First-year Ohio State head coach Luke Fickell lauded Buckeye Nation’s contribution to Saturday’s win against then-No. 12 Wisconsin and senior running back Daniel “Boom” Herron said he thinks the offense could score 50 points against Indiana (1-8, 0-5) during a Tuesday press conference. Neither addressed the forthcoming decision from the NCAA regarding the football program’s rules violations, though a university spokeman told The Lantern Tuesday that the expected announcement date of the ruling is “hard to predict.”

A nod to students

Fickell began his remarks by thanking the OSU students and fans for helping create an atmosphere at Ohio Stadium that he said was “unbelievable.”

“(I) wouldn’t want to start any other way but to thank the fans, the crowd and the students for an unbelievable atmosphere this weekend,” Fickell said.

Fickell said he even needed he wife’s reassurance that the Horseshoe, which held 105,511 fans on Saturday, was as loud as he perceived it.

“Sometimes, I had to get in the car afterward, ask my wife to make sure I saw and felt that atmosphere as well as it was,” he said. “I wasn’t sure if it was my heart that was pounding or the screams from the crowd, but it was an unbelievable atmosphere, unbelievable experience, just to be a part of something, obviously a game like that. But that’s what Ohio State football’s all about.”

“Signature” win? Not a chance

With the 33-29 win against the then-No.12 Badgers Saturday, Fickell clinched his second consecutive win against a ranked opponent. OSU beat then-No.16 Illinois, 17-7, on Oct. 15.

Fickell rejected the notion that Saturday’s win was a “signature” win in his young career as a head coach, saying, “Every win is big.”

“The way it was won, obviously, maybe that might mean something different, the atmosphere it was won in,” he said. “But still it goes down the same on the schedule — it goes down as a win.”

Running the score up on Indiana

The Indiana Hoosiers, which have allowed opponents to score 204 points combined in their last four games, could be in for more trouble Saturday. OSU senior running back Daniel “Boom” Herron said he wants the Buckeyes to score 50 points against the Hoosiers.

“Yeah, I mean, you gotta look at it that way. Whatever we could do to put points on the board,” Herron said. “I think it’s possible. It’s definitely possible.”

All crickets on the NCAA front

After its Aug. 12 hearing with the NCAA in Indianapolis regarding the football program’s infractions, the university originally expected the final ruling to arrive sometime during the Buckeyes’ four-game stretch between Oct. 8, when they traveled to Nebraska, and this Saturday’s home game against Indiana.

There was no mention Tuesday of the NCAA violations, or when the ruling would be handed down.

In a Tuesday email to The Lantern, OSU spokesman Jim Lynch said that since additional violations were considered by the NCAA after the Aug. 12 hearing, “We (OSU and the NCAA) are no longer on the same timetable.”

As a result, Lynch said in the email that it is difficult for him to predict when the ruling will be announced.