Oregon sent some shockwaves through college football today in Columbus by absolutely putting it on Ohio State.
The final ended up 35-28 thanks to some offensive heroics from Ohio State in the second half, but watching the whole thing it was pretty clear Oregon was the better team today.
Some select highlights:
Oregon’s offense had the run of things all day, but their defense came up big on multiple fourth down attempts by the Buckeyes, too:
Oregon’s drive to start the second half was a real sign that Ohio State was in trouble:
Ohio State didn’t go away; C.J. Stroud and the OSU offense played well enough to win the game, fourth down issues aside.
But the Ducks had multiple answers on both sides of the ball:
OSU scored one last time in the fourth quarter:
But it was too little, too late. Oregon’s offense ran clock and OSU couldn’t get anything else going on offense. Oregon intercepted Stroud to essentially seal the game:
And with that, the Buckeyes lost a regular season game at home, which is incredibly rare. The PAC 12, meanwhile, gets a huge non-conference win, something the league could desperately use; they haven’t had a playoff representative in years (not since Oregon in 2015!) and this is the kind of win that could end up a resume booster.
Ohio State, meanwhile, has a lot to fix. They’ll have a soft stretch in their schedule to do it, but that also means they won’t really be able to rack up quality wins to try and rebuild their own playoff case.
What a wild way to start off Saturday action, though.