1. Can't Stop Won't Stop
Alabama features the best offense Ohio State has seen since probably 2005 Texas. The 2005 Buckeyes were able to grind the Longhorn attack to a near halt, but that team had the best set of linebackers in school history and sent three DB's to the following year's NFL draft. This year's version of the Buckeyes face a bit more of a pick your poison, as three Bama skill players finished in the top five of the Heisman voting, including the first WR to receive the award since the College Gameday court jester. The last team to put three Heisman finalists in the top five was 1946 Army, who went 9-0-1 and won a national championship. Oh, and the big guys up front making it happen just won the prize for top OL in the nation. Yes, the Tide only put 31 points up on Notre Dame in the Rose Bowl, but that was a Tresselball, slow-roll-your-chump-opponent performance for the ages. Bama now has the luxury of having saved everything they had in the Playoff tank for the Silver Bullets.
2. Primary Target: Secondary
So who is tasked with stopping this unstoppable Crimson onslaught on the back end? A thoroughly average secondary. Criticism of the Buckeye DBs has been a bit overblown this season; they're right in the middle of the pack in terms of YPA and QBR, and their TD : INT ratio of 11 : 7 isn't horrible either. Yes, the Buckeyes give up a ton of yards per game, but that's to be expected when (i) Ohio State scores in a flash and gives their opponents a ton of possessions, and (ii) running the ball against the Buckeye front is completely pointless. That being said, see #1 above. An average defense is not going to make the cut against a passing attack more lethal than last year's Joe Burrow juggernaut. The back seven may have stopped Trevor Lawrence from finding the end zone too often, but he still put up a quiet 400 yards. If Bama's receivers are getting the ball in space, look out.
3. One Game Season (not this one)
In the 1969 season finale, the #1 Ohio State Buckeyes suffered probably the worst loss in team history, a 24-12 upset at the hands of That Team Up North, denying them what would have been a second straight national championship. For the next 12 months, the Buckeyes obsessed over this loss, even having a rug installed in the locker room with the score of the 1969 game printed on it. And sure enough, the Buckeyes avenged their loss to the Wolverines the following season to cap a 9-0 regular season. Then they went to the Rose Bowl and faded down the stretch against the #12 Stanford Indians, narrowly missing out on the national title for a second straight season. The point is, how much of this season has been focused on the national championship, and how much has been a buildup to a revenge game against Clemson? Take a good look at how the Buckeyes played against Northwestern, and then how they looked 2 weeks later against the Tigers. How much of the prep time against the Wildcats was devoted to, perhaps, a different anticipated opponent? And, if so, have the Buckeyes spent any extra time in this truncated season preparing for Alabama? Not likely.
4. Past Perfect + Future Perfect
As stated above, I don't think it's any secret that the Buckeyes were more motivated and prepared for Clemson than any of their other hapless opponents this season. But preparation is meaningless without execution, and Ohio State's execution in the Sugar Bowl was nearly flawless. Sure, there was Fields's pick in the end zone that wiped 3 points off the board, and a couple of misses in coverage, and whatever the Buckeyes were trying to do to slow their own momentum on their first possession, but Clemson was the team crumbling under the pressure, not Ohio State. Think back to the 2014-15 Playoff. Ohio State made boatloads of errors in both the Alabama and Oregon games but was able to pretty much dominate both teams regardless. This year's Alabama team is a whole different beast. The Buckeyes have really only played two complete near-perfect games this year (Michigan State and Clemson...maybe you can throw in Nebraska as well); they're going to need a third to walk away Monday as champions. Alabama merely needs to be very good.
5. Crimson Zone > Scarlet Zone
Why did Ohio State lose the 2019 Fiesta Bowl? There are about 20 answers to that question, but the most glaring issue was the Buckeyes' performance in the red zone. Ohio State reached the red zone on three drives and came away with three field goals. Clemson, contrariwise, scored a touchdown on their only red zone possession. Have the Buckeyes fixed this problem in 2020? No, it has gotten worse. The 2019 Buckeyes actually excelled overall at red zone production throughout the year, with a 78.67% TD rate matched at the Power 5 level only by LSU (exactly matched, eerily enough). This year? The Buckeyes are posting a nasty 64.10% TD rate, and a paltry 76.92% overall scoring rate, in the red zone. That's right, the 2019 Buckeyes were better at scoring TDs in the red zone than the 2020 Buckeyes are at getting any points in the same area. How about the Buckeyes' championship opponent, sporting the nation's top offense? 77.42% TD rate and 91.94% overall scoring rate. And these stats aren't padded against the Citadels and Charleston Southerns of the world, either. The Buckeyes didn't settle for any field goals against Clemson this time, but an interception stole one red zone scoring opportunity, and the Buckeyes would have lost a TD without Skalski's targeting call. Bend but don't break may not be an option for the Silver Bullets on Monday night.
