Greg McElroy believes that Ohio State could win the Big Ten this year. In fact, the ESPN analyst and former NFL quarterback is convinced that the Buckeyes should win the Big Ten.
But, he isn’t sure that they are a national championship caliber team. Let’s start with some background on this first…
Ohio State was offensively the best team in the Big Ten a year ago, leading the conference with 45.7 points per game. Defensively, however, they were not nearly as dominant. In fact, they were a bit middling.
The Buckeyes checked ninth in the Big Ten in total defense (22.8 points allowed per game). For a team with legitimate national championship ambitions, it simply wasn’t good enough and a major reason why Ohio State didn’t win the Big Ten last year or make the College Football Playoff.
And there lies the rub for McElroy when it comes to projecting Ohio State as a national championship contender.
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Now an analyst with ESPN, McElroy won a national championship with Alabama in 2010 and then spent three seasons in the NFL. Last week, he joined College Football Live on ESPN and discussed why he thinks Ohio State is the favorite to win the Big Ten.
And what he thinks could hold the Buckeyes back.
“Ohio State winning the league should be a slam dunk. No doubt they should win the league. They should. If they don’t, it’s their own fault,” McElroy said on ESPN last week.
“It really is but have they addressed the issues that have plagued them the last two years? Because this is not a one-year occurrence and a two-year multi-year occurrence in which they have been atrociously bad at times on the defensive side of the football. Ohio State’s M.O. forever has been they want to get after the quarterback and they want to create turnovers.”
For comparison, Michigan, who won the conference, was second in scoring offense (35.8) and fourth in scoring defense (17.4). The Wolverines lost a lot of pieces this offseason to the NFL draft, but their demise is likely a bit exaggerated at this point.
And the Wolverines won the biggest stat of the year as well, beating Ohio State in the regular season finale for both teams.
Michigan would win the Big Ten Championship Game and was selected for the College Football Playoff. Prior to that, Ohio State had won the Big Ten the last four years.
McElroy thinks that Ohio State is the favorite to return atop the Big Ten in 2022 as he postures that their defense will be significantly better this season.
The reason for this improvement? New defensive coordinator Jim Knowles, who had an Oklahoma State unit that was fifth in the FBS in total defense.
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“Well, the good news is last year, they did a pretty good job when it comes to (turnovers with) 14 interceptions. They did a pretty good job when it comes to sacks. However, compared to Ohio State teams of years past, it pales in comparison. In 2020 there were 49th in the country in sacks. In 2021, they were 34th in the country in sacks,” McElroy said.
“You know what they were in 2019? First. That was the last time Ohio State played the caliber of defense that you’ve come to expect from the Buckeyes. So they’ve hired Jim Knowles from Oklahoma State; I think they’ll take a step in the right direction because if you look at Oklahoma State – that’s where Jim Knowles – came from… If you look at the Oklahoma State defense last year, they were aggressive and they could penetrate and create negative plays and they can get a lot of pressure on quarterbacks.
“But will that be able to work and will they wave the magic wand in year one in Columbus is a real question for me because I know Ohio State is great, but do they play championship-caliber defense? That’s the big question.”
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