeVier Posey came close to hauling in the lone offensive touchdown for the Buckeyes on a perfectly placed deep ball from Pryor but could not pull it down in the end zone between corner Donnie Evege and safety Orhian Johnson.
With the defense hounding him all morning, Pryor finished the game just 5-of-16 passing, unofficially, for 45 yards. Part of that was the cold weather, part of it was dropped passes and bad protection, but a big portion of it was just bad passing by the junior signal caller who was wearing a black no-contact jersey.
It’s become abundantly clear that Pryor hates wearing the black jersey, and seems to struggle when he is confined to being a pocket passer at the mercy of his offensive tackles. For that reason, Tressel doesn’t expect to get an accurate reading on Pryor’s progress from this type of setting.
“You don’t. That’s going to be the reality that a quarterback, mobile or not, if you don’t let him play the game you’re not going to have a real evaluation so you evaluate the things you can,” Tressel said.
In fact, Tressel is taking a similar approach when it comes to evaluating the performance of the entire offense from Saturday’s jersey scrimmage.
“Until you get into a game where everything is game-like instead of some things being game-like you just evaluate things play by play,” he said.
Defensive Line Dominates
Watching the defensive line dominate the line of scrimmage should not come as a surprise to anyone who watched this team last season. The Buckeyes consistently controlled the line with their deep, talented defensive line in 2009, but a number of key players are gone from that unit.
While the Buckeyes return four starters on the offensive line, they lost Thad Gibson, Doug Worthington, Todd Denlinger, Lawrence Wilson and Rob Rose from their defensive front. That didn’t stop them from having their way with all three of the offensive lines today. Along with Simon, who had a number of tackles in the backfield to go with a pair of knockdowns and a touchdown, Cameron Heyward also had a big day for the first-team defense. He was constantly in the offensive backfield and made life miserable on Pryor and Joe Bauserman during his two series with the ones.
“Those guys are amazing,” linebacker Brian Rolle said of the defensive line.
“It’s hard to even explain how those guys play. They have a different level of play than I’ve seen in a while.”
It wasn’t just the first group. Defensive tackle Garrett Goebel made a handful of nice plays for the second-team defense while defensive ends Solomon Thomas and Melvin Fellows were just paying guys out. Both had a pair of sacks that drove Bauserman and Kenny Guiton hard into the turf.
Berry Shines, then Leaves
There wasn’t much to get excited about offensively for the Buckeyes Saturday, but one bright spot was tailback Jaamal Berry. The freshman out of Miami (Fla.) is enjoying an excellent spring after redshirting last season because of a hamstring injury and he showed some good things Saturday with Brandon Saine, Jordan Hall and Carlos Hyde all out of action.
“I thought he looked pretty good. He looks like he’s got a little bit of an ability to burst,” Tressel said of the 5-10, 200-pound back.
“That was the first time he really got a chance to get in there in the flow of things and it looks like he’s got a little burst.”
He weaved his way in and out of traffic for a game-high 81 yards on 17 carries, making linebacker Dorian Bell look silly with a few of his jukes, but limped off the field late in the scrimmage.
“But he rolled his ankle right there at the end and I hope it doesn’t affect him missing a couple practices down the stretch,” Tressel said.
Starting left guard Justin Boren also limped off with a foot injury, but said he plans to be back in practice Tuesday as the Buckeyes prepare for next Saturday’s spring game.
“It’s fine, I got stepped on last week and my toe’s about to fall off. They hit it in the same spot today and it was really bad pain, but I’ll be fine,” said Boren, who was more upset about the offensive performance than the injured toe.
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