College Football Playoff: Ohio State’s hot start takes it past Tennessee and into the Rose Bowl vs. Oregon

On By Littum

Ohio State gets its rematch with Oregon.

The Buckeyes jumped out to a 21-0 lead in the first quarter en route to a 42-17 College Football Playoff victory over Tennessee in a game that is sure to take some pressure off coach Ryan Day after the Buckeyes’ Week 14 -loss to Michigan. At least for a little bit.

Star freshman wide receiver Jeremiah Smith opened the scoring with a TD catch on a perfectly thrown pass from Will Howard.

Smith then put the game out of reach in the third quarter when he caught another pass from Howard to give the Buckeyes a 28-10 lead.

Tennessee had crept back into the game in the second quarter, but Ohio State forced a punt when the Volunteers received the kickoff to open the third quarter. And just after Smith’s second TD of the night pushed the lead back to three scores, Tennessee struck again. Not long after the punt, Ohio State fans again mockingly rained down chants of “SEC” at the thousands of Volunteers fans who had made the trip north from Knoxville for the game.

The Vols were overwhelmed at the start of the game. Ohio State had 133 yards on its first two drives of the game, while Tennessee was minus-11. The Buckeyes’ first three drives all resulted in touchdowns as the OSU offense ran 17 plays for 201 yards. By the time the Volunteers got back into positive numbers in the yardage column, the lead had become insurmountable.

The Buckeyes will face the Ducks in the Rose Bowl on January 1st. Oregon is the No. 1 seed in the College Football Playoff as it won the Big Ten and was the only team at college football’s highest level to make it through the season undefeated.

Ohio State was a favorite to be in Oregon’s position before the year with the additions the Buckeyes made via high school recruiting (Smith), the transfer portal (RB Quinshon Judkins, DB Caleb Downs and others) and on the coaching staff (offensive coordinator Chip Kelly). But the Buckeyes lost 32-31 at Oregon earlier this season and fell 13-10 at home to Michigan in the final week of the regular season.

That loss to Michigan showed Ohio State’s offensive fragility. For all the talent the team has, it has gone into an offensive funk far too often in 2024. Howard didn’t play his best against the Wolverines and Penn State, and he slipped just a few seconds late against the Ducks to prevent a game-winning field goal goal attempts from happening before time expired.

However, Saturday night showed why the Buckeyes had that preseason favorite status. The offense was unstoppable early, and the defensive line shut down Tennessee’s offense, even though the Vols were dealing with some significant injuries. SEC Offensive Player of the Year Dylan Sampson had a leg injury and receiver Squirrel White was also hobbled.

That limited the Tennessee offense significantly. QB Nico Iamaleava was left to make mountains out of molehills, and it worked as well as the scoring line.

Ohio State’s win was the fourth blowout in four first-round games in this inaugural year of the 12-team playoff. The closest game of the four turned out to be Notre Dame’s 27-17 win over Indiana on Friday night in a game that wasn’t that close. The Irish led 27-3 in the fourth quarter before Indiana cut it to two scores with a pair of late touchdowns.

All four wins were also by the teams that hosted playoff games. The margins led to a lot of reaction on social media about how the playoff committee could have put different teams into the postseason. But if none of the four teams that lost on the road in the first round deserved to be in the playoffs, who did?

Indiana, SMU, Clemson, and Tennessee all deservedly made the playoffs. All but the Tigers made it because of their regular-season success, and Clemson got in based on its ACC title game win. The only two-loss major conference team to miss the playoffs was Miami. And the Hurricanes suffered their second loss after blowing a 21-point lead in the final week of the regular season.

But the first weekend of the 12-team playoff is far too early to judge the format. We all knew there weren’t 12 teams that could win the national title this season. In addition, there were also a lot of blowouts in the semi-finals of the four-team playoff.

And they were almost as bad as they were this weekend. The average margin of victory in the four first-round games this year was 19.25 points. In the 10 years of the four-team College Football Playoff, the average margin of victory in the semifinal games was 18.35 points.

The 12-team playoff made more games in the regular season mean more and has added more meaningful games to the postseason. It’s a win for college football fans, although there will continue to be endless and pointless arguments about who should have made the playoffs until the Fiesta Bowl on Dec. 31.