When you talk to a coach after a game and ask him about how a player or unit played, you’ll usually get some kind of general answer, followed by some version of the coach saying he’d have to watch the tape and get back to you.
They do always end up watching the tape, but they don’t always end up getting back to you.
When you ask a defensive coordinator about their own offense, however, there’s no telling what kind of answer you’re going to get. They have to practice against that offense every day, but they also don’t spend time watching film of that same offense because they won’t be playing against it on Saturday.
At Ohio State, the Buckeye offense has clearly grown from last season, but the two new offensive coordinators weren’t here to see how things were a year ago, which makes defensive coordinator Greg Schiano a good guy to ask when it comes to what he has seen from last year to this year.
Specifically, what is it about the changes to this year’s offense that intrigues him the most.
“Well, the guts of our offense is the same, it’s always going to be the same. It’s the Ohio State offense,” he said on Wednesday. “There’s been some things that enhance the offense, and when you enhance it with some different concepts, if they’re great concepts like they are, they not only show in that concept, but they make your other stuff better. So there’s a bleed over, you know?”
You only need to scan the Ohio State record books to know that Urban Meyer’s offense works pretty well, and so when Kevin Wilson and Ryan Day add in their flourishes, it also enhances what the Buckeyes have been doing since Meyer arrived.
The offense now looks like many expected it to back in September. The performance against Oklahoma will not soon be forgotten, but the growth has continued and even though Schiano doesn’t get to see much, he likes what he has seen.
“Yeah, I’m very impressed,” he said. “I don’t get to watch them ever, unless we’re going against them. My back’s to the field. Since we had some time this Sunday actually, they have those replays of the game, I actually watched our own TV game and it was fun to watch. I didn’t realize that J.K. ripped that one off the sideline. I hear the crowd cheer and I hear on the headset, ‘We’re up!’ And that’s what I know.”
It turns out that the Ohio State offense can sometimes be pretty fun to watch.
And also that J.K. Dobbins is a pretty good player.
“Yeah, no kiddin’,” Schiano said.
I know this is an article about the Offense but when will they address the issues on Special Teams?
I believe I have heard/read that Urban Meyer coaches the Special Teams? It seems like he’s always hanging his head after nearly every special teams play. Maybe because they often seem like a debacle and he feels some of that is on him?
So I have a question – can OSU not hire a Special Teams coach to help Meyer out? Where the sole purpose would be to develop that side of the game to a higher level. If this comes off as a completely stupid question I’ll take my beating but it just seems like the lack of a competent and well performing special teams unit is going to bite OSU in the rear one of these games. Fortunately the last several games have been blow outs. I have a bad feelig that either a shanked punt (seen those a few times this year), a bad snap/hold, kick return (or kickoff out of bounds) or something special teams related will rear its ugly head at the most unfortunate of times. Just like it did in the now infamous Michigan/Michigan State ending from 2016.
Kerry Coombs is the special teams coordinator as well.It’s generally been a well-performing group, but they’re obviously struggling right now.
Ah, thanks Tony! I like Kerry Coombs (I don’t know anyone that doesn’t) but I thought he was only the Defensive Backs coordinator. Now I see from the profile page he has special teams too. Maybe give HIM some help then. 🙂
Christopher, Penn State last year is probably a better example. The kick and punt coverage teams have done particularly well (with some bad ‘hiccups’ this year, especially on kick coverage, but a couple bad punts as well), it’s the return teams that consistently underwhelm from my view.
I too expected OSU’s O to show up against IN and blow them away, and was shocked when OK put our O under wraps. The reality appeared that all needed time to adjust, grow and develop into our current system. Glad Schiano sees it, the rest of us OSU fans as well as the CFB universe will need to see it starting against The Nittany Lions.