Ohio State football vs. Indiana: Offense grades

Ohio State was able to get the 42-35 win over Indiana today, but it wasn’t because of an offensive masterpiece by the Buckeyes. In fact, it was their worst offensive performance all year.

Ohio State won their toughest game of the season today by beating Indiana 42-35. It was a top 10 matchup that showcased the two best teams in the conference. While Ohio State did win the game, it was not a well-played game by any stretch of the imagination for the Buckeyes. Here is how each unit graded out.

Only one quarterback played for the Buckeyes today, and it was Justin Fields. Fields had the worst game of his career today and it wasn’t even close. He had some of the worst decisions I’ve ever seen him make. He threw three interceptions and all of them were a product of bad decisions.

Fields being a turnover machine really held this Buckeye offense back. Not only were the turnovers a problem, but he held the ball way too long in the pocket. That resulted in him taking 5 sacks. Not all of them were his fault, but a decent amount of them are.

Even so, Fields did throw for 300 yards and 2 touchdowns and ran the ball 15 times for 78 yards and a score. His worst game is still pretty good for most other quarterbacks. Even so, if he plays like that against an elite team, Ohio State will lose.

It’s really a shame that Ryan Day refused to run the ball more in the second half because the running backs were fantastic in this one. Master Teague had 26 carries for 169 yards and 2 touchdowns, good enough for 6.5 yards a carry.

Trey Sermon didn’t have as many carries, only toting the rock 9 times for 60 yards. That’s still good enough for 6.7 yards a carry. If the backs were getting that many yards every time, Day should have fed them the ball more often with Fields struggling.

Garrett Wilson continues to be a monster out there. He had 7 catches for 169 yards for 2 touchdowns and was really good to start both halves. Chris Olave had 8 catches for 101 yards as well. Those two were the only receivers who really did anything, but they continue to be good.

The tight ends were a non-factor in this game. Not a single catch was made today by the tight ends, which was disappointing considering how good Jeremy Ruckert has been in the red zone. They blocked pretty well in this game though, which helped.

The offensive line had yet another shaky performance. They allowed 5 sacks, although about 3 of them were on Fields for holding onto the ball for too long. They also were very good in the run game, opening up a bunch of holes for Teague and Sermon.

Giving up that amount of sacks is why this rating is so low despite a good job in run blocking. It’s something that they have to figure out moving forward. Hopefully, Ryan Day will light a fire in his team and get Fields fixed for next week.

A win is a win, but Ohio State has to be better.