Urban Meyer is just a handful of days away from coaching in his first Buckeye game of the year, but first he has to make the media rounds. On Monday, he spoke with the assembled media at the Woody Hayes Athletic Center, and on Tuesday he spent his required allotment of time on the Big Ten coaches teleconference. Here are the highlights.
+ Nose tackle Davon Hamilton has made tremendous improvement over the last year. He was almost a non-factor early in his career.
+ Freshman running back Brian Snead will be back practicing today. He missed last week for a disciplinary reason.
+ There is lost yardage without the quarterback running, so you have to pick up those yards somewhere else. They are doing that with passing and with J.K. Dobbins and Mike Weber.
+ Ryan Day and Kevin Wilson have done such a great job running the offense that Meyer will still be involved, but will be more of a game manager. This was in response to a question if Meyer would like to see more quarterback runs.
+ Meyer has wanted to get Ryan Day on his staff for a while now. He is an elite coach.
+ The first two games, the linebackers played very well. Pete Werner has played well. The one thing that has gotten them out of sorts on Saturday was the tempo which caused some misalignment issues. Malik Harrison has been playing great. The other guys have been getting better. Greg Schiano has been happy with the progress.
+ Ryan Day will be on the field this week instead of in the press box.
+ Meyer has been a “game manager” before in the past, but a high degree as to why he is okay doing it now is because of the high degree of the success that the offense has had. He went into the season hoping to be able to do this and the results have been very positive.
+ On Nick Bosa, “He’s one of the best players I’ve ever been around.” They’ll know tomorrow or Thursday more information on how long Bosa might be out.
+ Robert Landers has a slight injury but he is probable.
+ Everybody in the program loves Malcolm Pridgeon and is happy for his success this season.
+ The team can still improve on their consistency in kickoff return and offensively they can take care of the ball better. They can run the ball better. The defense needs to stop giving up the big plays, and if it does break, get them on the ground.
+ The return game is a competition every week until somebody takes the job.