Ohio will be bowl eligible if it wins Saturday against Buffalo.
A week removed from Western Michigan’s 49-14 blowout win against Ohio —when the Bobcats gave up 401 yards rushing in the second half — Solich didn’t want to drastically change the team’s typical schedule solely for one bad half.
"We’re 5-2,” Solich said. “We’d like to be better than that, but we are 5-2 with a chance to continue to build. I think most teams in our conference would love to be in our situation. You can’t overreact with our players and coaches.”
Yet all five of the wins came when redshirt sophomore linebacker Quentin Poling played.
When Poling, a three-time Mid-American Conference East Division defensive player of the week, hasn’t played in the second half of a game, the Bobcats are 0-2.
And now with him injured for a few weeks at best, according to Solich, that leaves a gap that needs fixing.
Or, as linebacker coach Ron Collins said, a dam.
“Once you put your finger in one whole in a dam, water is springing out somewhere else,” he said.
Ohio’s linebackers, arguably one of the strongest positions on the roster, have not only lost Poling but are also bruised and battered among the other top three players on the depth chart.
Redshirt senior linebacker Jovon Johnson said he should be fit for Buffalo, but Blair Brown and Chad Moore were also injured, leaving Ohio thin. Both resumed practice as the week went on.
Sophomore running back A.J. Ouellette even lined up as a middle linebacker beside Johnson at practice this week in what Collins called a “little emergency measure situation” Tuesday.
{{tncms-asset app="editorial" id="5a7dfd0e-78f3-11e5-9b30-b39769ee51a6"}}
“Well, I’m going to let the head coach address those personnel issues,” defensive coordinator Jimmy Burrow said. “But we’re going to put a group out there that’s hungry to respond to the challenge.”
Regardless of who lines up at middle linebacker, or at linebacker at all, the Bobcats have clawed their way to being one win away from bowl eligibility and tying the 2014 season’s win total: six.
At this point, it’s about staying healthy and plugging "wholes in the dam."
“I think it will be a very interesting ball game in many ways,” Solich said. “Mentally, we will be ready to play the game. Hopefully, physically we will be as well.”
@charliehatch_
gh181212@ohio.edu
