Tale of two halves
Glendale, Ariz. - Through the first 30 minutes of last night's Fiesta Bowl, Ohio State had the Longhorns right where it wanted them - caught in the middle of Tresselball.
Pounding the ball up the middle with 1,000-yard man Chris Wells and then outside with the shifty Terrelle Pryor, the Buckeyes racked up 140 rushing yards in the opening half behind Wells' 96 yards on 12 carries. The run first, pass second strategy helped Ohio State acquire a 17-to-13 advantage in the time of possession battle.
The Buckeye defense, meanwhile, held Texas to just nine yards rushing and three points.
But then came the third quarter.
Awoken at halftime, Texas fired off 14 first downs while holding Ohio State to none. Texas quarterback McCoy completed 11 of his 15 pass attempts for 112 yards and added the game's first touchdown run on a 14-yard scamper on the third quarter's opening drive. The Longhorns' defense also held Wells to 8 yards on three carries before he left with what he called a concussion. By the time the dust had settled from McCoy's gunfire, Texas had taken control over the time of possession and created some of the deciding moments of the game.
"I thought we had a great game plan going on and executed well," said senior co-captain James Laurinaitis. "… We really struggled with it all year. But you have to stop a team. The first drive out of the locker room they were able to go down and score."
Dual Quarterbacks
In what was originally thought to be a playful decoy, the quarterback tandem of Todd Boeckman and Terrelle Pryor proved to a weapon of significant influence.
It didn't take longer than the Buckeyes' first play of their opening drive to get both quarterbacks in the game. With Pryor lined up wide right at receiver and Boeckman behind center, the fifth-year senior took the direct snap and tossed a 14-yard completion to Brian Robiskie - a target he hooked up with on three of his five completions. Those catches helped tally 84 of Robiskie's team-high 116 receiving yards.
"You just have the connection after being around for so long," Boeckman said. "You know I've been throwing to him for four years. I just know where he always is."
Boeckman entered the game on eight occasions in the first half, but did not take another snap until the opening play of the fourth quarter. In that play he hooked up with Robiskie, and yet again on a 48-yard pass to setup an Aaron Pettrey 43-yard field goal.
Yet without a doubt, his biggest play was a 6-yard touchdown pass from Boeckman to none other than Pryor. The play pulled Ohio State to within 17-15 at the 7:26 mark, but a failed to point conversion kept it right there.
"We had been working on it a lot in practice, so I knew he could go up in get it," Boeckman said. "I didn't know a lot of those calls were really going to happen, I wasn't even sure how much playing time I would get. It felt good to get back out there."
Senior tackle Alex Boone said the team was pumped when "The Dunk" was called in the huddle.
"Terrelle always talked about how he was going to 'dunk' on someone, but I never thought he would, and he went up and made that kid look bad," Boone said. "That's why it's called 'The Dunk.'"
Boeckman finished the game 5-of-11 for 110 yards and a touchdown, while Pryor connected on five of his 14 attempts for 66 yards and no touchdowns. According to Texas coach Mack Brown, it was Pryor's best game to date.
"He will be a guy that's in a Heisman race and it may be sooner than we think because he is a leader," Mack said. "He played with poise today. He took them down to win the game today, and Colt [McCoy] just came back. We had a little too much time left on the clock."
Duo thwarts Longhorn scoring threats in second quarter
With a slim three-point lead in the second quarter hanging in the balance, Ohio State's defense stepped up not once, but twice on critical downs to escape a pair of Texas scoring drives.
Facing fourth-and-seven on the Buckeye's 37-yard line, Longhorn coach Mack Brown opted to go for the fourth-down conversion with less than three minutes left in the half. Junior Heisman runner-up Colt McCoy dropped back in shotgun formation, but before his receivers could break free, Ohio State's Thaddeus Gibson came rushing through the left side of the offensive line and chased the retreating McCoy for a loss of 11 yards. The sack not only gave Gibson a team-best five on the season, but also ended the Longhorns' scoring threat.
"That's been our defense all year, different guys step up in situations like that," Laurinaitis said. "Anderson stepped up and made that great play and Thaddeus - that's a guy that has a great future ahead of him."
Not long after Gibson's sack preserved the Buckeyes' 6-3 lead, junior safety Anderson Russell also chipped in with a touchdown-saving effort. Facing third-and-two on the Buckeyes 15-yard line, McCoy launched a shallow dump pass to a streaking receiver into the end zone. However, before the pass could reach its intended target, Russell stepped in front of the lame duck for his second interception of the season. The pick was hauled in at the 1-yard line, where Ohio State proceeded to run the remaining seconds off the clock to head into halftime with its three-point lead still intact.
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