Ohio defeated Ball State 34-21 on Saturday behind a season-high 316 rushing yards and a quality defensive performance that held the Cardinals to their lowest scoring output of the season. The Bobcats have made noticeable strides toward becoming a more complete team and improving their defensive woes from earlier this season.
Here’s a look at some of the notable performances and what they mean:
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Nathan Rourke’s run game
The rainy conditions meant the quarterback needed to rely more on his running game to ensure the Bobcats offense stayed afloat.
That plan couldn’t have worked better. Rourke led Ohio with 127 rushing yards and two touchdowns on 18 attempts and found success despite the Bobcats shrinking their playbook to adjust to the miserable weather.
It all happened against a quality defense, too. The Cardinals rank fourth in the Mid-American Conference in rushing yards allowed per game, but they couldn’t prevent Rourke and running backs De’Montre Tuggle and O’Shaan Allison from trucking Ohio down the field.
A stat to know: Rourke is ninth in the conference with 536 rushing yards this season.
Everything about the defense
Ohio needed to play its best game of the year defensively if it wanted to stop Ball State, which entered Saturday with the top-ranked offense in the conference.
That is exactly what happened, and Ohio might not have a better game from its defense all season. That’s not a bad thing — it’ll just be tough to beat a performance that included four sacks and a 4-of-12 third-down ratio. The Bobcats also held Drew Plitt, one of the top passing quarterbacks in the conference, to 109 yards.
Sure, the rain certainly played in Ohio’s favor, but it’s been waiting for a quality defensive game all season. Now it has one. Suddenly, the problems that clouded over the defense just 14 days ago appear long in the past.
Offensive line
Everything appears to be clicking with Ohio, and that includes its offensive line, which hasn’t allowed a sack in the past two games.
The Bobcats weren’t going to have a strong run game without a stout performance from the offensive line, and it had its way with the Cardinals defense, which recorded four sacks a week earlier against Toledo.
“I think they’ve gotten better every single week,“ Rourke said. “We asked a lot of our o-line in terms of the option and the stuff that we asked them to do up front. It’s great to be able to get on this kind of roll with those guys.”
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Red zone efficiency
We’re nit-picking a little here, but this was arguably the biggest improvement Ohio could make.
The Bobcats could’ve put the game out of reach in the second quarter if they converted two Louis Zervos field goals from inside 25 yards into touchdowns. Ohio still led 13-7 at halftime, but it could’ve had a much larger cushion had those drives not stalled out.
It’s not too big of a concern for Ohio, but coach Frank Solich always wants drives to end with seven points, not three.
The rest of the MAC East
The Bobcats’ win over the top team in the MAC West spells trouble for the MAC East, which has had a rough start to the conference season.
Ohio is joined with Miami as the only two teams with a 3-1 division record. They play Nov. 6 at Peden Stadium, and that might decide who goes to Detroit for the MAC Championship game in December.
At this point, there’s not much hope for Buffalo — which earned that trip last season but is now 2-2 in the division — or any other MAC East team.
