Ohio State - Purdue Animated Drive Chart | End of Championship Dreams

by Tyler T. on Nov 14, 2011 12:00 PM EST in Animated Drive Charts

Animated Drive Chart brought to you by Gameday Depot.

Stats & Impressions

Yards Per Play: Ohio State 4.5, Purdue 4.6
Plays: Ohio State 65, Purdue 79
When Bill Connelly releases his advanced metrics for this game at Football Outsiders, if he chooses to, the numbers will reveal that Purdue beat Ohio State in one key category: success rate. While the two teams were about even with yards per play, Purdue ran considerably more plays because they gained more first downs and moved the ball in efficient, but not explosive, chunks.
Braxton Miller Watch: 8/18 passing, 132 yards, two touchdowns; 16 rushes, 43 yards, one touchdown.
Ross will tell us how Purdue stopped the Ohio State run game, but for now, it just matters that they did. Boom Herron, Jordan Hall, and Carlos Hyde combined for 38 carries and 120 yards, for only 3.2 yards per carry. That just won't do when you have no passing game.
Barring a Michigan upset of Wisconsin, the Big Ten Championship dreams died a windy death in West Lafayette.
Plain Dealer Ohio State reporter Doug Lesmerises is wondering what's up with the defense:

The defense appears to be battling two issues against offenses like Purdue and Indiana a week ago, teams that do some zone-read runs and fire passes at the softer middle of the OSU zone. Their older players -- Etienne Sabino, Storm Klein, Moeller -- don't have the speed to make tackles in space, and their younger players -- sophomore safeties C.J. Barnett and Christian Bryant -- sometimes lack the discipline.

Lesmerises errored by including Moeller in the analysis, but otherwise, his point is spot-on. Sabino is plodding and struggles in space, and Klein just disappears against spread teams.

When weakside linebacker Andrew Sweat left the game, Ohio State replaced him with a speedy but young Ryan Shazier. Shazier has the physical talents to play now, but his youth contributed to the discipline issues Lesmerises notes in the secondary.

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This issue about speed is confusing me… i thought everyone had been talking about Sabino for years as some kind of physical freak/prodigy with crazy speed, who just couldn’t quite get the mental aspects of the game…

So is he playing slow or is he physically slow, and why was everyone so wrong before?

by yrro on Nov 14, 2011 12:32 PM EST reply actions

I recall reading the same things, so if this is the case, then it would have to be playing slow. He’s certainly looked indecisive in virtually every game but the Wisconsin game, which would indicate playing slow (and that the mental aspect still hasn’t clicked for him).

Come to think of it everyone looked better against the badgers, and unfortunately it seems that game was aberration. Though I know we all hoped it was the team finally playing up to its potential (at least for the first 3.5 quarters on defense) the past 2 weeks (coupled with the rest of the season sans Wisconsin) have demonstrated otherwise.

I hope we win out, but really all I care about at this point is beating Michigan. I don’t see that happening considering how badly we struggled against a similar and worse offensive attack in Indiana, but I’d be happy as a pig in filth to be wrong.

by Estrada on Nov 15, 2011 6:01 PM EST up reply actions

After my preseason Pollyanna pick of a 9-3 record has worn off, I’m just about worn out. Prior to Wisconsin game, I downgraded my forecast to 6-6, with caveat that if offense improves, we’ll probably do better. I’m sticking with my 6-6 record.

Two things that I did look for this season were ‘playing with intensity’ and ‘improvement’. I’ve seen neither, particularly with the defense.

"I'm not a psychopath, Anderson, I'm a high-functioning sociopath. Do your research." - Sherlock Holmes

by KenK on Nov 14, 2011 2:03 PM EST reply actions