On the face of Saturday’s game, Ohio State shouldn’t have beaten Penn State. The Nittany Lions gained 6.5 yards per play to the Buckeyes’ 5.1. Playing in an electric Beaver Stadium, PSU led for most of the game, and regularly seemed to rattle Ohio State quarterback Dwayne Haskins.
When it mattered most, Ohio State called game-winning plays. Penn State didn’t.
The Buckeyes’ coaches put their players in exactly the right positions. Then, PSU’s staff couldn’t do the same.
James Lang-USA TODAY Sports
Things didn’t work out for the home team, however. Ohio State won 27-26, and the Buckeyes’ triumph had a lot to do with the way the two coaching staffs handled their teams’ final drives.
Just like in 2017, Ohio State executed on a game-winning drive it had to have to beat Penn State.
A point deservedly beleaguered on ESPN’s broadcast was that Haskins looked flat-out bad when Penn State forced him to move out of the pocket with aggressive pressure.
If you move a QB off his spot and force off-platform throws, a defense has a better chance of creating erratic deliveries that result in incompletions. Penn State consistently did that all night. But on the final drive, specifically, OSU took the Lions’ aggressiveness and used it against them with perfectly executed screens.
Screens neutralize a pass rush like a Venus flytrap. Defenders are lured up the field, and by the time they realize that their would-be blockers are in the second level headed the other direction, it’s too late for them to change course.
With 4:34 remaining and first down on their own 4-yard line in the shadow of their goalposts, Ohio State made the first of several deft playcalls.
Ohio State had three receivers to the bottom of the screen who widen out, and was facing just six Nittany Lion defenders in the box. The tight end at the top of the screen ran a vertical route to clear some space, giving J.K. Dobbins room to do his thing.
The second screen was a little different. It went to wideout Parris Campbell on first-and-10 from the Penn State 43:
Ohio State’s No. 13, Rashod Berry, made a nice downfield block to spring Campbell, who used his speed to get to the outside while a bunch of big uglies clogged the middle of the field. Campbell helped the play, and there was lots of space for him to run. Elsewhere, Johnnie Dixon, (No. 1 at the bottom of the screen) ran a vertical route to help clear out the left side of the field.
Finally, the 24-yard touchdown to K.J. Hill was a beauty of a wide receiver screen:
The play pitted three receivers against three defensive backs on the right side of the field. One of those receivers got the ball. The vertical release by the receiver at the top of the screen took one DB out of the play. (You should be noticing a theme here.)
No. 11, Austin Mack, got between the defender — who was playing soft in coverage at the snap — and the sideline, giving Hill space to work. From there, it was on Hill to make a guy miss and get the first down. Hill did more than that.
The strength of these plays came from the strength of a loaded Ohio State roster.
With four minutes left, Ohio State wasn’t rushed. There was no need to push the ball downfield with Haskins. So instead, the coaches gave him simple throws to get the ball to their playmakers and trust them to do what they do best.
But on the game’s decisive play, Penn State had the ball. The Nittany Lions used two timeouts to draw up a total failure.
You’ve already seen this play, so you know how badly it tanked:
A loss of 2 yards on fourth-and-5 in Ohio State territory, and game over. Nobody’s going to argue that Penn State called the play it should have called, least of all the guy in charge.
“Obviously, we should’ve called something different,” James Franklin said after the loss.
Let’s give this to Penn State’s coaches: they had had a plan. This was a standard zone read, and the Nittany Lions had good enough numbers to run it. There were eight blue jerseys near the heart of the formation, matched against seven white ones in the defensive box:
In blocking terms, Ohio State had a fine defensive box, with seven defenders against six Penn State blockers. But a give-or-keep option read on the play should neutralize one un-blocked defender, leveling the numbers and giving PSU an edge at the point of attack. The offense just goes where the read defender (a defensive end, here) doesn’t.
This play is also a pre-snap run-pass option, with a bubble screen to the slot receiver available if the offense has a numbers edge to the perimeter. While Penn State has a three-on-three situation much like Ohio State had at the snap on one of its big screens, you can’t fault McSorley for not taking it, given the favorable box. Ohio State has extremely fast defensive backs, and it’s quite possible that slot man Mac Hippenhammer would not have been able to outrun safety Jordan Fuller to the line to gain.
No matter whose assignments were what, Penn State’s blocking never materialized. A play that often works collapsed before it had a chance.
It looks like Penn State’s offensive linemen got confused when two Ohio State linebackers — No. 20 Pete Werner and No. 39 Malik Harrison — shifted before the snap. Both of them went right, toward the weak side of the formation, where the play called for McSorley to read a defensive end. If the DE crashed toward running back Miles Sanders, the play called for McSorley to keep the ball and run to his left, where he’d have open grass.
The shift ruined that plan. Just after the snap, Harrison was standing where McSorley would have gone if he had kept the ball. An apparent blocking miscommunication by Penn State’s left guard and tackle also enabled the Buckeyes to pour into the backfield. The “keep” option was completely removed from the table. McSorley would have been flattened if he had run left:
Of course, Harrison vacating the center of the formation should have left room elsewhere. But Ohio State linemen Chase Young (No. 2) and Jashon Cornell (No. 9) worked together to wreck the right side of Penn State’s offensive line, which had struggled all night. There was no lane for Sanders to the middle, either. That left the play’s three options all in bad states:
- The bubble screen to receiver Hippenhammer (No. 12) wasn’t clearly there, though Penn State could have tried it despite the eight-on-seven inside.
- McSorley’s keep option disintegrated immediately.
- The give to Sanders fell apart at pretty much the same time.
And that’s how Penn State turned in a dud.
While the call was defensible, Penn State never should have bet on its offense to run for 5 yards against Ohio State in that circumstance.
Sanders had struggled all night. Just six of his previous 15 carries had reached the 5-yard threshold or gone for a score. The Penn State line is improved this year, but it’s way less skilled than the Buckeyes’ defensive front.
There’s no sure thing on a fourth-and-5 against the Buckeyes. But letting McSorley throw to someone instead of relying on six blockers to do exactly the right thing and McSorley or Sanders to hit a hole with explosiveness was too bold.
In the game’s decisive moments, both coaching staffs schemed up.
Ohio State put Haskins in a position to succeed against a defense that had pressured him all night. Penn State put McSorley and Sanders in what amounted to an impossible spot.
Or to put it more simply, when it came to crunch time, one team was much more aware of its limitations and capability than the other, and it decided one of the biggest games of the year.
See More:
