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Ohio State survives at Indiana, but Buckeyes no longer worthy of No. 1 ranking

By Patrick Schmidt

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The Buckeyes got the win at Indiana but it was ugly and proved the defending champions aren’t worthy of being the No. 1 team in the Top 25 polls this week.

Ohio State remained undefeated after winning at Indiana but it was enough to show the Buckeyes don’t deserve to be the No. 1 ranked team in the nation any longer after escaping with a 34-27 win.

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The defending champions were lucky to escape Bloomington with the win after Urban Meyer finally decided to feed Heisman candidate Ezekiel Elliott who set a career-high in rushing with 274 yards and had a trio of highlight-reel touchdowns. But for the fifth straight game, quarterback Cardale Jones struggled with his decision-making and reading the opposing defense as the passing game looks completely out of sync.

Further, the wide receiver position suffered another devastating injury after Corey Smith was carted off the field with his leg in an air cast, so there doesn’t look to be a quick fix. Michael Thomas should be getting 10-12 targets per game but the passing of Jones has hamstrung the Buckeye offense that ranked among the top five scoring units last year and Braxton Miller is still adjusting to his new position on the perimeter.

It’s a tall order to expect multiple 50-yard touchdown runs from your running back to win games, but that’s what Ohio State did against Indiana. This is an Indiana program with two wins since the 1950s against Ohio State and the last one came in 1987. Ohio State should rout a program like this, no matter if Kevin Wilson’s team was 4-0 entering this showdown.

This year’s Ohio State is doing their best impression of last year’s Florida State team who looked sluggish throughout the regular season last year after winning the national title the year prior and had to rely on Jameis Winston’s second-half heroics to save the Seminoles.

Elliott is the second-half savior for Ohio State this year as Jones continues to dig Ohio State in a deeper hole that will eventually become too big to dig themselves out of. What plagued Florida State in games last year when they had to sweat out victories was a penchant for turnovers and that’s what’s crippling Ohio State.

Ohio State entered the game with six interceptions and six passing touchdowns. That’s not the sign of the best team in the country. Ohio State is ranked based on last year’s success and their preseason expectations. If you removed preseason rankings to influence your opinion on Ohio State, there’s no chance you’d say they are playing the best football five weeks into the season.

Florida State was usurped last year in the Top 25 polls and the College Football Playoff rankings despite an undefeated regular season and as Ohio State continues to mirror the Seminoles, the Buckeyes should drop from the top spot after that too-close-for-comfort win at Indiana.

This doesn’t mean Ohio State isn’t still the best team in the Big Ten or a national title contender but they no longer are deserving of being recognized as the No. 1 team in the country.

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