OSU-IU 2024 just another game?
COVER PHOTO: OSU safety Lathan Ransom celebrates making a play against Indiana during their game in Ohio Stadium on Nov. 12, 2022. The Buckeyes won, 56-14. Picture by Sam Fahmi/Columbus Wired.
Is this year’s Ohio State - Indiana game really going to be just another game? Another snoozefest where the Buckeyes blow the doors off of the Hoosiers and celebrate with an exuberant version of Carmen Ohio in front of tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of OSU faithful?
The Hoosiers haven’t beaten the Buckeyes since Ronald Reagan was president. Since that 1988 win by a final score of 41-7 in Bloomington, Ind., they have scraped together a total of seven winning seasons, have two bowl wins in nine tries (1988, ‘91), and their highest ranking in the final AP poll was four years ago at No. 12 following the conclusion of the 2020 COVID-shortened season.
Meanwhile, Ohio State has had only two losing seasons since that loss (1988, 2011), won 15 out of 32 bowl games, ended the season ranked in the top 10 of the AP poll 22 times, outright won or at least split 14 Big Ten championships, and played in four national championships with two natties tucked under their belt (2002, ‘14).
History would have you believe that this will indeed be another boring blowout where the Scarlet and Gray dust the field with crushed up Cream and Crimson sprinkled all over.
But sometimes we find out that the past doesn’t know the present and can’t predict the future.
It’s the first time EVER both teams will play each other ranked inside the top five and this year’s version of the game will feature both teams battling it out for a potential Big Ten championship game appearance, which has NEVER been the case. In fact, no matchup in the 97-game history has had conference title implications on the line.
So when the undefeated, No. 5 Hoosiers (10-0, 7-0 Big Ten) invade Ohio Stadium on Saturday afternoon to smash facemasks with the No. 2 Buckeyes (9-1, 6-1), it’s safe to say that the enormity of the 98th rendition between the two schools from neighboring states will be, as the kids would say (probably not anymore), off the chain.
To hear Indiana’s head coach talk about it, though, it’s almost as if it is just another game.
“We treat them all alike. If there was a better way to prepare for a certain team, we’d do that for every team,” said Curt Cignetti on Monday.
OSU defensive end Caden Curry seemed even more blasé about Saturday and when asked by Columbus Wired if Cignetti’s comments made specifically about the Buckeyes had fanned the flames of a potential blaze erupting in their locker room, Curry threw water on the idea.
“No, we don’t look at anybody differently, it’s just a different game for us,” the junior said on Wednesday. “As long as we play our game, we’re good.”
Although, the Greenwood, Ind. native wasn’t completely tone deaf to what Cignetti has accomplished in his first season at the Hoosiers’ helm and tossed of smidgen of accolades Cignetti’s way.
“I’ve definitely heard great things about him. I’ve heard he’s a great coach, I’ve heard he’s serious about what he does and he definitely wants to turn that program around.”
And Cignetti has done that.
Not only has Indiana never been 10-0 entering their game against the Buckeyes, but they’ve never won 10 straight games since their first official contest played in 1887.
“Excited about this week’s opportunity against Ohio State,” Cignetti said. “Obviously a good football team, one of the favorites to play in the national championship, lot of great players, extremely well-coached (and) their tradition speaks for itself. So it’s a big game for us because it’s this game coming up.”
Sounds like a glowing review. And indeed it was. But to hear Cignetti deadpan his praise sounded like typical coach speak. Don’t try to give the opposing team any bulletin board material by saying something silly.
That might be a little too late, though.
One day after being named the Hoosiers’ head coach, Cignetti told a packed Assembly Hall in December to Google him because all he does is win, that he didn’t “take a back seat to anybody” and then proceeded to whip the crowd into a frenzy by proclaiming that “Purdue sucks… but so does Michigan and Ohio State!”
If you’re going to inspire your team to get behind you with some overzealous comments, you better back it up.
And if history has told us anything about this game, Cignetti’s back is against the wall.
Ohio State owns a lopsided margin of wins over Indiana, leading the series 79-12-5. And of those 12 wins for the Hoosiers, half came over 100 years ago when they jumped out to a 5-0-1 lead between 1901 and 1913. Their sixth win literally came a little over 100 years ago to the very day of this writing when IU beat OSU in the Horseshoe, 12-7, on Nov. 8, 1924.
The Hoosiers may be 10-0 for the first time entering their Saturday showdown against the Buckeyes but it’s not the first time they’ve entered the game undefeated.
