Down three starting offensive linemen and his head coach and main play-caller, it seemed the safest course of action for Ohio State quarterback Justin Fields against Michigan State would be to manage the game and hand the ball off.
That was far from the case on Saturday though, as Fields took matters into his own hands early and often in East Lansing. In particular, it was the ever-capable but sometimes modestly utilized rushing ability of the Buckeyes’ quarterback that bailed out a hamstrung Ohio State team against the Spartans.
“If you’re gonna be a head coach for one day, you want Justin Fields with you,” Ohio State defensive line coach and acting head coach Larry Johnson said after the game.
Despite the omnipresent threat of Fields’ legs, he entered Saturday having only rushed for 100 yards once as a collegiate quarterback, and that was back at Georgia when Fields was still a freshman. In fact, Fields’ best rushing performance in Scarlet and Gray came in Ohio State’s last contest, a 78-yard game against Indiana on Nov. 21.
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He topped that on Saturday though, racking up 75 yards and two touchdowns on the ground in the first half alone en route to a career-high 104-yard rushing exhibition.
“Some of those creative plays he made with his feet, throws he made down the field, I thought he played really gutsy in a situation where we had to be really careful with the offensive line and what we were doing,” head coach Ryan Day said after the game.
With Ohio State’s regular starting center Josh Myers out, left guard Harry Miller slid to the middle, and the results were not always pretty early on.
On the Buckeyes’ opening drive, Miller struggled to deliver accurate snaps to Fields out of the shotgun, but he managed to handle all of them with surprising success. Fields picked one snap off the ground to turn a potential catastrophe into an 8-yard rush for a first down, but that was just a blip of what he had in store.
On third-and-goal from the 2-yard-line later in the drive, Fields received the best snap of the series from Miller, faked an end-around to Olave and turned a broken play into six points on a scramble toward the right pylon.
The very next possession, Fields faced a third-and-7 from his own 21-yard-line, but scrambled right away from the Spartan pass rush to pick up 13 and keep the drive alive.
“With coach [Corey] Dennis being out and coach Day being out, I head to step up a little bit more this week, and I have no problem doing that,” Fields said. “I actually liked it, to be honest with you.”
With time ticking down in the first quarter, Fields pulled a fake handoff to Master Teague on a first down play in Buckeye territory for a QB keeper. After eluding the edge rusher, Fields froze a linebacker with a stutter step that helped him spring a 44-yarder down the left sideline to set up a touchdown a couple plays later.
Fields ran in another touchdown in the second quarter, a 1-yard quarterback rush to the left, but maybe most impressive of all of his rushes came on a third-and-5 earlier on the same drive.
Scrambling right and faking a throw as he approached the line of scrimmage, Fields tucked the ball and ran over a Spartan defensive back, fighting through another would-be tackler along the way to stay ahead of the sticks.
“I don’t know if I enjoy initiating contact, but I’m gonna do it if I need to,” Fields said.
The game well in-hand late in the third quarter, Fields came up with more magic after a bad snap, turning the ball upfield for a 25-yard gain after what looked for a moment like another near-disaster in the Buckeye backfield.
Fields had no poor day passing either, finishing with 199 yards and two touchdowns on 17-of-24 attempts, but his willingness to run the ball signalled the grit necessary for the Buckeyes to get a win in the midst of difficult circumstances.
Even with certain chips stacked against them, the Buckeyes managed to get Fields out of the game with significant time left in the contest, something they had failed to do in any game prior.
