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Hello and welcome back to another edition of Cus Words Sports!
Today we’re examining the penultimate team on Ohio State’s regular season schedule: Rutgers.
On paper, this does not look much like a typical Greg Schiano team, but the 5-5 Scarlet Knights do present a couple of potential challenges.
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Rutgers: Decent offense, bad defense
The Scarlet Knights are 39th in total offense and tied for 56th in scoring (29.9 points per game).
They are 21st in passing yards (277.4 per game) but 86th in rushing yards (143.1) in no small part because they are allowing more than three sacks per game.
Their team passing efficiency rating is a solid 45th, and their 13.3 yards per completion are second in the Big Ten and 17th nationally.
Veteran QB Athan Kaliakmanis is second in the Big Ten in passing yards (2,705) and yards per completion (13.3) while KJ Duff is second in the Big Ten in receiving yards while Ian Strong is fourth.
While the team rushing numbers are poor, Antwan Raymond has already hit the 1,000-yard mark right on the nose. He is second in the Big Ten behind Emmett Johnson of Nebraska.
The defense is dreadful, ranking 120th overall (425.5 ypg.) and 123rd against the run (196.5). They’re 83rd against the pass (229) and 126th in pass efficiency defense.
On the bright side, they are only 106th in scoring at an even 30 points allowed per contest.
The defense is bad on third down and in the red zone, where the offense is also bad, but the Scarlet Knights are seventh in net punt returns so that’s something.
In much more Schiano fashion, Rutgers has blocked three field goals and three punts, something Ryan Day addressed in his weekly press conference.
The Scarlet Knights have also had four kicks blocked…
The advanced stats are just as bad for the defense — maybe worse
According to CollegeFootballData.com, they are 111th or worse in almost everything. The exceptions include explosion on passing plays, where they rank 72nd, and explosion on passing downs (so run or pass on a passing down) where they rank 83rd.
Additionally, they are 93rd in power success and 73rd in stuff rate so this should be an opportunity for the Ohio State offense to continue developing the attack with an eye on Michigan, Indiana and the College Football Playoff even if their top two receivers don’t play.
On offense, they have some respectable advanced numbers.
They’re 36th in success rate on rushing plays and 21st in success rate on passing plays but not explosive on either.
Passing DOWNS success rate is 17th, so they are able to at least get the ball out and make some yards when behind the chains.
The Scarlet Knights are 91st in explosiveness overall but 50th in explosiveness on standard downs. That probably tells us they will try to go downfield on first down and that is their best hope for making big plays.
They are a very good 26th on overall success rate and 49th in offensive line yards, so they can present some challenges with the ground game and could put together some extended drives to try to tire out the Ohio State defense.
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What about the series?
Rutgers winning this game would truly be historic.
The Scarlett Knights are the first program to start 0-10 against Ohio State all time.
Yes, schools such as Akron, Case, Colgate, Denison, Kenyon, Marietta, Oberlin, Ohio Medical, Ohio Wesleyan, Otterbein, Princeton, Western Reserve, Wittenberg and Wooster all needed fewer tries to get their first wins against the Buckeyes.
Maryland is 0-9 against Ohio State while Oregon was 0-9 before getting its first win against the Buckeyes in 2021. The Ducks then picked up another last regular season before getting blown out in the Rose Bowl to fall to 2-10 against Ohio State.
That’s all for this edition of Cus Words Sports, but please remember sharing is caring if you think anyone else would like what I’ve been producing! The key to the success of newsletters is organic growth since search is pretty much useless now, so I appreciate any help I can get.
I’ll have another edition of This Week in Ohio State Football on Friday. Maybe more between now and then, too.
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