Kirk Herbstreit: Ohio State should take pride in playing in Rose Bowl

Ohio State’s goals of playing for the Big Ten Championship and in the College Football Playoff were not met this season. The Buckeyes fell to Michigan in the final week of the regular season, meaning that the Wolverines instead reached those goals. But despite the disappointment of not playing for a national title, Ohio State is still playing in a prestigious game in the Rose Bowl.

College GameDay analyst Kirk Herbstreit has a clear message for Ohio State ahead of the Rose Bowl. Herbstreit understands being disappointed, but he wants Ohio State to appreciate the Rose Bowl for what it is.

“Even before we had a BCS and had a playoff, the goal was always to go to the Rose Bowl,” Herbstreit said. “How often did they actually go to the Rose Bowl? Not very often. But yet, they still went to another bowl game, and they still were excited to go play in whatever bowl that they went to. I just don’t buy into this narrative of meaningless bowl games. These high profile teams have always goals to get to the championship or to get to a certain bowl. It doesn’t happen all that often. But you don’t throw in the towel and say, ‘Well we didn’t accomplish our goal so we’re not real happy about going to this bowl but we’re going to go.’

“I was on a team that did that. We lost to Michigan in 1990 and back in those days you fell way down and we went to the Liberty Bowl. We had players on our team that were basically bad mouthing the city of Memphis and the Liberty Bowl publicly to the media. And we went down to Memphis and they hated us and I don’t blame them for the things that were said after that Michigan loss.”

Herbstreit: Playing in the Rose Bowl shouldn’t be a ‘consolation prize’ for Ohio State

Even though Ohio State failed to live up to its expectations this season, the Buckeyes have an opportunity to end the year on a very high note in the Rose Bowl against Utah. But that won’t happen if the players don’t buy into it and get past the disappointment after losing to Michigan.

“To me, I get being upset,” Herbstreit added. “I get, ‘Hey, we didn’t accomplish our goal, we didn’t beat our rival, we didn’t go to the Big Ten Championship, we didn’t go to the playoff.’ But we’re going to the Rose Bowl. It’s the Rose Bowl. We used to deal with the consolation prize of the Citrus Bowl. But this is the Rose Bowl. Maybe these players that are struggling to understand it, maybe when they get out there and get on that field, maybe that will dawn on them why this bowl is different or why it’s unique. I hope they do. I get being disappointed. But you’ve got to shake it off and move onto the next game and get the bad taste out of your mouth.”

Kickoff for the Rose Bowl is slated for 5 p.m. ET on Saturday.