Last week’s 26-6 win over Michigan State felt, to some, like a return to form for a Buckeye defense that spent most of the year floundering. That was a fair takeaway, at least on the surface. Holding a bad Michigan State offense to six points is what you’d expect from a good Buckeye defense, so to see this defense — which has been definitively not good this year — do it was encouraging.
I think, however, that there was a tendency to think that one game proved that Ohio State, and specifically, Ohio State’s defensive staff, had fixed the issues that have ailed the unit all season long.