Ryan Day Happy With Major Ohio State Advantage That Steve Sarkisian Didn’t Have Last Season

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Top-ranked Ohio State started its season with a dominant 56-3 win over Ball State on Saturday. Head coach Ryan Day gave his players just fifteen minutes to celebrate in the locker room. The rush makes sense because a massive top-five battle against Steve Sarkisian’s Texas Longhorns is coming up next week. Day knows his Buckeyes now hold a key scheduling edge that Texas did not get when these two powerhouses faced off last season.

“You know, as we know, when you get into the stadium in the first game of the year, you know, even like that first few plays and the first try was a little off. You know, and then you see you know somebody come new and come into the game, and you see a couple things that are off. Well, that’s why it was good to play this game before we went down to Texas,” Ryan Day fully justified his stance by explaining how crucial it was to iron out early kinks against Ball State in yesterday’s press. “So you know, but I thought it was great to see them come out the second half and rock off the ball the way that we’ve seen them all preseason camp.”

Even in a dominant win, the Buckeyes’ running game got stuck early on, and the offense suffered from typical first-game jitters.

Having a Week 1 tune-up game under your belt is an absolute luxury when preparing for a heavyweight fight. Last season, the script was flipped, and Texas had to fly to Columbus to play Ohio State in a high-stakes, high-pressure season opener.

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Without a single warm-up game to see how his rebuilt roster would actually gel under the stadium lights, Sarkisian was forced to fly blind. The result? The Buckeyes’ defense completely stifled the Longhorns, holding them scoreless through three quarters and handing them a tough 14-7 loss right out of the gate.

Coach Day perfectly captured the urgency of the situation, telling reporters: “The minute we leave the locker room, it’s on to Texas. So we gave them about 15 minutes to enjoy it in the locker room, and then it’s on to Texas.”

The real advantage lies in film study: coaches can now diagnose weaknesses before facing Texas in a real stadium and under real pressure. They can correct mistakes that simply cannot be fully tested during closed practices.

The Ball State game was also important for some of Ohio State’s younger players. Star receiver Jeremiah Smith had a huge night, finishing with 151 yards and two touchdowns. Quarterback Julian Sayin also got valuable game experience and had a chance to build better chemistry with his receivers, something that had been a question during the offseason.

Texas also looked impressive in Week 1. The Longhorns defeated Texas State 59-7, while senior quarterback Arch Manning threw for more than 300 yards and four touchdowns.

Both Ohio State and Texas are ranked among the top five teams in the country. Steve Sarkisian’s squad has been waiting to settle the score for the last two years. When said and done, this could be the game of the season if both teams play to their full potential.

At the end of the day, college football often comes down to these sorts of micro-advantages. While Texas has the home crowd and a heavily motivated roster looking for revenge, Ohio State has the invaluable benefit of early problem-solving and film corrections.

Coach Day’s quick pivot away from the Week 1 win tells us he understands exactly how heavy the crown is, and he isn’t wasting a single second of the advantage they’ve earned.

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