{mosimage} Illinois entered Ohio State favored to win by my boy, Mark May. As it turns out Ohio State let Marky May's funky hunch pull through, as the Illini held onto the ball for the game's final 8 minutes to capture the oh-so-sweet upset for Isiah "Juice" Williams and his posse.

The Illini ended up with 400 total yards and 0 turnovers compared to OSU's 335 yards and 3 turnovers.

Why did this happen?

Breakout Game

Juice played the best game of his collegiate career. The guy has tons of talent and played under control. Compare that to Todd Boeckman, who threw 3 interception and looked rattled at times and you can see that Illinois is better at the QB position.

Never a Good Time for an INT

Boeckman is having a fine season but his turnovers were directly responsible to many bad things for Ohio State. His 1st set up the Illini's final score of the first half. His second pick was when they had the ball inside the red zone. His third pick was on their final offensive play of the game, a play action bomb to Robiskie that fell short. This is when Juice took control and got every first down they needed to milk the clock.

Ron Zook went for it

Questioning the call by Tressel to pass long when Beanie Wells is itching to take over the game like he did last week is understandable. Zook out coached Tressel at times in this one. Including when OSU burnt a timout on Illinois final drive once they lined up to punt. This lead to Zook changing his call and going for it on what became a huge fourth down conversion. Jim Tressel is a great Offensive coach, but on this game he had way too much faith in Todd Boeckman.

Ohio State's Defensive weakness is on the D-Line

There are plenty fingers to point but the glaring weakness all year has been on the defensive line. Due to an injury to Lawrence Wilson early in the year, OSU has had to rely on true freshman Cameron Heyward and Robert Rose who slid out from DT. Of course, Rose was also injured for this game. In addition, starting DT Todd Denlinger has also been injured.

Despite all of this, I thought OSU would pull out a tough game. Too bad for them turnovers played a key role and -3 overall put way too much pressure on a D that was up against all they could handle.

A Turnover that was but Wasn't

Seriously, WTF is the point of instant replay if you allow it to fail? On the first drive by the Illini, RB Daniel Dufrene CLEARLY fumbled at the end of his 80 yard run. If the OSU people would grow some balls and show close calls on the jumbo-tron, over 100,000 Buckeye fans would have CLEARLY seen it was a fumble. Then, maybe the replay official would have woke up and saw the guy CLEARLY fumbled. As it stands, Illinois scored later that drive and evened the score at 7-7.

Illinois matched up well with Ohio State, ending their Big Ten record 20 game win streak and a bunch of other streaks that were bound to end sometime.

Ohio State plays for the Big Ten crown and a Rose Bowl birth. Too late in the season to lose and make it to the championship game, unless of course you are Florida in '96 who lost to FSU, only to get a rematch in the final bowl game which they won. Why do I bring it up? Well, they only won because a 1 loss Ohio State team defeated #2 ASU (Jake Plummer, Pat Tillman) in the Rose Bowl--their last trip to Pasadena.

This stings far less than the loss that year to Michigan State, which ended their #1 run that year. It also stings less than last year's NC game, as I expected more from Troy Smith and the gang that year. But it still stings, as opportunites for title games come down to 3 things working in your favor: Luck, Talent and Politics. OSU does not need to worry about that nonsense anymore this year.

A Big Ten crown would still be great for a team who was not supposed to contend for a title. As long as they can keep some of their juniors from going pro, there is always next year.

One Last Thing

The fight at the end of the game sucks. I saw Malcom Jenkins involved in the mess. It did not get too bad, but was certainly not something I expected out of the Buckeyes, I don't care why it happened. It ended quickly as cooler heads prevailed, but OSU better hope they don't lose anymore guys for next week's game against Michigan.

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onearmedbandit said:

Damn Jesse, you beat me to writing this article. I haven't been as enraged as I was yesterday since the NC Game last year. Words cannot express the combination of despair, helplessness, and rage that ran through me on that fumble. If the play is called correctly OR reviewed, then it's Buckeye ball on the 20 and the complexion of the game is completely different. OSU may have marched down the field and been up 10-0 or 14-0 instead of tied 7-7 on some bullshit. In spite of this egregious officiating error, OSU still didn't make enough plays when they needed them. Todd Boeckman showed that the comparisons to Troy Smith were premature and the defense gave up about 50 third down conversions in the second half. The line play on both sides of the ball was inadequate as Juice Williams ran for huge first downs straight up the gut on several occasions to seal the game in the 4th. OSU had this game robbed from them, but since the horrfying no-call on the fumble was so early, they had plenty of time to recover and make plays. They didn't, and now they are out of the national title hunt. The defense was exposed much like they were at the end of last year. Juice ran the zone read play that made Vince Young so effective to perfection, picking up chunks of yardage at will. In conclusion, I'm going to stab somebody.

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November 11, 2007
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Lloyds Apple said:

	Yeah, and I think Anotnio Henton and/or Terrelle Pryor could come in to mix things up for OSU next year. Boeckman has earned the starting nod, but hey, why not throw in some wrinkles. He will recover from this, but he panicked for no reason at times yesterday. I did not mean to steal an article or anything. I just had no place else to go. I prefer poking people in the eyeballs after losses.
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November 11, 2007
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wpeery said:

	Good stuff Lloyds
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November 12, 2007
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