Buckeyes Periscope

COLUMBUS (AP) — What’s brew­ing with the 2012 Ohio State Buckeyes …

BUCKEYES BUZZ: It took only a few min­utes — shak­ing hands on the field, singing the alma mater and a brief meet­ing with coaches and team­mates in the dress­ing room of Saturday’s 29–15 win over UAB — for the Ohio State Buck­eyes to turn their atten­tion from their fourth win of the sea­son to their fifth game of the season.

They travel to Michi­gan State to play the Spar­tans in the Big Ten opener on Sat­ur­day (3:30 p.m.)

OL Jack Mewhort said it’s a fresh start.

“It’s the Big Ten — that’s what we’ve been wait­ing for. The so-called pre­sea­son games are over,” he said. “We need to be 1–0 in the Big Ten. We plan on doing that. We’re going to go up to East Lans­ing and play hard.”

WR Corey Brown said despite some up-and-down play in their first four games, the Buck­eyes were in a good spot.

“I know we’re ready,” he said. “I’ve been play­ing with these guys every day. I know as a team we’re ready and I know how we’re going to approach this week, espe­cially with the way some of the guys were talk­ing in the locker room. This week when we come out to prac­tice on Tues­day, we’re going to have a whole dif­fer­ent mindset.”

MAN OF THE HOUR: Jor­dan Hall, match­ing the 17 car­ries he had a week ear­lier in his first game this sea­son, piled up 105 yards rush­ing. His per­for­mance went a long way to tak­ing some of the heat off of QB Brax­ton Miller, who at times has seemed like Ohio State’s soli­tary offen­sive weapon.

“That was huge. It was nice to have him back,” offen­sive co-coordinator and line coach Ed Warin­ner said of Hall, who didn’t have any con­tact drills from June until two weeks ago after cut­ting a ten­don in his foot. “There was a lit­tle rust last week. He took a huge step. I like his progress.”

Warin­ner said that Hall’s role may grow, even if Car­los Hyde returns against Michi­gan State after miss­ing two games with a sprained knee ligament.

“We’ve got to keep using (Hall),” he said. “He caught a nice swing pass out of the back­field, too. That was nice so he’s a multi-dimensional guy. We have to keep using him for qual­ity car­ries and yards.”

POLL DANCING: The Buck­eyes moved up two spots in the Asso­ci­ated Press Top 25, to 14th.

Only three Big Ten teams are listed, led by the Buck­eyes. Michi­gan State is No. 20 and Nebraska No. 22.

Alabama, Ore­gon, LSU, Florida and Geor­gia com­prise the top five teams. Just miss­ing the rank­ings were North­west­ern and Michi­gan, which were 26th and 28th in points.

The Ohio Bob­cats, 4–0 for the first time since 1976, received 40 points in the media poll and were right behind Michi­gan. The Cincin­nati Bearcats (2–0) picked up 10 points and were tied for 36th.

HE SAID IT: Coach Urban Meyer after Saturday’s game: “Try­ing to grow is over. Now it’s try­ing to perform.”

Posted by Jon Kleinknecht on Sep 24 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.