Ohio State football: Secondary will have a challenge vs. Northwestern

The Ohio State football team faces Northwestern for the Big Ten Championship. Their secondary is going to have quite a challenge.

The Ohio State football team is close to realizing one of its goals for this season. To win the Big Ten, only one more team stands in their way. To beat that team though, they must have a strong performance from their weakest unit on defense; the secondary.

So far this season, the secondary has had an up and down year. They have had really good performances like they did last week against Michigan State. They have also had some bad ones as they did against Rutgers and Indiana. There hasn’t been much in between.

Ohio State needs to have one of the good performances on Saturday to win. IU transfer Peyton Ramsey has been a steady performer for Northwestern. While he doesn’t put up massive numbers, he can still have some big plays down the field.

Big plays have been an issue for the Buckeye secondary. Allowing big plays has kept teams in games against them this season. IU specifically was able to get back in the game because of a couple of big passing plays down the field in the second half.

The safeties have to be able to stay deep enough to not get beat behind them. Northwestern doesn’t scheme up a lot of big plays. That’s what would make allowing them so devastating for the Buckeye secondary. The defense should be prepared for them to try and run the ball, not have chunk pass plays.

As long as the secondary can stay disciplined on Saturday, there is no reason why Ohio State shouldn’t emerge with a conference title.