Joel Klatt defends toss sweep play call from Steve Sarkisian

The play of the game for Ohio State in Friday’s College Football Playoff semifinal win over Texas was without a doubt the scoop-and-score from Buckeyes veteran Jack Sawyer to clinch a spot in the national title game. However, there was a highly-questioned play call by Steve Sarkisian a couple of plays earlier that set up Sawyer’s heroics.

With Texas facing second-and-goal from the 1-yard line, the Longhorns lined up in shot-gun with Quintrevion Wisner behind Quinn Ewers. Steve Sarkisian called a toss sweep play to the left, but Caleb Downs and company blew it up, dropping Wisner for a loss of 7.

Get your team’s official College Football Playoff watch from AXIA by CLICKING HERE: “Watches that tell so much more than time”

Ewers then threw an incomplete pass on third down, before Sawyer’s scoop-and-score to seal the game on fourth. Steve Sarkisian received a lot of backlash for the play call on second down after the game, but Fox Sports analyst Joel Klatt recently defended him on The Joel Klatt Show.

“Everybody on social media is going to take off on that play call. Everyone’s going to say Steve Sarkisian cannot do that, there’s no way he can do that. But, I would just offer this as a glimmer of a defense of Steve Sarkisian,” Klatt said. “The game plan is built based on the film that he has watched. The film that he has watched suggests that he cannot run the football between the tackles and score against Ohio State.”

As Klatt said, time-and-time again this year the Buckeyes made stops when teams tried to run up the middle on them. In fact, Texas tried to run up the middle on Ohio State on first-and-goal from the 1, only to get stuffed.

While Klatt understood Sarkisian’s thought process, he did acknowledge that overall he wasn’t a fan of the call.

“He tries it on first down and there’s nothing there. So on second down, with that in mind, I understand the toss sweep,” Klatt explained. “Having said that, as a player that got these play calls signaled into him and had to give them in the huddle, I despise toss sweep in short-yardage situations. Despise it.

“It’s like being in the shot-gun in these situations. The ball goes 5 yards backwards, intentionally. So a play-call that has the opportunity to lose that many yards, in that situation, that’s a tough pill to swallow. It’s the fourth quarter. You may not get another possession.”

Texas did get another possession, but only because the Buckeyes scored a defensive touchdown and the game was practically over.

Instead of Texas tying the game at 21, Ohio State took a 28-14 lead with only 2:13 remaining and went on to win by that margin.