Kyle McCord evaluates performance after Buckeyes top-10 win over Penn State
COLUMBUS — The Ohio State offense wasn’t perfect, by any means. The unit struggled to move the ball Saturday against Penn State.
But which team wouldn’t? Penn State entered Saturday’s top-10 showdown with the best defense in the country. Ohio State was near the top of those standings, as well. A defensive slugfest was expected — and a slugfest happened.
But the Buckeyes did enough to find the end zone twice and make plays when they needed them in the 20-12 win over the Nittany Lions for their second top-10 win of the season.
Quarterback Kyle McCord started the afternoon 5 for 5. Everything looked great early, but then the third-year signal caller had a stretch immediately after that in which he went 1 for 7. McCord needed to settle in.
“I felt like early on, on that first drive, I thought we did a pretty good job of moving the ball, made some plays, and obviously went down for the field goal,” McCord said. “But I think, just for me at least, I feel like I just needed to ease into the pocket a little bit more. Obviously, they’re really good D-Line. But I thought our O-Line did a really good job today. And I felt like the more and more plays we started running, the more and more they started to wear down. So I felt like we did a good job just continuing to play. I need to do a better job early on of, I wouldn’t say relaxing, but just calm in the pocket.”
From there, McCord ended with a good-looking stat line. The junior completed 63 percent of his passes for 286 yards and a touchdown toss to Marvin Harrison Jr. He found Harrison Jr. early and often, connecting with his superstar receiver and high school teammate 11 times for 162 yards and the score.
The box score looks good for Kyle McCord. But he knows there will be plenty of correcting to do this week.
“Regardless of how you play, getting a top-10 win is really good,” McCord said. “And, you know, obviously I think we’ll use this momentum and keep it rolling. But at the same time, you go back and you watch the film. I think I said this when we played Notre Dame: you get a top-10 win and you go back and watch that film, there’s so much room for improvement. And I feel like obviously, we’ve taken steps in the right direction since that game, I think we’ve definitely gotten better. But at the same time, the sky’s the limit for this offense and for this team, and so I know going back and watching the film, there’s going to be plays I want back.”
He and the offense still aren’t operating at peak capacity right now, and that’s OK. The program has two top-10 wins without reaching its ceiling as an offense. And to do that against the best defense in America?
McCord and Ohio State will certainly take that.
