COLUMBUS, Ohio - Saturday's game between the Buckeyes and the Nittany Lions will be the biggest game on a weekend of big games across the nation and just one of many big games on FOX with the network having the Buckeyes, the World Series and the Dallas Cowboys on their air over the span of 48 hours.

Just to add to the pageantry, Gus Johnson will be on the call along with Joel Klatt and Jenny Taft on FOX's main college football crew. This will be Johnson's second time to Ohio Stadium on the call, he had a chance to call the Ohio State vs. Maryland game earlier in the season, but he knows the stakes are higher.

The enormity of this is not lost on Johnson who grew up in Detroit and grew up watching the Big Ten through his childhood. He will also be on the call for the upcoming game against Michigan as well and when it was announced that FOX was going to be part of the Big Ten contract, it was a high point for the storied play-by-play man.

"I almost had tears in my eyes. I am from here," Johnson said on Friday night. "It is part of the world that I grew up in. I know how it is since I was a baby."

Johnson has seen it all through his storied career (including the Ohio State vs. Xavier basketball game where Ron Lewis sent the Buckeyes to overtime and one of the most memorable calls in Ohio State history) and calling Big Ten football is something that means a lot to the veteran sportscaster. And even bring born and being raised north of the border (the Ohio border) he knows how special Ohio State is.

"The Big Ten is the greatest conference in the history of America," Johnson added. "Ohio State is the home of Jesse Owens."

This game also means a lot to analyst Joel Klatt. He is not from the Big Ten region nor did he play for a school in the Big Ten, but the former Colorado Buffaloes quarterback has been taken back about how everything seems to mean just a little bit more around Columbus when it comes to the Buckeyes.

"I have not been to a lot of Big Ten venues, I played in the Big 12 and then we were covering the Pac-12 and the Big 12 for the entire length of the FOX deal until now… I have been blown away, blown away," Klatt said. "The scope, the size and the fervor of the fan bases and pageantry and the fans, there is nothing like it. There is nothing like Big Ten football. It is something special."

Of course, there is a game that has to be played and both the Buckeyes and Nittany Lions come in with questions. Who has more questions?

"I think Ohio State because the last two big stages they have been on, they have lost with Clemson and Oklahoma," Klatt added. "I can't remember a time where Ohio State lost three big stages in a row. I think the pressure is on them, at home, they are favored. The narrative surrounding J.T. Barrett, the narrative surrounding the pass defense… it sounds crazy but to me, I feel like the undefeated team is the one that is coming in with the least amount of pressure."

Even from his national position with FOX, Klatt has seen the scrutiny that Barrett has been under this season after a clunker of a game against Oklahoma. He heard the cries for a chance at quarterback and it is not something that is unique to Ohio State fans when it comes to the most rabid of fans having a short leash on players who don't produce the biggest of numbers in every game.

"College football fans all over the country and unfortunately even Buckeye fans suffer from this at times, they have a virus, the virus is called familiarity," Klatt said. "It breeds contempt and complacency. All over the country, when you see players that have played for a long time, which in college football is three years or more, their fan bases are like, 'I wish he was more like that guy. More like Baker Mayfield or Deshaun Watson or so on'. Unfortunately, it is a lot like relationships in general, you don't realize what you had until you lost it. JT is an incredible player."

The goals at Ohio State are not complicated to figure out.

"When you are at a place where excellence is not an option and when the two goals are Michigan and the National Championship, for him he has to replace the narrative that he does not play well against great teams," Klatt said. "For all of that, he is going to bring this new perspective, new quality rhythm to a game where he is going to have to prove the narrative wrong."

Penn State has one heck of a defense, how does Klatt feel that Barrett will respond?

"I think he is going to play really well," Klatt said.

One thing that will help both Barrett and Penn State quarterback Trace McSorley is a chance in the weather forecast for Saturday. Rain on Saturday is still in the forecast but it appears that it will now be finished before lunchtime and will be dry by the 3:30pm (EDT) kickoff. That sits well with Klatt, who does not want to see a turnover plagued game with a wet ball and bad weather. Johnson on the other hand would like to see more familiar Big Ten weather.

"Being from around here, I hope that tomorrow's temperature is minus-five," Johnson joked. " A snowstorm… I hope from tomorrow through the rest of the year, the weather is brutal. I want to see some football in the Midwest, so all those SEC guys, they can look at these games and be like, 'Man, I don’t want to play up there'. I want to see some football. I want it to be cold."

Mother nature may not comply with game time temperatures being forecast in the mid-40s.

Either way that you look at it, this will be the de facto Big Ten East elimination game. The winner of this game will hold a commanding lead on the loser of the game with Michigan State waiting in the wings for both teams. College Football Playoff dreams are on the line for both squads and 60 minutes of football separate each team from another step toward that goal.