6. Bustin Fields
In the first quarter of the Sugar Bowl, I found myself struck by how much Ohio State's game plan revolved around moving Justin Fields all over the place. Whether on designed runs or rollouts, Fields didn't seem to stay limited to the pocket very often, and I wondered how much his knee injury had limited his (and the Buckeye offense's) true potential in last year's loss to Clemson. Now, once again, we find ourselves wondering how and to what extent Fields is limited after another huge hit. Sure, on Friday, Justin just took a licking and kept on ticking, proving he can still toss darts over the safeties' heads even after his rack of ribs got smoked, but how much is he willing/able to run with the ball if he needs to? Fields's excellent mobility is his most glaring advantage over his counterpart in this game, and it's hard to imagine the Buckeye offense matching the Tide blow for blow with their star QB at less than 100%. And, though Fields is as tough a customer as any who've worn the scarlet and gray, it's not hard to imagine how another hard hit could knock him out of the game for good.
7. Five Below
Unless you start losing star players down the stretch, your team is only going to be strengthened by each additional live-fire rep they can get. And as we've seen this season, the Buckeyes have faced problems in different places on the field (*cough* *secondary*) that they haven't had many opportunities to repair. Alabama has faced 11 different SEC opponents and the #4 team in the country, while Ohio State has only had 7 chances total to learn and progress in real games in this most bizarre of bizarro seasons. And, as stated above, they've looked good start-to-finish in, at most, three of them. Thankfully, two of those were in the last three games the Buckeyes have played, but there was the clunker against Northwestern sandwiched in the middle. It doesn't help when the shortest gap between games in the second half of the season was between the Big Ten Championship and the Sugar Bowl. Alabama perfected their craft by sometime around the Georgia game, which was before Ohio State even saw the field. The Tide, like the Buckeyes, looked vulnerable on championship weekend, but that was the only blip in a stretch that's been longer the entire 2020 Buckeye season.
8. The Ring King
Ryan Day has been a tremendous success in his 2+ years as Ohio State's head coach, racking up one loss in his first 24 games. But, uh, the guy on the other sideline is no slouch either. All he's done is win five national championships in thirteen years as coach of Alabama, after winning another natty at LSU. He has more wins than any active FBS coach not named Mack Brown (Mack has double his losses), and before last year's blip, his teams finished ranked #1 or #2 four years running, a trend sure to continue this season regardless of Monday's outcome. That being said, his Alabama teams haven't completed an undefeated season since he won it all the first time in 2009.
9. Going Viral
You may be aware that there is a disease that has been causing some slight disruptions in society over the past few months. And its spread hasn't spared the Buckeyes, either. Aside from causing the straight up cancellation of three games on Ohio State's already depleted schedule, the virus has contributed to the Buckeyes fielding some less than complete squads over the past few weeks. A missing Chris Olave against Northwestern here, an absent Zach Harrison against Clemson there, the whole OL gone against Michigan State...it's been an issue. And now rumors swirl of additional players likely to be out against Alabama, including what may be the Silver Bullets' anchor and best player. The Tide, for better or worse, seem to have navigated the pandemic a bit more cleanly, and I haven't seen any reports of any key players in danger of missing Monday's showdown. And speaking of Bama not having problems with missing players...
10. Waddle We Do?
Why wasn't Heisman winner Devonta Smith a finalist in 2019? Because he had to compete with Jaylen Waddle, Jerry Jeudy, and Henry Ruggs for touches, the latter two of which have been busy this year tearing it up in the NFL. As for Waddle, he may have been outplaying Smith for the first 4 games of the season before he broke his ankle and Smith was suddenly "the guy" for the Alabama offense. And now, after missing the better part of the 2020 season, look who's back at practice and inspiring whispers of playing on Monday night. The Buckeye back seven are already going to have their hands full trying to cover one NFL first round WR; they don't need a second one to get lost in the secondary and bring back nightmares of Penix to Fryfogle and Philyor.
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