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Ohio State in crisis mode
Boom is back for Bucks
Yahoo Sports
It is not often that the season reaches the halfway point and the Ohio
State Buckeyes are in desperation mode. But this is no ordinary year in
Columbus.
The Buckeyes are reeling. Ohio State is 3-3, and in the middle of their
most difficult four-game stretch of the season. Losses to Michigan
State and Nebraska have Ohio State 0-2 in the Big Ten and their string
of six straight conference championships about to come to an abrupt end.
The most recent loss, a 34-27 defeat at Nebraska in a game Ohio State
had led 27-6 in the third quarter, was particularly devastating.
First-year head coach Luke Fickell is fighting to hold the program
together.
“Obviously, all of us are disappointed in how we finished out last
week’s game, but we move on, and that’s what we’ve got to do,” Fickell
said. “Everything hurts a little bit more when your heart hurts, and
that’s a part of the football game. We’ve been on the other side of a
lot of those. We were on the other side of this one.”
With No. 16 Illinois on the road next, and a home date with unbeaten
powerhouse Wisconsin coming after a bye week, Fickell keeps talking
about the process of improving and moving forward.
“We’ll all grow from it, we’ll all be better in the long run because of
it, as long as we handle it in the right way,” Fickell said. “Nothing
will change for us—the energy, the passion, all those kinds of things
won’t change the way we coach, won’t change the way we get after our
guys, our expectations of them won’t change, and I think they’ve
embraced that.”
With a winning season and a bowl bid still very much in play, and hopes
of making noise in the Big Ten not yet completely vanquished, Fickell
said job security is not on his mind.
“We don’t look at it like that. We can’t look any further ahead than
today,” Fickell said. “That’s just where we are. You drive yourself
batty trying to do it. So no, I don’t give that any thought.”
RB Dan Herron is eligible to play this week for the first time since
the early January win over Arkansas in the Sugar Bowl. Herron, a
first-team all-Big Ten running back last season, missed the first six
games of 2011 serving two NCAA suspensions.
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