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Football
10 Things We Learned: First Loss to Michigan in Eight Years
By Brandon Castel

ANN ARBOR, Mich. — It had been nearly 3,000 days since Ohio State’s last defeat at the hands of their archrivals from the state up north. Nearly a decade of dominance finally came to an end Saturday, as the Buckeyes once again could not find he magic to pull of a late-game comeback in the state of Michigan.

The Wolverines intercepted a tipped pass in the final minute, and held on for a 40-34 victory at Michigan Stadium. We take a look at the 10 things we learned in OSU’s first loss to the Wolverines in eight years.

1. Fickell cares more than you do. Ohio State’s interim coach Luke Fickell could not hide the emotion in his eyes following the team’s loss in Ann Arbor Saturday. The 38-year old was holding back tears after an emotional end to an emotion-filled season. It had been everything Fickell ever wanted, and nothing he ever wanted a part of all at the same time. It was a rough season for everyone at Ohio State, including fans and players, but maybe most of all for Fickell. Whatever pain you felt this year, multiply it by 10. Whatever sadness was in your heart after OSU’s first loss to Michigan since 2003, imagine how Fickell felt.

This guy has lived and breathed Buckeye football since he was a teenager. Not just in his spare time or on the weekends, but Ohio State has been a 24/7 lifestyle for Fickell since he committed to play for the Buckeyes back in the mid 1990’s. No one cares more about this program than the Columbus native, who has either played or coached for his alma mater for 14 of the last 19 years of his life. For four years, this guy left it all on the field. He started a school-record 50-straight games at nose tackle. He bled for this team. He played hurt for this team, and when everything was crumbling around them, he stood up and became the face of a program in despair. Don’t forget that.

2. They care about ‘The Game’ on that side too. There was a while towards the end of the John Cooper era in Columbus where Michigan fans began to act like they no longer cared as much about their rivalry with Ohio State. They already had other rivalries with Michigan State and Notre Dame, so what was the big deal about the Buckeyes? A decade of Jim Tressel had the folks in Ann Arbor singing a different tune. They were tired of losing, and they were tired of getting trampled in The Game year after year. You could feelit in Michigan Stadium Saturday. This one meant everything to them, and they finally got a coach who understood that. Brady Hoke has united the fan base for all their rivalries, but primarily Ohio State. The crowd was chanting “Beat Ohio” all afternoon, and then finally did, it was celebration time in Ann Arbor.

3. Play-calling actually does make a difference. All year, this coaching staff has been talking about mistakes and execution on offense, but Saturday’s game proved yet again what a little ingenuity and creativity in the play calling can do. The Buckeyes expected to find themselves in a little bit of a shoot-out, so they came out aggressive in the early stages of the game. Braxton Miller threw the ball on each of the first three first downs against Michigan, which is probably more than he has thrown on first down all season. The coaches clearly added some new things—and saved some other stuff—for this game, and it showed. For the first time all season, the offense actually had some balance. In fact, they were a passing attack in Ann Arbor, racking up 235 yards through the air compared to just 137 yards on the ground.

4. It was too little, too late for the 2011 Buckeyes. Unfortunately, Jim Bollman and his staff waited 11 games too long to start getting creative. They showed a glimpse of it in the first half of the Nebraska game, but then it went away for the rest of the year. In the meantime, the Buckeyes became a 6-5 football team and they were desperate for a season-saving victory against Michigan. Had the coaching staff decided to use a little of that creativity earlier in the year, maybe Ohio State would have been in a different position heading in to this game. Now we will never know.

5. This team never quit. This is not going to be one of those seasons Ohio State fans hold onto in their memories for years to come, but the one thing that should be remembered is how this team kept fighting. They weren’t the most talented. They didn’t have a lot of leadership. They were playing without their coach and without their star quarterback. They had very little balance and they couldn’t put together 60 minutes against a quality opponent all season long, but this team never gave up. Whether it was the Miami (Fla.) game early in the year with Joe Bauserman, or the final minutes of the Michigan game, this group kept fighting.

