After reading Ramzy's article yesterday about the brutal five-game stretch an Undisputed 2015-16 tOSU National Champion Football Team needs to complete (http://www.elevenwarriors.com/ohio-state-football/2015/05/53254/buckeyes...), I began thinking about the rest of the Buckeye's 2015 schedule.
09/07/15 at Virginia Tech (Blacksburg, VA)
09/12/15 vs. Hawai'i
09/19/15 vs. Northern Illinois
09/26/15 vs. Western Michigan
10/03/15 at Indiana (Bloomington, IN)
10/10/15 vs. Maryland
10/17/15 vs. Penn State
10/24/15 at Rutgers (Piscataway, NJ)
11/07/15 vs. Minnesota
11/14/15 at Illinois (Champaign, IL)
11/21/15 vs. Michigan State
11/28/15 at TTUN Ann Arbor, Mich.
Big Ten Championship Game
12/05/15 TBA Indianapolis, Ind.
I've seen at least one Forum thread already that points toward MSU and TTUN as potential losses for the Buckeyes late in the season. Personally, I have faith that Coach Meyer and company will have the team sufficiently prepared mentally and physically for those big games.
IMHO, Rutgers is the Buckeye's most likely trap game on 24 October. I base this on several factors. It's a road game against a likely unranked opponent in late October; it's the Buckeyes' 8th consecutive game without a bye; and it follows a televised night game against PSU at home (we are their biggest conference rival, in case you hadn't heard).
tOSU has lost 13 games in October since the 2000 season, significantly more than any other month even taking into account that there are generally more games played in Oct. Most of those losses were road games, several were against ranked opponents, but at least four were against unranked opponents on the road.
Rutgers is coming off a surprisingly successful first-year in the B1G, and they crushed UNC in their bowl game giving them some momentum coming into this season. The Scarlet Knights will be coming off a road game in Bloomington, which would be another momentum builder if they win. Add to that, this will probably be the biggest televised night game in their stadium's history.
I'm interested in hearing which game 11W readers think has the highest potential to be a 'trap-game' for tOSU this year and why.
