{"id":9354,"date":"2023-07-02T03:57:07","date_gmt":"2023-07-02T08:57:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/?p=9354"},"modified":"2023-07-02T03:57:07","modified_gmt":"2023-07-02T08:57:07","slug":"ryan-day-says-ohio-state-will-lean-on-defense-more-in-2023","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/ryan-day-says-ohio-state-will-lean-on-defense-more-in-2023\/","title":{"rendered":"Ryan Day says Ohio State will lean on defense more in 2023"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ohio State<\/a><\/strong> actually fielded a pretty good defense in 2022, but a few poor performances to close out the season tainted the view of an otherwise good unit. Buckeyes head coach Ryan Day<\/a><\/strong> isn\u2019t running from this fact.<\/p>\n

But the struggles at the end of last season haven\u2019t stopped him from being hopeful about Ohio State\u2019s defensive unit in 2023. With defensive coordinator Jim Knowles<\/a><\/strong> back for a second year, Day is bullish on the growth that will come on that side of the ball.<\/p>\n

\u201cSo a lot of experience on the defensive side of the ball and really in Year 2 \u2014 Year 1, you\u2019re learning what to do. Year 2 and 3, you\u2019re learning how and why. And I think those all, those matter. So we\u2019re going to have to win some games on defense this year,\u201d Day said on the \u201cAlways College Football\u201d podcast<\/a> with Greg McElroy<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n

One of the biggest issues Day and the coaching staff identified in the defense in the only two losses for Ohio State \u2014\u00a0against Michigan and Georgia \u2014\u00a0were big plays.<\/p>\n

Against Michigan<\/a><\/strong>, Ohio State gave up touchdowns of 45, 69, 75, 75 and 85 yards. <\/p>\n

In the College Football Playoff semifinals against Georgia<\/a><\/strong>, the Buckeyes surrendered touchdowns of 25 and 76 yards, plus an array of chunk plays. <\/p>\n

Across the two games, Ohio State gave up 87 points \u2014\u00a043.5 a game \u2014\u00a0after giving up just 16.9 points per game in the 11 games prior.<\/p>\n

\u201cComing out of those last couple games, I know everybody on the defensive side of the ball, there was a lot of progress made there but the way that it ended just left a sour taste in everybody\u2019s mouth. So, that\u2019s something that we\u2019ve looked at hard and tried to identify the areas, certainly explosive plays were the ones that kind of jumped off the screen.\u00a0So, Jim Knowles will be in his second year and it\u2019s significant because we really didn\u2019t lose much on that side of the ball. We have a lot coming back. A lot of experience. Added some new pieces, through the transfer portal. We don\u2019t do a lot of that but I think we\u2019ve added some nice pieces there,\u201d Day said.<\/p>\n

With a question still to answer at quarterback \u2014\u00a0though the Ohio State offense will likely churn out points like usual \u2014 Day is right to think there might come a game or two where the Buckeyes need the defense to produce a game-winning effort.<\/p>\n

The post Ryan Day says Ohio State will lean on defense more in 2023<\/a> appeared first on On3<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ohio State actually fielded a pretty good defense in 2022, but a few poor performances…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9354","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9354","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9354"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9354\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9354"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9354"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9354"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}