What They're Saying: Ohio State-Minnesota Aftermath

Game Recaps

Ohio State Buckeyes vs. Minnesota Golden Gophers - Recap - October 30, 2010 - ESPN
After his Buckeyes lost to Wisconsin two weeks ago, Ohio State coach Jim Tressel asked every player on his team to turn in a paper on how they planned to deal with the adversity. Terrelle Pryor and the rest of the squad have aced the assignment so far. With the field of unbeaten teams shrinking, Ohio State is piling up the style points.

The setting is more appealing for Minnesota, but the wins don't stop for Ohio State: Bill Livingston | cleveland.com
In a beautiful new stadium, open to the stars, chilled by the autumn night, with the bright lights of this, the bigger twin city, blazing behind the TCF Bank Stadium scoreboard, Ohio State showed Saturday that nothing really changes in this part of the upper Midwest. The Buckeyes have not played particularly well this season outside of Columbus, where they will venture only four times in their 12-game schedule. Then again, they had not been to Minnesota until Saturday night, and they had never been to this two-year old stadium on the Minnesota campus, which replaced the grim Gopher hole of the Metrodome as the school's football venue. Minnesota never beat Ohio State in the Metrodome, and, while "never" is a long time in a new building, the Gophers opened the new phase of their series the way they closed the old, losing, 52-10. It gave Ohio State a tidy 43-7 all-time lead in the series.

Ohio State Buckeyes throttle Minnesota, 52-10, move into four-way tie top Big Ten | cleveland.com
Playing under the stars at TCF Bank Stadium, no longer stuffed inside the Metrodome on their jaunt to Minnesota, the Ohio State Buckeyes couldn't quite see all the way to California on Saturday night. They could once again see their shot at Big Ten history, though. With a 52-10 victory over the Golden Gophers, and with Iowa's win over Michigan State earlier in the day, Ohio State moved back into a tie for first place in the Big Ten, with the Buckeyes and Spartans at 4-1 and Wisconsin and Iowa at 3-1. That means, in the final year before a Big Ten title game, Ohio State controls its own destiny for tying the all-time Big Ten record of six straight conference titles.

Buckeyes' pressure got to Gophers | BuckeyeXtra
The Ohio State secondary is beat up, but the Buckeyes still went into a game last night at Minnesota counting on the Gophers to stay true to form, by passing often. "We would hope so," safety Aaron Gant said. "That would be more production for us." Even though the Buckeyes won 52-10, for a few moments in the first half, quarterback Adam Weber and the Gophers took dead aim at the deep part of the pass defense, which has been riddled by injuries. Weber hit consecutive passes of 35 yards to Marqueis Gray and 32 yards to 6-foot-7 tight end Tiree Eure to set up DeLeon Eskridge's 7-yard touchdown run to tie the score at 7.

The Gophers made it look stunningly easy to slice up the defense, and it had all the makings of being a long night for the secondary. But as the Buckeyes defensive front stepped up the pressure, the big pass plays came less frequent and the Gophers started throwing screens to try to slow it down. The Buckeyes, No.1 in the Big Ten in pass efficiency entering the game, had the Gophers where they wanted them. "We made an adjustment and just pretty much tried to get after them," cornerback Devon Torrence said. "We just tried to man up on them a lot more (in tighter coverage), and we knew if we did that, we could get pressure on Weber."

Side Stories

Herron reaches triple digits | BuckeyeXtra
Daniel Herron finally burst through the 100-yard barrier, and he did it in less than a half. The Ohio State junior running back had come close to his first collegiate 100-yard rushing game the previous two weeks, only to be turned away. But last night he made it look easy, ripping off 114 yards - the most by a Buckeyes player this season - on 17 carries in the first half as part of the 52-10 win over Minnesota. "It was a lot of fun to get one. It was a great honor to get 100 yards," Herron said. "Minnesota is a great team. Anytime you play a Big Ten team, it's going to be a fight. "The offensive line did a great job, Zach (Boren, fullback) is always doing a great job, and coach (Jim) Tressel gave me the opportunity to carry the load in the first half, and I thank him for that."

Herron took part in just one play in the second half, as a blocking back for Brandon Saine on a sweep out of the shotgun that lost 3 yards. But when Herron was carrying the ball, he usually was moving forward - never more so than on a six-play drive that put him over 100 late in the second quarter. He carried on five of those plays, gaining 25 on the first carry and capping it with a 10-yard run around left end for a touchdown after tight end Reid Fragel put up a road block on the pursuit. It gave Ohio State a 24-7 lead.

