The spring game is back in all its glory.
After attendance was limited to less than 20,000 fans for last year’s spring game, there will be no capacity restrictions at the Shoe on Saturday as the Buckeyes conclude their slate of spring football practices in front of what should be a significantly larger crowd of fans as the public gets its first look at the 2022 Ohio State football team inside Ohio Stadium.
Making matters even better, the spring game will be played more like an actual football game than any previous spring game in Ryan Day’s tenure, as Day announced Thursday the majority of the game will be played with live tackling.
“I think it's the right thing to do to tackle in this game and play the game,” Day said. “We still have a lot of young guys who need to go out there and play football. So we're going to do that. Early on, we'll have a few plays and a couple series where we'll thud, but then we'll quickly get to that tackle.”
Saturday’s spring game will also serve as an opportunity for Ohio State to pay tribute to former quarterback Dwayne Haskins following his tragic death last Saturday. All players will wear “DH” stickers on their helmets, and Ohio State will hold a pregame moment of silence and play a video remembering Haskins at halftime.
“It'll be nice to have Buckeye Nation together for this event on Saturday to celebrate our team and the hard work we put in this spring, but also to get everybody together to honor Dwayne,” Day said. “And I think that's appropriate. So there's gonna be a lot of excitement, but also a lot of moments in the day that will be deep thoughts based on just our memories with Dwayne and playing in that stadium. So excited about the weekend.”
This year’s spring game will be played with an offense vs. defense format, with the offense making up the Scarlet team and the defense representing Gray. Day said that decision was made in the interest of being able to mix and match lineups and ensuring they have enough players available at every position rather than thinning their depth chart by splitting players between teams.
“In order to keep it where we can roll guys and the depth and not running guys across the field and being more organized, I think this is a better way to control who's in the game,” Day said. “We're still going to get to just as many reps. But it allows us to mix and match guys and have guys play for the offense and defense where if it was Scarlet and Gray, we would need them to play on both sides of the ball. It just becomes logistically a little harder to manage.”
The game will consist of three 12-15 minute quarters with clock stoppages followed by a 10-minute fourth quarter with a running clock. The scoring format will be adjusted to give the defense more opportunities to score points, though a final determination of how exactly the game will be scored had not yet been made as of Thursday.
While Day confirmed Tuesday that starting quarterback C.J. Stroud will play on Saturday, it will likely be a short afternoon of work for the Buckeyes’ established starters, as Ohio State probably won’t want to risk injuries to stars like TreVeyon Henderson and Jaxon Smith-Njigba during the tackling portion of the game (quarterbacks will not be tackled at all). Starting the game without tackling will also open the door for players who have been limited to non-contact work this spring, such as safety Josh Proctor, to potentially get on the field for a few snaps before watching the rest of the game from the sideline.
For young Buckeyes who don’t have much game experience yet, however, Saturday will be a key opportunity for them to get some game-like reps in the Shoe, especially considering that the Buckeyes open their season with a marquee non-conference game against Notre Dame. That’s why Day believes it’s important for Saturday to function as a true scrimmage rather than a glorified touch football game.
“I just think we need to play the game this year and we've got to go out there and tackle and play. And I think it'd be good for a lot of our guys to do that, get out there,” Day said. “The first game of the year, we play Notre Dame at home, and we've got to be ready to roll. So once you get into the preseason, you start getting closer and closer to that first game, you start to really hold your breath because you don't want to lose guys. But we've also got to tackle, we've got to play physical, we've got to be tough. If we want to reach our goals this year, we're going to have to be that way. We're gonna have to play that way. So we'll do that on Saturday.”
“We still have a lot of young guys who need to go out there and play football. So we're going to do that.”– Ryan Day on Saturday’s spring game
Among others, two players will certainly be in the spotlight Saturday are backup quarterbacks Kyle McCord and Devin Brown, who are expected to take most of the reps behind center in a scrimmage that could serve as a precursor to next year’s starting quarterback competition.
“The more reps they get under their belt, the better, especially in the stadium,” Day said. “We're not going to see a lot of crazy blitzes or anything like that, it's not going to be a challenge schematically, it's just going to be a matter of getting the snap, making the right read, delivering the football, handing the ball off, reading the right guy and just managing the game. And being able to do that or not, locate the football, make the right reads in that type of environment, where you’ve got probably more than half of the whole stadium filled and it's going to feel like a game. And so you get an opportunity to see how they do with live bullets going on.
“Now they're not getting tackled, but still, you get a feel for who's moving the offense. And you don't need to do much more than just make the routine plays routinely, especially with the players that we have.”
While the decision not to tackle in past years has been made in part due to depth concerns at key positions, Day feels the Buckeyes have enough available players this spring to play Saturday’s game at full speed.
“Year in and year out, you look at your team and try to figure out who needs to get tackled, who needs to play, who needs to get a feel for playing in the stadium. And then also, it's your depth. I mean, how many guys do you have? You don't want to get into a situation where you can't get enough guys on the field,” Day said. “And so I think we're at a decent point right now where we can go out and scrimmage and tackle. I think it's important. It changes a little bit in terms of the way you play, the angles you take, the speed you play with and I think it's good for our guys to do that. It's gonna be healthy.”
Going into Saturday’s exhibition, Day feels good about what the Buckeyes have accomplished this spring. He believes they’re in a much better place than they were at this time last year, when Ohio State was still trying to make up for all the reps it lost due to the COVID-19 shutdown in 2020.
“We went through the entire roster yesterday and kind of talked in evaluating them as a staff and there's been a lot of guys who have improved,” Day said. “So across the board, we're in a much different place than we were last year just with our experience. And that combined with the new scheme on defense, it's been a good spring, it's been exciting, it's been a challenge.”
Because of that, Day isn’t necessarily looking for anything different out of his players on Saturday than what he’s already seen during the first 14 practices of the spring. But he does want them to finish the spring on a high note, as Saturday will be their last full-blown practice for more than three months until preseason camp starts in early August.
“You know what you see in practice, and typically early on, they get a little nervous in the first time out there, but they settle back into their training,” Day said. “It's rare that all of a sudden, you get into the stadium, and you start to see something that's completely different. That’s happened before. Some guys struggle with that, and we try to help, but for the most part, they're gonna go back to how they are training themselves during practice, when you put it out in the field, and we call that competitive excellence. So once you get out there, you're really able to do it. And the more you do it, the more confidence you can have when you're out there. And so I expect these guys to play with a lot of confidence out there and enjoy the day.”
Saturday’s spring game will kick off at 12:05 p.m. and will be televised on Big Ten Network with Brandon Gaudin, former Ohio State linebacker Joshua Perry and Elise Menaker providing commentary. Ohio Stadium gates will open at 10 a.m., and parking will be free. Tickets remain available through Ohio State’s official website, and Ohio State is waiving service fees for all tickets purchased Friday. Tickets can also be purchased in person at Ohio State’s ticket office during normal business hours. Children under the age of six will be admitted for free in general admission areas, and current Ohio State students can also attend the game for free with a valid Ohio State BuckID.
Stay tuned with Eleven Warriors for full coverage of Saturday’s scrimmage, as Dan Hope, Griffin Strom, Garrick Hodge and Kevin Harrish will all be inside Ohio Stadium to provide full coverage during and after the game.
