Ohio State Football: Biggest trap game for Ohio State
By Alex Austin
Ohio State is favored to win the Big Ten again this year, but that doesn’t mean the Buckeyes won’t have challenges. Today we look at the biggest potential trap game on Ohio State’s schedule.
Ohio State had several games under Urban Meyer that were closer than they should have been. Iowa in 2017 and Purdue 2018 are times where the Buckeyes were on the wrong side of the scoreboard against teams they were probably better than.
2019 saw Ohio State soundly beat every team they played in the Big Ten as Ryan Day had his team ready each week. But, 2020 poses a new year with chances for teams to upset the Buckeyes.
When looking at trap games I am going to take out the games Ohio State will have circled from the beginning of the season – Michigan, Penn State, and Oregon.
When looking at the Buckeye’s schedule there are a few weeks that could pose some problems.
Iowa always has the potential to be a trap game. But with the way the score ended the last time these two teams played, I don’t see Ohio State sleepwalking especially since the game is in Columbus.
Going on the road to Michigan State in most years would pose a challenge, but this is a team that will be transitioning to a new head coach and has underperformed recently.
After removing the two other non-conference games (Bowling Green and Buffalo), as well as traditional Big Ten bottom dwellers (Rutgers and Maryland) I am left with three games that have potential.
The first is Nebraska. The Cornhuskers were pegged as a dark horse to win the West last year, but that ended miserably. Nebraska has also been a revolving door since the end of 2019 with 14 players transferring. They do not seem like they are in a position to pull off the upset.
Illinois had a good stretch last year, but ended the season losing three straight games. We saw that they are capable of pulling off the upset when they beat Wisconsin, but outside of that game, they didn’t play the better teams particularly close. I think they are still a bit away from being able to win against Ohio State.
That leaves Indiana. This team tends to pull out one or two surprises when they play the upper levels of the Big Ten each year. Coming into the show is a hard task, but with no big games coming up they may catch the Buckeyes in a bit of a lull.
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I think the two biggest potentials for trap games this year are Illinois or Indiana. What are the games you fear could become traps?