Football
Too Much Juice Short-Circuits Buckeyes
By John PorentasAfter watching over 8,000 posts roll over the-Ozone message board tonight we've seen plenty of theories to explain No. 1 Ohio State's (10-1, 6-1 Big Ten) 28-21 defeat at the hands of Illinois (8-3, 5-2 Big Ten) in Ohio Stadium to end OSU's undefeated season in the last home game of the year.
The theories were many, but when it comes right down to it it's pretty simple. Illinois quarterback Juice Williams made plays, Ohio State quarterback Todd Boeckman made mistakes.
Williams completed just 12 passes against OSU, but four of those completions resulted in touchdowns to account for all the Illini scoring. When he wasn't tossing TD passes Williams was running the football (70 yards on 16 attempts) or directing the Illinois offense flawlessly. Williams had no interceptions and made perhaps the biggest run of the game on a fourth-and-inches situation in the fourth quarter that allowed the Illini to maintain possession of the football and run precious time of the clock to seal the win.
"Juice was really handling their offense to the tee. He did a great job of coordinating his offensive line and his running back," said OSU linebacker Larry Grant.
Williams entered the game with more interceptions than touchdowns, but against the Buckeyes threw no interceptions in a near-flawless performance. He was protected by an Illinois offensive line that dominated the OSU front seven not only in the passing game but in the rushing game as well. Illinois runners rushed for 260 yards against an OSU rush defense that had been giving up just 65 yards per game until the Illini shredded them.
Over on the other side of the field it was a very different story. Todd Boeckman entered the game as the most efficient passer in the Big Ten and third-best in the nation. Boeckman had thrown at least two touchdown passes in every game this season. He threw none against Illinois, but threw three interceptions, all of which impacted the outcome of the game.
"They were definitely forced a little bit. They made good plays on the ball," said Boeckman of his three critical miscues.
"You can't turn the ball over like that. I know the first one gave them good field position and they went down and put some points on the board. You just can't have that," Boeckman said.
The Illinois secondary took away OSU's deep game with excellent coverage on OSU wide receivers Brian Hartline, Brian Robiskie and Ray Small.The Buckeyes threw for 156 yards in the game, but 65 of those game on the first play of the game when Boeckman hit Hartline who was running free on what appeared to be a blown coverage. After that the OSU passing game could muster just 91 yards on 22 additional attempts, an average of 4.14 yards per attempt.
The Buckeyes turned Hartline's catch into a touchdown when Chris Wells went 11 yards for a score on the second play of the game. Some teams would have been shell-shocked by the lightning score. Not the Illini.
On Illinois' first play from scrimmage tailback Daniel Dufrene found a cavernous hole in the middle of the OSU defense and went 80 yards, 15 more than the Buckeyes has been allowing in entire games this season, to set up an answering touchdown and serve notice that they would not be intimidated in this game. Dufrene appeared to have fumbled on his long run when he was knocked out of bounds at the five-yard line by Donald Washington. The Buckeyes recovered the ball in the endzone for an apparent turnover, but the officials ruled that the fumbled had occurred after Dufrene had gone out of bounds and disallowed the recovery. The Big Ten replay official did not review the play and OSU Head Coach Jim Tressel did not challenge it, so the play stood as called. Williams threw the first of his four TD passes on the next play.
"There was no panic in their eyes," said Zook of the Illinois sideline after OSU's quick strike to start the game.
"They knew what they had to do and the offense went right back and scored. That was obviously a great sign for the whole football team that they weren't going to be intimidated and they just needed to settle down and play."
The Illini answered every OSU challenge. The Buckeyes scored again in the first period, this time with an impressive nine-play 76 yard drive capped by a 19 yard touchdown run by Maurice Wells. Once again, the Illini didn't wilt. They turned their first interception of Boeckman into a 26 yard drive for the tying score before the first period came to a close.
The Illini defense dominated the OSU offense in the second period. OSU managed just seven net yards of offense in the second period, and eventually put the OSU defense in a bind when a 32-yard punt by A. J. Trapasso gave Illinois great field position at their own 45-yard line. The Illini took full advantage, covering the 55 yards in eight plays to take a 21-14 lead at the half.
The Buckeyes nearly seized the momentum in the second half - but the Illini wouldn't allow it.
The OSU defense came up with a three-and-out on the first possession of the half and the Buckeye offense then put together a good looking drive that carried to a first-and-goal at the nine. A score would have tied the game, but Boeckman suffered his second interception when Antonio Steele intercepted a tipped ball to end the drive.
The Illini took over - literally and figuratively. Following the interception Illinois went 80 yards in nine plays to score a touchdown on Williams' fourth TD toss, this one a 31 yarder to Marques Wilkins to go up 28-14 with 3:52 remaining in the third quarter.
The Buckeyes were able to answer that score to cut the lead to 28-21 with 34 seconds left in the third quarter and keep their hopes alive, but the Illini simply owned the fourth quarter.
The Buckeyes ran just three offensive plays in the fourth quarter as the Illini were able to hold onto the ball by running it against the OSU defense. The Illini controlled the football for 13 minutes and 46 seconds of the period, OSU 1:14.
Nobody scored in the fourth period, but it was a microcosm of the entire game. Boeckman made a crucial mistake, suffering his third interception of the game when he tried to force a deep ball to Robiskie who was double-covered. Williams, on the other hand, made another big play.
It looked like the Buckeyes would get one more chance with the football when the defense appeared to have the Illini stopped with a fourth and inches at Illinois 34-yard line. The Illini lined up to punt, but the Buckeyes were forced to call a time out when sideline confusion caused them to have too many men on the field as the Illinois punt team lined up. During the time out, Williams convinced Head Coach Ron Zook to go for it on fourth down.
"I knew it was just an inch or less, and when they called time out Juice kind of grabbed me and said 'I will get you an inch.' I said 'You better,'" said Zook of the decision to change the call.
Williams got the first down on a quarterback sneak.
"I think sometimes you have to take chances. Sometime they don't work out but we were fortunate enough today that they worked out," said Zook.
Following that play the Buckeye defense was powerless against the Illini offense. Illinois maintained possession the rest of the game to run out the clock by possessing the football for 16 plays that consumed the last 8:09 of the game.
The Illini played nearly flawlessly on both sides of the ball. The lone error in their game that showed up in the box score was a single penalty.
"We said two years ago when we were here that it would be a different story when we came back. I don't want to take anything away from Ohio State, that is a good, good football team, but we've gotten better," said Zook in perhaps the understatement of the season.
"We didn't come up here to try and play them close, we didn't come up here to try and be like last year, we came up here to try to have an opportunity to win."
They did just that, and they took full advantage of the opportunity with a great performance in every phase of the game to send OSU to their first defeat of the season.
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