Tim May: ‘3rd-and-19’ — Kyle McCord likes the historic ring of that

COLUMBUS — 3rd-and-19.

In football parlance it evokes a formidable challenge, one not easily conquered. In very recent memory it brings to mind the situation Kyle McCord and the Ohio State offense faced in the closing seconds at Notre Dame.

The Buckeyes were trying to drive 65 yards in the last 1:26, needing a touchdown, and after an intentional grounding penalty, seemed to be behind the 8 ball at the Notre Dame 22-yard line with 15 seconds left.

Jump forward two plays, if you wish, to the one-yard plunge Chip Trayanum made for the game-winning touchdown with one second left in the 17-14 triumph. But when McCord was asked this week what he would nickname the one-score thriller, a game that will resonate in Buckeye lore forevermore, he simply said:

“3rd-and-19, or something like that?”

Former Ohio State coach Urban Meyer, now an analyst on the Fox Big Noon Kickoff Show and the Big Ten Network, agreed. When asked on the weekly Urban’s Take with Tim May on On3.com for a checkmate moment from the game, he said anybody ought to be able to gain a yard when needed, especially since the Notre Dame defense inexplicably had just 10 men on the field.

“The ‘checkmate moment’ was 3rd-and-19 with, by the way, with 15 seconds and no timeouts, that’s one of the greatest plays – you know, it’s an awful bold statement to say it’s one of the great plays in Ohio State history, but it is,” Meyer said.

As Meyer had explained to me before the show started, it’s probably a play in the Ohio State two-minute drill the team had practiced often, at least in walk-through theory moment: Emeka Egbuka releasing straight up the left hash mark, knowing he probably has to get at least 20 yards downfield before turning inside toward the soft spot in the zone defense and looking for the pass, already launched by McCord.

It was executed like clockwork, Egbuka making the catch and being tackled at the 1-yard line. The rest of the offense sprinted forward, and McCord was able to spike the ball to stop the clock with seven seconds left.

Following a quick McCord sprint pass right toward Marvin Harrison Jr. which was incomplete, the Buckeyes capped the stirring drive with the plunge by Trayanum and ecstasy ensued.

“That’s a kind of a play we don’t always get full speed [in practice], a walk-through kind of play there at the end [of possible scenarios they could face],” McCord said. “And I think the guys we have playing at receiver, their football IQ is through the roof. So I think he kind of felt that void right there, and knew that it was going to be a bang-bang type of play.

“So when I threw it, I don’t know if he even had his head around yet, but obviously … he trusted where I was going to put the ball, away from the defender, kind of right in that soft spot like we talked about.”

Egbuka saw the void then turned and saw the ball, hauling it in before two defenders hit him, complete for 21 yards down to the 1-yard line, his second catch on the drive, and seventh for the game, tying him with tight end Cade Stover for the team lead.

“That’s a play that we practice pretty much every week; every Friday we go over that play just in case — you never know when you might need it,” Egbuka said. “Unfortunately we never get to practice it at that magnitude (in front of a frenzied crowd of 77,600, at night, on prime time TV), so you’ve kind of got to be ready to step up at that moment.

“But … Kyle and I were on the same page when it came it to that play and we were able to execute it.”

Get this, though. When McCord was asked to name his favorite throw on the drive, it wasn’t that one, or the medium slant to Harrison, or the 23-yarder to Egbuka on the third play of the series that put things in motion.

It was the 4th-and-7 play from the Notre Dame 39-yard line. No conversion there and the Buckeyes would have been done.

Instead, they aligned in a bunch formation of three receivers left, and as Julian Fleming cut inside on a drag route over the middle, the other two sort of ran interference to give him a step on his defender. With Fleming short of the line to gain as he crossed the field, it took a precise pass from McCord to make sure Fleming did not have to slow down before turning up field to cross the needed distance by not even a full yard.

“Obviously there were a lot of big plays down the stretch, but I probably have to say the throw to Julian, because it’s something we talk about all the time, those crossing routes,” McCord said. “We call it ‘quality of the throw’, because if I put it a foot behind him he has to stop for the ball, the game’s over.

“It’s something we harp on in practice, and for it to come up in a situation like that, 4th-and-7, with the game on the line, and I think he got the first down by half a yard, that just goes to show that everything the coaches harp on in practice is real. And to kind of see it all play out like that was pretty cool when I went back and watched it.”

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