Ohio State ‘re-engineered’ defense after loss to Oregon

Ohio State returned most of the players that made up its vaunted 2023 defense and then gave up just 34 total points the first five games of the 2024 season.

But when the Buckeyes gave up 32 points and 496 yards in a heartbreaking road loss to now-top-ranked Oregon last month, head coach Ryan Day knew he and defensive coordinator Jim Knowles had to go back to the drawing board.

“We almost, it’s kind of a goofy word, but like re-engineered the defense,” Day explained Tuesday. “We had to almost start from scratch after the Oregon game. What I mean by that is not like scrap everything, but, ‘OK, what are the base foundations of what we’re trying to get done? Who are best players? We got to put our best players in a position to be successful. What are teams scheming us up, in terms of what are they looking at?’ And you start going through that process, and you almost have to kind of knock it down and rebuild it a little bit.”

Day continued: “Now, to the naked eye, there’s probably not a lot out there that you’re really noticing, but there’s significant things that are going on that I think are giving our guys confidence. I think we’re doing a better job of putting our guys in a position to be successful.”

Day emphasized that he thinks, since the one-point defeat in Eugene, his defense is getting lined up better, and that Knowles’ unit has “looked the way that we wanted it to look.”

Ohio State has bounced back with a 21-17 win against Nebraska and a 20-13 road victory over then-No. 3 Penn State. After generating just two tackles for loss — and zero sacks — against the Ducks, the Buckeyes piled up 13 TFLs and a trio of sacks versus the Cornhuskers. They spoiled a potential game-winning Nebraska drive with a game-ending interception, courtesy of senior defensive back Jordan Hancock.

Then, over the weekend, Knowles’ crew stonewalled Penn State on three straight goal-to-goal runs: two from the Buckeyes’ 3-yard line and one from the 2-yard line. On 4th-and-Goal, safety Lathan Ransom covered Penn State tight end Tyler Warren in the flat, and fellow safety Caleb Downs made sure another Nittany Lions tight end, Khalil Dinkins, didn’t come down with a touchdown reception that could have led to a game-tying extra point.

Ohio State had only three TFLs versus Penn State, but two of those were third quarter sacks that set the stage for the Buckeyes’ final scoring drive, which culminated in a Jayden Fielding insurance field goal.

Knowles has ushered in a more diverse blitz package. Ohio State has flashed more stunts along the defensive line. In other words, Knowles is getting back to some of the stuff that got him the job in the first place when he was a standout coordinator at Oklahoma State.

“It’s just a process of going back to the basics, alignment,” Knowles said Tuesday. “Things got out of whack in that game somewhat, and I’m just trying to give the players every chance to succeed. So, for me, it just all goes back to the basics.

“You can get yourself out of whack sometimes trying to match people up and get everybody in the right places and be perfect. And in that [Oregon] game or really any game, we realized it’s more important just to have guys with their feet set and ready to play when the ball is snapped. So it’s really just back to basics.”

Ohio State didn’t redo its defense. Rather, as Day said, the Buckeyes re-engineered their defense. The unit has given up five field goals and one touchdown in the two games since. Neither Nebraska nor Penn State averaged more than 3.8 yards per carry. The Huskers threw for 152 yards, and the Nittany Lions had just 150 yards through the air.

“It’s like, ‘Let’s just trim all this out of here and just focus on these things right here,'” Day said of his defense’s restructuring. “These are the best things we do right now and then kind of go off and have the one-offs from there.

“You didn’t all of a sudden start to see a three-down front, so it wasn’t like that. It was just really cleaning up some of the communication, how we do things, putting the right guys in the right spots. But it doesn’t take much to be a little bit off, you know. I think that we’re moving toward where we want to be, and there’s going to be really good offenses coming at us here soon.”