Hot 11: Post Nebraska
Week one is in the books and even if the rest of the college football world is not calling it week one, it is week one for Ohio State and the Big Ten and that is what we are going to ride with.
Ohio State's 52-17 win over Nebraska had plenty of good, some bad and a little indifferent after going back and watching the tape. Anyone who thought this team would come out and look like the team that beat Michigan in the regular season finale last year was probably not very honest with themselves with that team having 11 games under its belt at that point and this team having a grand total of zero.
Plenty of teams did not answer their week one challenge, be it in the Big Ten like Penn State, the SEC like LSU or plenty of other teams that were expected to come out and look a lot better than they did right out of the gate.
But this now gives us a chance to look at our old preseason rankings and update them with some game data. It would be great to jump in and throw someone like Jaxon Smith-Njigba in after a catch of the year, but if we are being truthful, he needs a larger sample size before we could honestly move him into the Hot 11 list.
This is a feature that we run weekly and there is always movement on this list after each game is played. What we don't do is over-correct from game-to-game. If a player comes out of nowhere to have a big game, he won't move up to the top-four of the list and conversely, one bad game won't drop a player off the list entirely if he was ranked highly just a week before.
How did the most recent contest change our list? Take a look below and be sure to vote each week over in The Horseshoe Lounge to have your voice heard.
| Rank | Who | Why |
|---|---|---|
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1. |
Justin Fields |
Fields passed for 276 yards on 20-21 passing and two scores while rushing for 54 yards and a score. There really wasn't a whole lot more that Fields could have done outside of maybe converting a couple of third-and-short plays that the Buckeyes inexplicably came up short on. One note we will take away from this is that 15 carries is too many for Fields on the regular. Last Week: 1 |
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2. |
Shaun Wade |
We have said it once, we will say it again and we will probably say it again as the season goes on, being a top corner does not mean that you are going to have a lot of stats in the defensive playbook as teams just avoid you. Wade had a pair of tackles in this game but as the Huskers only completed 16 passes for 160 yards, there was not a lot there for Wade to do in terms of picking off passes and things of that nature. Last Week: 3 |
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3. |
Wyatt Davis |
The offensive line played well but we will have to go back to the tape and look at what broke down in the run game, was it that the run blocking was not quite there yet, that the running backs were not maximizing opportunities, a combination of both or something entirely different. The Buckeyes came up just shy of 500 yards of total offense in this one. Last Week: 2 |
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4. |
Chris Olave |
Six catches, 104 yards, quite likely getting his bell run, maybe twice... all in a day's work for Chris Olave. Sure, Justin Fields was slinging it to go 20-21 but someone had to be there to make those catches and the catch radius of Olave is fantastic and will make any quarterback look that much better. Last Week: 4 |
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5. |
Garrett Wilson |
Garrett Wilson even topped Olave in terms of stats with seven catches, 129 yards and a long touchdown grab on the day. Olave is still going to get the most mentions when observers watch this team but don't sleep on Wilson who gives the Buckeyes an incredible 1-2 punch at the position. Last Week: 6 |
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6. |
Josh Myers |
Myers is the second offensive lineman to make the list and much of the same things that we said for Davis will be echoed here. We really still need to go back and watch the game closer to see where some of the breakdowns were and the challenge will be real next week, regardless of how Penn State did in its week one game. Last Week: 5 |
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7. |
Pete Werner |
Werner led the Buckeyes in tackles from his linebacker position and had a solid game. Things were shaky for almost everyone on the defense over the first quarter-plus but things started settle down after some adjustments were made and Wener played like a leader on the line. Last Week: 11 |
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8. |
Thayer Munford |
It probably was not Munford's best game in terms of being able to assert his will but he handled everything that the Huskers threw at him and most importantly, this may have been the first game in some time where Munford was not playing in considerable pain. Last Week: 9 |
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9. |
Zach Harrison |
We are still not sure at the time of publication why Harrison saw less action than many of his linemates but we still feel, even without a big outing that he is one of the top players on the team but runs the risk of falling off the list if he doesn't have a strong game against Penn State next weekend. Last Week: 7 |
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10. |
Haskell Garrett |
Garrett was not the only player to record a sack or a tackle for loss but he was the only player on the team to do that after being shot in the face only weeks prior. Maybe we are just being sentimental here but it was too good of a story not to chronicle. Last Week: NR |
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11. |
Trey Sermon |
Sermon had 11 carries for 55 yards for the Buckeyes in his debut. Neither he nor Teague had great games but even JK Dobbins would have an off day here and there and it is not time to sound any of the alarm bells, at least not yet. Last Week: 10 |