Before he served a two-game suspension for NCAA rules violations, Chase Young was on pace to not just beat, but utterly destroy the single-season sack record at Ohio State.
And the junior defensive end wasn’t about to let something like a couple missed weekends or the Penn State offensive line keep him from it.
Saturday, Young tied Vernon Gholston’s 12-year-old record with a half-sack of Penn State quarterback Sean Clifford in the first quarter.
He then broke the record with a half-sack against backup quarterback Will Levis in the third quarter.
That sack gave Young 14.5 on the season, besting Gholston’s total of 14 in 2007.
Before the suspension, Young was seemingly on his way to breaking the NCAA’s single-season mark of 24 sacks by Arizona State’s Terrell Suggs in 2002.
Alabama’s Derrick Thomas recorded 27 sacks in 1988, but the NCAA didn’t consider sacks an official statistic until 2000.
It’s still possible for him to get there. After all, he tied the OSU single-game record with four sacks against Wisconsin in late October. And Young may have as many as four more games ahead after PSU.
The fact that he’s done it partway through just his ninth game of the year is mind-boggling, considering how many other great pass-rushers have played at OSU.
Joey Bosa had a career-high of 14 in 2014. Mike Vrabel topped out at 13 in 1995.
Andy Katzenmoyer (1996) and Vrabel (1994) both had 12 sacks in a season.
Young is also moving up the OSU career sacks list.
The same sack that gave Young the single-season record also pushed him past Jason Simmons into second place on the school’s career sacks list. Again: he has played less than 10 full games in his junior year.
He entered this season with 14, and now has 28.5 and counting. That puts him second behind Vrabel’s 36.
Earlier this year, Young said he wanted to go down as the greatest pass-rusher in Ohio State history.
It’s now entirely possible that Young could leave Ohio State with at least a share of the single-game, single-season, and career sack records at Ohio State.