Maybe that came from leaders like John Simon and Michael Brewster. Maybe it came from Fickell, but this team was in every football game since that loss at Miami. Watching them take the field the last four weeks, it was obvious this team was drained, both physically and emotionally. Ohio State teams have played their best ball in November over the last 10 seasons, but this group just didn’t have a lot left in the tank. What they did have left, they gave it all. That’s what they should be remembered for.

6. Braxton Miller is ahead of schedule. No one embodied that more than the team’s young quarterback. It just seemed like he was always going to make a play when they needed it most, and it certainly helped that he remained calm under pressure in every single situation he faced. Ever since he became the starting quarterback in week four, we have seen Miller become more and more comfortable running the offense. He has become a dynamic runner throughout the course of this season, but Saturday we saw a different side of Miller’s game.

He was far from perfect passing the ball against Michigan. In fact, had he been a little more on-point in this game, the Buckeyes probably would have won. He missed some WIDE open receivers down the field, including two big ones to DeVier Posey. Even with that, Miller managed to pass for over 200 yards for the first time in his young career. He finished with 335 yards of total offense, including 235 through the air, in his first every Michigan game. It took both Troy Smith and Terrelle Pryor until their third seasons at Ohio State to put up those kind of numbers in the Michigan game. This is only the beginning, but we saw a glimpse of the future Saturday, and it looks bright.

7. It’s a shame we didn’t get to watch DeVier Posey the player all season. There are plenty of people who would have been perfectly happy never seeing DeVier Posey in Scarlet and Gray ever again after his two five-game suspensions for violating NCAA rules. He hurt his team in the worst way and some people thought he should have been kicked off the team. Regardless of your personal feelings surrounding Posey, it sure was a pleasure watching him play receiver on Saturday. It certainly appears like Posey has gone from being a pretty good receiver last season to being almost uncoverable at the college level. Officially, he had three catches for 58 yards and a score, but anyone who saw the game knows that Posey was running open down the field all afternoon against Michigan’s secondary.

He doesn’t have blazing speed, but he is a precise route-runner with excellent ability to get in and out of his cuts. He made a few defenders look downright silly Saturday, and was about two or three feet short of a catch to give the Buckeyes the lead in the final minutes of the game. It’s a shame we didn’t get to watch this kid play football all year. It could have been something special, and there is no question he would have dramatically improved Ohio State’s passing game. Unfortunately, he put himself in the position he was in.

8. Corey Brown can catch! This might have been the biggest news of the day, because there were some people who were ready to write this kid off after his big drop last week. “Philly” Brown has been battling an ankle injury all season, but he had no trouble getting behind Michigan’s defense Saturday. The more important part was that he came down with the football. Miller found him for a 54-yard touchdown to open the game, and Brown made a nice snag as he went into the end zone. He also had another catch for 22 yards that was even more difficult along the sideline. This is a big deal, because Brown has wheels. He can get open, but that doesn’t do much good if he can’t catch it. Now we know he can. More importantly, he knows he can.

9. Ryan Shazier is one tough kid. It’s impossible to know what the game might have looked like if Shazier never gets hurt Saturday. The freshman linebacker was flying around the field making plays, and he was the only one on Ohio State’s defense with enough speed to track down Denard Robinson in the open field. It looked like the Buckeyes were going to be in big trouble after Shazier had to be helped off the field with a knee injury. He came back in, but didn’t quite look like himself. He stayed with it, though, and gutted it out for eight tackles Saturday despite pain in his knee that he called a “7 out of 10.” This kid is not only fast, but tough. Those are two of the best qualities to have in a linebacker. He will be a starter and a playmaker for the Buckeyes in 2012.

10. John Simon will be back next year. There isn’t much to be said here except that Simon was the best player on Ohio State’s defense all season, and getting him back will be huge for next year. Simon should have more guys around him who can make plays in 2012, which should helped prevent the late-season drop-off we saw in his production this year. He is only going to continue to get better, and this is a huge start to the rebuilding process that must take place next season.

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