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Ryan Day challenged Larry Johnson and his defensive line after Saturday’s victory over Tulsa.
After Golden Hurricane quarterback Davis Brin threw for 428 yards in the game, Buckeye’s head coach said he “would like to see a little more hitting” from his defense – a request that could hardly have been framed in the midst of Chase Young’s record-breaking campaign in 2019, or even after dominating play from Jonathon Cooper and Tyreke Smith helped shut down Clemson in the second half of the 2021 Sugar Bowl.
Day said the line needs to do a better job of making opposing quarterbacks uncomfortable, and given that Ohio State has a grand total of four sacks in three games – and that only 22 teams in the country have less – it’s easy to see why.
“No excuses. We have to join the quarterback,” Ohio State defensive line coach Larry Johnson said at Tuesday’s press conference. “Our guys know it, my room know it, I know it. I don’t sleep well when we can’t put pressure on the quarterback, because that’s what we have to do. If we do that, we’ll be a game-changer. the game immediately, and that’s what we’re going to move forward on, looking for ways to get to the quarterback. That means changing staff, putting the right guys on the field to do it. But the bottom line is that we have to do it, and that starts with me.
Even with three former five-star rookies on the roster at the defensive end position, all of Ohio State’s sacks this year have come from linebacker Cody Simon and defensive tackles Antwuan Jackson and Tyleik Williams.
Williams’ sack was crucial as the real freshman beat Brin in a third quarter in the fourth quarter in which Tulsa still had the chance to tie the game with a touchdown. The play was enough to make Williams the only member of the Ohio State defensive line to clinch champion after Saturday’s performance, even though he didn’t start the game and registered just 22. clichés.
“My scoring system is really tough. To become a champion, you have to meet all the standards, ”Johnson said. “It’s more than just playing, it’s just technique and everything that is involved in the game is more important to me than the guys who make the games. Making parts is really cool, and I think that’s what we should be doing in terms of production, but there are also some technical things that need to be improved. Tyleik played really well for a guy who played 22 games – there were guys just about to be champions, I just felt like I needed to see more.
Johnson admitting he’s ready to try plenty of staff combinations, Williams was the first name on his list of players who will see more time in the future.
The same goes for 2021 class five-star defensive end JT Tuimoloau, who played a season-high 45 snaps on Saturday when pass thrower and team captain Zach Harrison was sidelined. due to injury. Johnson has said Harrison is expected to return to the fold this week, but that doesn’t mean Tuimoloau will have less time. Johnson said the real freshman will likely see his shots increase to 50-55 depending on the game.
Expect to see more of JT Tuimoloau in DE, Larry Johnson said on Tuesday:
“Last week was his biggest week, he played 45 games. We will continue to increase that probably up to 50, 55, it depends on the game. We would like to see more of him as we start to move from the front. ”
– Griffin Strom (@ GriffinStrom3) September 21, 2021
Harrison was named the Buckeyes’ defensive player of the game against Minnesota for recording a game-changing strip bag that led to a touchdown and a score for the return of All-American defensive tackle Haskell Garrett. Garrett was adamant after Ohio State’s loss to Oregon that the Ducks were avoiding the Buckeyes’ typically vaunted pressure by focusing on getting the ball out as quickly as possible. Against Tulsa, however, Johnson said that wasn’t necessarily the case.
“It all starts upstream. I say it every time in my room, it’s not behind us, it’s what’s in front of us, and it’s us. And we have to find a way to generate that, ”Johnson said. “For the quarterback to hold the ball 3.4 seconds is not a good deal. We have to get to the quarterback, we have to affect his shot. ”
Johnson said his passers haven’t been successful enough to win one-on-one clashes and they may need to vary their skill repertoire. Johnson said “you can’t push a guy around the whole game and think you’re going to push him into the quarterback’s lap. ”
This description especially brings to mind a memorable play from the Buckeyes’ national championship winning 2014 season when Joey Bosa ended a double overtime deal with Penn State using such a move. The Bosa brothers are long gone, as has Young. Over the past two seasons, players like Harrison have answered questions about the possibility of becoming the next of their ilk, but no Buckeye has yet reached that standard.
“These guys were special athletes,” Johnson said. “If you go back to their first year debut, you saw flashes, but you didn’t see flashes of who they were until later in their careers. You saw Chase take a shot in sophomore, he flies away. First year, he was a good player. I didn’t coach Joey in his freshman year, but Nick was the same. We put Nick on part-time until he was ready to go. I think it’s a process that you go through. I don’t think anybody can come in here and say, “Hey, he’s ready to go, play him.” Hope someone can do it, but for me it’s a process of the way you go.
It may take longer for Tuimoloau and his five-star freshman colleague Jack Sawyer, but Harrison is now a junior, Javontae Jean-Baptiste a junior redshirt and Smith a senior. Johnson said if the players in his line weren’t flashing in their third year in his system then “we did something wrong in training them.”
While defensive coordinator Kerry Coombs has taken the brunt of the blame for the Buckeyes’ defensive woes so far, Johnson made sure to take it himself on Tuesday.
“I won’t use the word disappointed because it’s not a good word. I think there is room for improvement, and it starts with the guy standing in front of you, ”Johnson said. “We have to find a way to improve their skills and take them forward, and that’s what we’re going to be working on. We’ll spend all day and night figuring out why, but we’re going to fix it and find a way to get these guys going. They take great pride in this room, they don’t sit there smiling everyday, they know we have work to do and we need to go to work. So that’s how you solve it.
Even though players in Johnson’s room have struggled to live up to the expectations of their predecessors, the veteran defensive-line coach doesn’t believe a decline in talent is to be blamed for the production disparity.
“We would love to have another pick in the first round draft, but we have these guys, they’re there,” Johnson said. “They are there, we just have to keep developing.”
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