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COLUMBUS, Ohio -- A Saturday afternoon trip into "The Horseshoe" proved a step to far for the #4 ranked Kentucky Wildcats, whose Cinderella unbeaten start to the 2018 college football season came to an end in front of a packed crowd, as junior quarterback
Joe Burrow led his Buckeyes team to a 27-20 victory.
The Wildcats have pretty much had it their own way through their first six wins of the season but found out the hard way today what a proper defense should look like. The Buckeyes put up seven sacks on
Brandon Dixon with junior defensive tackle
Davon Hamilton proving to be a real thorn in the Wildcats side with three of those seven sacks, not only did the Buckeyes record those seven sacks but the defense forced three turnovers with linebacker
Nick Conner on hand for a pick and two forced fumbles (one of which was recovered by Kentucky), the senior left with today's game ball.
You would be dumb if you didn't think that Buckeye's head coach Urban Meyer knew how important this game was, having watched his team be manhandled two weeks ago at the hands of the nations No. 1 team the Texas Longhorns.
You have to tell your kids to just bounce back,"Urban Meyer said after the game. "It was humiliating, 37-0! Tell me how many times an Ohio State football team hasn't scored a single point in a game... They did exactly what we asked them to do, we had that extra week to prepare and this was key. This Kentucky team isn't no easy game but the defense was perfect today and Joe (QB Joe Burrow) took back this offense in this game."
Burrow, an Ohio native was about as good as it gets today. The junior had a 75% completion rate, passing for 293-yards and a 56-yard touchdown bomb to tight end
A.J. Alexander. Burrow also added 67-yards on 23 carries and scored the games first touchdown on a 8-yard touchdown scamper.
For his opposite number it wasn't quite the day we have come to expect from the sophomore under center for Kentucky.
Brandon Dixon left the game no less than three times after tacking on a massive seven sacks, he was constantly forced to rush out of the pocket and was hit on at least half of his forty one passing attempts today. Dixon also accounted for all three of the Wildcat's turnovers throwing for two picks and a costly fumble in the endzone which took seven points off the board, seven points that would have taken this game to overtime.
"We will just chalk it up as one of those games," Dixon told ESPN's Allison Williams. "I am not going to sit here and put any blame on anyone else but myself but I am only human, you can't sit there and say we played well, or it just wasn't our day because we were just plain awful until the final four minutes of the game, you can't play that way against a team like Ohio State."
Dixon finished the game passing for 278-yards; His late touchdown pass to true freshman
Jaylon Brown was one of a select few highlights the Kentucky offense made today.
The Wildcats (6-1, 4-0) will now look to bounce back next week when they return home to face the Mississippi State Bulldogs (2-4, 2-3).
You only have to look at statistics like third down conversions to see why Kentucky lost today; On twelve third downs they only converted three of those for a season low 25% where as the Buckeyes were 10-for-16 (62%).
Kentucky had the nations No.1 ranked rush defense going into the game allowing below 100-yards a game on average, well that all went out of the window to today after giving up a season high 210-yards on the ground. Ohio State senior
Mike Weber, Jr. rushed for 110-yards on 22 carries with
DeMario McCall adding 23-yards and a touchdown on 4 carries.
Senior cornerback
Chris Westry did his best to help Kentucky get back into the game late on with two forced fumbles, and his head coach took note of that.
"It's guys like Chris that you want on your team," Riley said after the game. "Whilst it would have been easy to quit today and some did out there, he didn't and he tried to give our offense the best chances to get back into this game, it is just a shame at the end of the day that they blew it, back to the drawing board and hard work."
With nine recruits on campus for next weeks game against Mississippi State this could prove the most important weekend in
Lincoln Riley's first full recruiting class. The Wildcats can also get back to winning ways and on paper should do that, but the Bulldogs are not to be underestimated despite only having two wins on the season, those wins came against Georgia and LSU though!
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