There's an interesting article by Mark Schlabach on ESPN where he compares this season to the chaos of 2007 and then probes each of his Top 10 teams' most fatal flaw. For the #10 Buckeyes, it's giving up big plays on defense:

The Buckeyes were left for dead after an ugly 55-24 loss at Iowa two weeks ago, and they'll still need some help to climb back into the CFP race. But if Ohio State finishes the regular season with victories over Illinois on Saturday and at Michigan on Nov. 25 and then beats unbeaten Wisconsin in the Big Ten championship game, the Buckeyes will at least be in the committee's discussion.

For that to happen, Ohio State's defense will have to play more like it did in this past Saturday's 48-3 rout of No. 12 Michigan State. With two new starting linebackers, the Buckeyes largely eliminated the big plays that plagued them in earlier losses against Oklahoma and Iowa. The Buckeyes have allowed a whopping 43 plays of 20 yards or more in 10 games this season, which is 11th in the Big Ten and 52nd in the FBS (4.3 per game), according to ESPN Stats & Info. The Buckeyes allowed only 48 such plays in 13 games last season (3.7 per game).

OSU allowed seven plays of 20 yards or longer in a 31-16 loss to Oklahoma and nine in a 55-24 loss at Iowa.

That means that 37% of the 20+ yard plays Ohio State's defense has given up this season were in its two losses, an average of eight per game. In its other eight games, all wins, its average is 3.4 or less than half.

Is Schlabach right? Is Ohio State's susceptibility to giving up big plays more easily addressed and fixed than say Alabama's injury bug or Clemson's freshman PK's inability to make a FG or Oklahoma overall porous defense or UGA's one-dimensional offense?