The 2021 Ohio State Buckeyes will take the field for the first time this season a week from today as Ryan Day’s squad travels to Minnesota for a rare week one conference game to kick things off.

Over the past several months we have spoken at length about who is gone from 2020, who is new in 2021 and who needs to step up and fill some of the voids left by last season’s departures. While we have not seen a depth chart in advance of week one, we have a pretty good idea of who will be out there for a first series, we know what this Ohio State team is all about and we also know that the Buckeyes are in position to do something that no other team has done in the history of the Big Ten Conference, win five outright championships in a row.

It got us to thinking about some major overriding questions going into the season. This is not about who will step into the WLB position or who might win the place kicking battle (though we are unsure of Noah Ruggles or Jake Seibert will be the guy just yet) but rather some larger picture items as football is just a couple of days away for a few teams and a week out for Ohio State.

If you see a challenging game coming up, is it really a trap game? We have seen Ohio State stub its toe against Iowa and Purdue in the past, and while the oddsmakers certainly did not see either of those games as likely losses, there was always an uneasy feeling about each of those games.

Let’s face it, it is a big ask to expect a team to be able to bring its ‘A Game’ for 15 games (if you play 12 in the regular season, a conference championship game and then two in the College Football Playoff) in a row, 13 of those games taking place over a 14-week period.

If you are among the nation’s top teams, generally it is the games where you are only able to muster a B or B-minus effort that separate a special season from a good or great season. This is not something that only pertains to Ohio State, we have seen teams like Clemson struggle against Boston College or North Carolina, we have seen Alabama have its moments against Ole Miss and of course we have seen Oklahoma see seasons get away with struggles against Kansas State or Iowa State.

More often than not, a trap game is on the road. If you get lulled into complacency against a double-digit underdog at home, maybe you were not all that great to begin with.

That means the only candidates that fit the bill are road games and it is impossible to believe that your trap game could happen week one, so we should probably scratch Minnesota off the list.

Michigan is “The Game” and by definition, there is no way that can be a trap game. The better team does not always win that game, even if the 2000s have treated the Buckeyes much better than the other guys. But, that can’t be a trap game as well.

So we are left with Nebraska, Rutgers and of course Indiana.

Let’s just cut out the rest of the pretty prose and get right to it, the trap game is Indiana. Ohio State will be coming off of an open week and a four-game stretch of Tulsa, Akron, Rutgers and Maryland. Those four games should be quite manageable and after Ohio State opens with a one-two punch of Minnesota and Oregon, it will be several steps down in terms of competition.

Well, this is the million-dollar question. Nobody is going to dispute that last season was far from a normal season for the Ohio State defense and even with that the Buckeyes were one win away from winning it all, losing to Alabama in the College Football Playoff Championship Game.

But No. 59 in total defense, No. 122 in yards allowed via the pass, and even giving up 25.8 points per game were all foreign to what Ohio State fans are used to.

And trust us, nobody felt more foreign than members of the Ohio State defense.

It is hard to base 2021 predictions based on 2020 results but Ohio State only will play two teams in the top-50 nationally in terms of total offense while playing five teams in the bottom-50. Minnesota ranks in the middle of the pack at No. 69 and no team is ranked higher than No. 37 (Penn State).

Ultimately the goal is to win games and the Buckeyes have been the class of the league over their four-year stretch as champions and well-beyond that as nobody has come close to winning as many games as Ohio State in the 2000s. But, last year sure did not feel like a normal year as Ohio State gave up more than 21 points in five of eight games.

The Buckeyes will be double-digit favorites throughout the regular season, that much we know. Odds will move as we learn more about teams but there certainly appears to be a wide gap between Ohio State and everyone else in the conference.

Who will be the team that pushes the Buckeyes, either in the Big Ten East or at a potential date in the Big Ten Championship Game?

Everyone seems to feel that Penn State is the next best team in the division, the Nittany Lions turned things around in the final four games of the 2020 season and remember that PSU did that without Micah Parsons, who opted-out for the year, and with no running game for the first five games of the year.

Is it as simple as saying that Penn State is the biggest threat in the league to dethrone the Buckeyes?

Penn State could anoint themselves as co-favorites if they get through a three-game stretch to start the season that includes games at Wisconsin and a huge non-conference home game against Auburn. Win both of those games and the accolades will be high and the anticipation for an October 30th games will be through the roof.

Lose one or both of those games?

Then attention turns where?

Across the bracket you have the Big Ten West, also known as the team, that annually loses to the Big Ten East in the championship game.

Every year we sing the praises of Wisconsin, this is going to be their year and in three of the last five seasons, we have been right as the Badgers have been there, losing twice to Ohio State and once to Penn State. The other two years were minor upsets with Northwestern advancing, losing to Ohio State in both instances.

How about Iowa? Earlier this summer, I picked Iowa to emerge from the West to take on Ohio State from the East.

But is getting to the game enough for any of these teams?

Since ditching the Leaders and Legends and going to geographical regions, the Big Ten East holds a 7-0 record in B1GCGs. We have no reason to expect that trend to change.

Heavy is the head that wears the crown.