Minnesota's new stadium brings back memories | BuckeyeXtra
Ohio State hoped its first outdoors game in Minnesota in 29 years turned out better than the last one. The Buckeyes and Gophers played last night in TCF Bank Stadium, Minnesota's second-year stadium that marks the school's return to on-campus, outdoor football. From 1982 through 2008, the Gophers played in the Metrodome, where they were third-class citizens behind the NFL's Vikings and baseball's Twins. But while the University of Minnesota community celebrated its new stadium, Ohio State might have been one of the few schools to mourn the Metrodome. OSU never lost there, going 11-0 in the controlled climate.

The Buckeyes did fairly well outdoors before then, posting a 9-4 record. But the last of those four losses - on Nov. 7, 1981 - was particularly memorable. "I remember we had a great rushing attack - Tim Spencer was one of the leading rushers in the Big Ten at that time," said former offensive lineman Jim Lachey, a freshman that year. "We go out on the field - it's a beautiful sunny day in Minnesota - and the field is just soaking wet. "Of course, (coach) Earle Bruce is a conspiracy theorist. 'They soaked the field! We've got the No. 1 rusher in the Big Ten coming in, and they soaked the field! We're still going to run on them.'

Bob Hunter commentary: A victory, no injuries -- it's all that really matters | BuckeyeXtra
It's hard to measure success in games like this. A one-win opponent raises expectations through the roof - or at least it would have if Minnesota hadn't moved its games to an outside stadium - and a mere victory doesn't necessarily mean it was a great night. But how can we tell? Should anything less than a 50-point beating be considered a downer? Or do we take Ohio State at its word that it was difficult to tell on video that Minnesota has only one win? Maybe it was bad videography. This can be confusing, especially after a 52-10 win.

A lot of yards and points aren't necessarily signs of success against a team that lost to South Dakota and Northern Illinois. But, seriously, what is? A giddy coach could probably be construed as a good sign, but that rarely describes Ohio State's Jim Tressel and certainly didn't describe him last night. "I think the reality of our situation is that we get to head home (today) and catch up a little bit academically and get some guys healthy and then we have to really look and see where we've got to get better," Tressel said.

Playing in the great Minnesota outdoors a good change for the Buckeyes: On The Clock with Doug Lesmerises | cleveland.com
Observations as the clock ticked along Saturday and the Buckeyes took on the Gophers. 6:47 p.m.: Ohio State defensive lineman Cameron Heyward was among the Buckeyes on the field at TCF Bank Stadium, warming up under the direction of strength and conditioning coach Eric Lichter. The odd thing was, Heyward could see the sky. 0Share 0 Comments Saturday night was Ohio State's first visit to two-year-old TCF Bank Stadium, the first new Big Ten football venue built since 1960.

The Golden Gophers entered the game 0-5 in their lovely new home this season, but their chances against the Buckeyes weren't any worse than they were in their former home of the Metrodome. Between 1982 and 2008, the Buckeyes went 11-0 in the Metrodome, though five of the wins were by a touchdown or less. The Gophers against the Buckeyes were never able to exploit that odd homefield edge under the Big Ten's only roof. Heyward was a freshman when the Buckeyes won their last game in the dome, prevailing, 30-7, in 2007.

On a day of big plays by Terrelle Pryor, it's interception in end zone that sticks in Jim Tressel's mind | cleveland.com
Terrelle Pryor moved into second place in two major Ohio State offensive categories while the Buckeyes cruised to a 52-10 win over Minnesota on Saturday, yetcoach Jim Tressel had a hard time getting past Pryor's worst throw of the night. "I'm still having trouble with that one," Tressel said, bringing up Pryor's one interception for a second time while answering an unrelated question. Pryor's lone turnover was one of only four passes he threw that didn't land in the arms of a Buckeye, as Pryor finished his night 18-of-22 for 222 yards while also rushing five times for 55 yards. He scored once on a 1-yard sneak and also hit Brandon Saine and DeVier Posey with touchdown passes.

Buoyed by a pair of blowouts, Ohio State gets a week to ponder the November challenge | cleveland.com
So 101 points and 996 yards later, the Buckeyes have officially bounced back. Only those with a target of 1,000 combined yards in the last two games would be disappointed with the way Ohio State has responded with a 49-0 win over Purdue and 52-10 win at Minnesota since the first-half mauling in Madison that led to their only loss of the season against Wisconsin. 0Share 0 Comments "It was a hard loss," OSU coach Jim Tressel said inside TCF Bank Stadium late Saturday night, reflecting on Wisconsin. "Our guys went up and played against a very good team and we were excited about playing and we just didn't do the things you need to do to win games like that. And our guys were disappointed, no question.