COLUMBUS, Ohio — Rivalry week has arrived for Ohio State. The Buckeyes say it’s about them, not their opponent. It might be more honest to read that sentence with an asterisk because it’s called rivalry week for a reason.
You’d be hard-pressed to find a person in Columbus who doesn’t think it’s about Michigan. Even when Ohio State won the national championship last season, the blemish being its loss to Michigan, to some, was more important than winning it all.
Ohio State does everything to prepare for The Game. It has a countdown clock in the Woody Hayes Athletic Center running at all times, a period dedicated to Michigan in practice, and is on the minds of head coach Ryan Day and the team 24/7.
While the Buckeyes do everything to prepare for this game, this season the approach has felt intentionally calmer — almost like treating it as just another week. And that’s the goal. After four straight losses to the Wolverines, but a taste of winning it all last year, it doesn’t come as a surprise that Ohio State is re-examining its approach to the one game that was their Achilles’ heel.
This year, Ohio State hosted TBDBITL to perform after practice during one of the team’s off weeks, something that had been traditionally reserved for the Michigan week. Ohio State usually holds all media availabilities the week of the Michigan game on Mondays, as opposed to its traditional availability schedule through the week. This year, however, that changed for the first time. The schedule for the Buckeyes will remain the same as every other week of the season.
“As we know, everything that comes with this game, we want to keep it as routine as we can and keep the guys focused on what we worked on all year,” Day said. “They’re always in the back of our mind, in terms of what we’re working towards. We know this is the last game of the year and what it means to everybody here.”
Not only has Ohio State shifted logistics to align with the goal of keeping it ‘routine,’ but the whole mentality of the team has shifted away from the results at the end of the year and their goals of beating Michigan and getting to the Big Ten championship in Indianapolis. Instead, the players and coaches have leaned fully into the process of getting there rather than the pressure of the destination.
The team even read Chop Wood, Carry Water: How to Fall in Love with the Process of Becoming Great by Joshua Medcalf in the offseason.
The message from that book has been implemented because all year the focus has been on the process of the season and growing through each week. Whether it was No. 1 Texas in Week 1, a non-competitive opponent, or now its biggest game of the year thus far at Michigan, the weekly approach hasn’t budged.
The tone of the team, coaches and players has felt consistent no matter what team they were preparing to face. It hasn’t felt like coach speak or just improving week-by-week, but almost as if Day got a taste of the mindset it takes to win it all and is learning from his experiences.
“When we talked about chopping wood and carrying water from the jump, that that’s what this was about — making sure we weren’t just saying ‘hey let’s get to the end of the year and everything that comes with it,'” Day said. “So, now we go.”
In the past, maybe there was too much of an emphasis on beating Michigan; the obsession became its own weight. It was consuming the minds of coaches and players last year, as many have since spoken on in reference to the player-led meeting following the loss to Michigan last year. The focus was always Michigan, with a few tests along the way.
The senior class has not been to Indianapolis to compete for a Big Ten championship, nor received a pair of gold pants. Day is desperate for a win against Michigan. The motivation and importance on the rivalry is there and as present as ever before. This year, however, the focus has not been on getting to Michigan week; rather, when you commit to the process all season, rivalry week isn’t pressure—it’s just the next log on the pile.
“We’re really focusing on the process because it’s easy to just say I want to get to the last game of the year but if that happens and you get distracted, you can get upset and all of a sudden the season can take a bad turn,” Day said. “I feel like we’ve focused on us, I felt like we’ve been consistent in our approach, so now that’s all in preparation for this week. So, we have to continue to do that very thing and that’s what it’s going to be.”
We learned last year that the road to the NC no longer goes through Shitigan. ScUM’s cheating has devalued the rivalry of late.