Don't pin USC on Luke Fahey, Ohio State lost that game kicking field goals

Don't pin this one on Luke Fahey. A true freshman made his first start at the Coliseum on Halloween night, threw for 260 yards, didn't throw a single interception, and Ohio State still lost 30-18. That loss belongs to an offense that kept driving the field and kept settling for three.

I can already hear Monday. Julian Sayin gets hurt, the kid plays, the Buckeyes drop their second game, and the whole story becomes that Ohio State's season went down with its starting quarterback. It's a clean story. The box score won't sign it.

Ohio State outgained USC 464 to 338. It held the ball for 39 minutes and 28 seconds. Bo Jackson ran for 121 yards on 21 carries and Isaiah West added 65. Jeremiah Smith caught 10 passes. You don't put up those numbers with an offense that's lost. You put them up with an offense that moves until the field gets short and then flinches.

Caleb Hawkins made field goals of 39, 34, 23 and 47 yards, and good for him. The 23-yarder is the one I'd put on the screen in the film room, because a kick that short means you were standing on the doorstep and walked away with three. Ohio State's only touchdown came with 2:12 left, Smith's 1-yard catch (the one that made him the Big Ten's career leader in receiving touchdowns). Throw in 11 penalties for 71 yards and West's fumble at the USC 32 in the third quarter, forced by Desman Stephens II, and you've got a team that wrote itself a winning check and kept tearing it up.

Here's the best case against Fahey, and it's real. He went 21 of 38. That's a lot of balls on the ground for a team that needed to finish drives, and some of those stalls are his. I'm not calling a first start in that building a masterpiece. But he threw every pass Ohio State attempted that night and gave the ball away zero times. The fumble was Isaiah West's. The flags weren't his. If you want a freshman to carry a team on the road, fine, but he did his part of the carrying and somebody else kept dropping the bags.

USC earned this, too, and it did it the opposite way. Jayden Maiava went 15 of 22 for 222 yards and hit Trent Mosley for 69 yards 39 seconds in. Mark Bowman's 70-yard catch and run set up King Miller's touchdown for a 27-9 lead. The Trojans lost the time of possession by a mile and won because their big plays ended in the end zone. Ohio State's long drives ended at the kicking tee.

And then the last one. Down 12, Ohio State drove to the USC goal line and turned it over on downs with 36 seconds left. That's the whole night in one possession.

The Buckeyes are 6-2 now, and their Playoff path runs through winning out in the Big Ten. If they want to make that walk, stop asking whether the freshman is ready. He looked ready enough. Ask why an offense that gained 464 yards needed until the final three minutes to find the end zone, and don't let anybody answer with Julian Sayin's name.

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