Navy visits Ohio State to open college football Saturday

Let’s get a few things straight: I love the Naval Academy’s triple option offense. I don’t like Ohio State. And, this Saturday should be a interesting matchup in Columbus between the two teams.

Ohio State will be heavily favored in the game which kicks off at noon on ESPN. The #6 ranked Buckeyes should win the game. After all, they’ll have 105,000 fans behind them and what some people consider to be one of the best quarterbacks in America, sophomore Terrelle Pryor, leading the show for his second year.

On the exact opposite end of the spectrum is the Naval Academy, led into battle by second year head coach Ken Niumatalolo. They’ll be led under center by junior Ricky Dobbs, who will be making his second start. He takes over for former Navy great Kaipo Noa Kaheaku Enhada, who left Navy after a few great years of leading the Middies.

Ohio State is worried about replacing all but two starters on offense. The only returning players that started at their position last season are Pryor and center Mike Brewster. The Buckeyes replace four starters on defense. Navy replaces Kaheaku Enhada and six other offensive starters and like the Buckeyes they must replace four defensive starters.

I love watching every Navy game that I can only to watch that offense grind out yardage on the ground, in an old fashioned style rushing attack. Navy’s defense has been suspect the past few years, and I expect Ohio State head coach and playcaller Jim Tressel and Pryor to exploit those Naval Academy weaknesses.

I don’t expect Navy to win, let’s get that straight. But, Navy could scare Ohio State with the combination of speed and quickness that has given the slower Buckeyes headaches over the past few years. Add in the fact that it’s tough to prepare for the triple option attack that the Midshipmen will bring to the table, and it could be a tough day for the Buckeyes.

And Tressel feels the same way. Yesterday he told reporters,

“Whenever you play someone like Navy it raises the urgency because you can’t look at them and say, ‘Well, I know what they do. Yeah, this is what they run. We know how to stop that.”’ he said. “Plus our guys have a tremendous respect for the people who choose to go into that particular world. You’ve got to be courageous and our guys know that. … It’ll be an eye-opener for us.”

One year ago Ohio State had trouble dismissing in state rival Ohio University on this same weekend in September. Although the Buckeyes pulled away they have had trouble defeating lesser opponents in the past. They won’t overlook Navy in favor of a prime time rematch with USC next Saturday.

Ohio State offensive guard Bryant Browning said, “First off, those guys have won a lot of games. They go to bowl games, and they win. We’re usually facing, I guess you could say, a lesser opponent sometimes—you could say it that way. But Navy is not one of those teams. They’re going to come in here looking for a big upset.”

And if they do, well, expect me to be one happy guy.
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Tomorrow I’ll let you in on the first time I heard a phrase that became a household saying last year at UC. I’ll tell you about the 2007 trip to Piscataway, New Jersey where the UC Bearcats beat the Rutgers Scarlet Knights. As always, I’ll include some photos of the trip. Friday will be a two part bonus post including NASCAR and UC football (only because my line of work is involved, check back later for more).

Have a great Wednesday and thanks for reading.