In fact, this will be the 13th time Indiana has claimed an unbeaten record heading into a hullabaloo with OSU. Five of those previous 12 games, though, the Hoosiers had played only one game prior to the Buckeyes. Their matchup in 2019 was after a mere two games played. The most games Indiana has gone unscathed before running into Ohio State has been four, which occurred on six occasions.
Unfortunately for IU, they walked away from only one of those 12 games as the victor, which was that last win to date in 1988. Indiana went into that one 3-0-1. Twice the game ended in a stalemate when ties were still a thing (1932 and 1990).
It’s not like Indiana has been a total doormat, though, whether or not they have faced the Buckeyes undefeated.
Not only did the Hoosiers dispatch the Buckeyes with ease in ‘88 but it was the second-straight victory after notching an easy 31-10 win in Columbus the season before. From 1987 - ‘90, Indiana put together their second-best streak over Ohio State going 2-1-1. The lone loss was a 35-31 nailbiter where the Buckeyes had to fend off an unanswered, 17-point second half Hoosier surge.
It should also be noted that in 1986, even though OSU got the best of IU, it wasn’t a cakewalk for the Scarlet and Gray as they had to fend off another late-game surge to hang on, 24-22.
Indiana’s two-time All-American running back, Anthony Thompson, rambled all over the Buckeyes during his four-year career in Bloomington (1986 - ‘89), amassing 623 all-purpose yards and nine touchdowns in those four games. His 191 rushing yards in ‘88 still sits as the 17th-best, single-game effort any rusher has put up against OSU.
In two of those 12 contests where IU came in without a loss, the game was actually quite the donnybrook, with Ohio State escaping by the seat of their pants.
In 2015, the Buckeyes had to mount a second half comeback against the 4-0 Hoosiers after being shut out of the end zone in the first half, squeaking out a mere two field goals and trailed in Bloomington, 10-6. However, OSU running back Ezekiel Elliott finally found some running lanes and ripped off three touchdown runs of 55, 65 and 75 yards to help propel Ohio State to a 34-27 win.
Three years prior to that, first-year head coach Urban Meyer got all he could get from a down-in-the-mouth 2-3 Cream and Crimson squad with the two teams slugging it out for an entire 60 minutes. However, with under four minutes to go, the game looked to be in-hand for Meyer as his Buckeyes held a comfortable 52-34 lead. But the Hoosiers wouldn’t quit and with 1:40 left, they pulled to within 11 after a 10-play, 78-yard drive ended with quarterback Nate Sudfeld finding running back Stephen Houston on a 25-yard strike.
Then IU pulled off the nearly impossible when they recovered the onside kick and quickly scored another touchdown 35 seconds later, capping it off with a successful two-point conversion to make it 52-49 with 1:05 remaining. But a second straight onside kick wouldn’t bounce IU’s way and the Buckeyes sat on the ball to run out the clock and escape with a three-point road win.
The combined 101 points scored and 1,049 yards gained in that contest are still a combined single-game high for each category within the series and the 49 points for Indiana are still a single-game high scored against the Buckeyes.
Fast forward to four years ago in 2020 and the Hoosiers were actually sitting pretty at 4-0 while the Buckeyes were 3-0. After 45 minutes of play, the Buckeyes looked to be the ones who would be sitting pretty, sitting on a 42-21 lead. But two unanswered TD’s by IU in the final quarter made current head coach Ryan Day a little nervous after Michael Penix, Jr. (yeah THAT Michael Penix, Jr. who just led Washington to the national championship game last year and finished the regular season as a Heisman finalist) had TD tosses of 16 and 56 yards to close the gap to 42-35.
However, the final 10:26 would peter out as both teams traded Jake Paul and Mike Tyson-like punches and the Hoosiers tried some dipsy-do magic that concluded in a puff of smoke as their hook-and-ladder attempt on the final play was eventually fumbled into the hands of OSU defensive end Zach Harrison to end the game.
Since that win, Indiana has come no closer than 20 points, which was last year by a final score of 23-3.
This year could be different, though. Indiana looks different. They feel different. They’ve got a swagger to them not seen in a long time. If Ohio State isn’t careful and they end up glancing past this reinvigorated Hoosiers squad to next week’s bitter rivalry showdown with “you-know-who”, that game could mean absolutely nothing other than getting a win over the hated Team Up North.
No conference championship and sitting on the outside looking in as far as getting into the playoff with two losses.
But if history says anything about this series, Ohio State should be fine. Right?
Kickoff is slated for noon and Columbus will be the site of both ESPN College Gameday and The Big Noon Kickoff on FOX. The game will air on FOX.