Urban Meyer weighs in on Georgia struggles, whether Ohio State is ranked too low

At this point in the season, Urban Meyer doesn’t really care what the order of the top three teams in college football is. The former Ohio State head coach and current Fox analyst knows that so long as the likes of Alabama, Georgia and the Buckeyes don’t falter, they’ll be fine at the end of the season.

That includes Georgia coming off a 26-22 win at Missouri that was less than convincing, Alabama perhaps being without reigning Heisman winning Bryce Young for a bit, and Ohio State playing without Jaxon Smith-Njigba for most of the season to date. Speaking on “Urban’s Take with Tim May,” the former head coach emphasized it’s about getting the win and moving on to the next game.

“We went through that several times. And I didn’t handle it well,” Meyer said of post-championship expectations. “You expect perfection and I got news, Tim, there’s no such thing as perfection. You can try as hard as you can and get sick over it like we used to, but there’s no perfection.”

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With that in mind, Meyer isn’t concerned about the performance Georgia put in at Missouri.

“I think they’re a great team. I think we’ve all been there. You won a national title, the head coach is now constantly fighting the — you know I think Nick Saban said that the poison, the just constant pressure on that team. ‘You’re only winning by two scores.’ You went on the road in the SEC and won. Move on, let’s go to the next game,” Meyer said.

As for the Buckeyes, sailing has been rather smooth during their 5-0 start. Outside of a 21-point performance in a grind-it-out season-opening win against Notre Dame, the offense has been top-flight, even without Smith-Njigba, and the new look defense under Jim Knowles has shown some upside while working out the kinks.

With Michigan State, Ohio State’s next opponent and first road contest, falling flat this season, the Buckeyes don’t face a real challenge likely until facing Penn State in Happy Valley on Oct. 29 or when Michigan comes to Columbus in late November.

“The problem I have with Ohio State is they’re not going to get a challenge for a while,” Meyer said. “They’re going on the road to Michigan State. That used to be a time where you walked in that stadium, that was one of the toughest environments to play in. Not just because of the crowd and the toughness of that environment — the team you played against. Remember, that was the most rugged team in the Big Ten.