Welcome to the Skull Session.
One more sleep until another Ohio State gameday.
TRAILER VOL. 2
— Eleven Warriors (@11W) September 4, 2025
1 Swing.
2 Keep swinging.
3 Don't fight alone.
pic.twitter.com/QRelSvDE86
Have a good Friday.
ON THE SHOULDERS OF GIANTS. This could be overlooked in a week of reflecting on Texas and largely looking past Grambling State — an opponent the Buckeyes are projected to beat 61-0 according to Bill Connelly’s SP+ metrics — but I think it’s really cool that Ryan Day had Larry Johnson discuss the Tigers’ rich college football history with Ohio State’s players this week.
“Larry Johnson just spoke to the team and talked a little bit about the history at Grambling,” Day said. “He spoke about Eddie Robinson and talked about his experience listening to Coach Robinson at a clinic. After that, he realized he wanted to be a coach because of the impact (Robinson) made on so many people, but also the game of football.”
Robinson coached the Tigers from 1941 to 1997, winning 408 games and leading the program to 17 SWAC titles and nine Black college football national championships. As Andy Anders shared in his article, Five Things to Know About Grambling State, some of Robinson’s teams during the 1950s and 1960s could have been national championship contenders if not for segregation.
Robinson’s 408 victories were an NCAA record at the time of his retirement, but St. John’s John Gagliardi (489) and Penn State’s Joe Paterno (409) later surpassed him.
“(Johnson) and I spoke before practice and we thought it was good for our guys to understand that Coach Robinson and Grambling are a big brick in what college football is now,” Day said. “The game wouldn’t be where it is right now without him and without Grambling. I think it’s important for our guys to know what’s come before. We talk a lot about tradition at Ohio State and Grambling has a great tradition as well.”
Extremely common Ryan Day W.
Xs AND Os, JIMMIES AND JOES. My niece loves corn. She’s 2 years old, and it’s her favorite food. Well, it could also be bananas, yogurt or watermelon — she just loves food, really.
When my niece has had a serving of corn at dinner, she’ll throw her hands in the air and yell, “More corn! More corn!” That’s how I feel about watching Ohio State vs. Texas. I just want to shout, “More film! More film!”
This week, I’ve watched more film on the Buckeyes vs. the Longhorns than any game before it. It’s been great! Earlier in the week, I shared Dan Orlovsky’s breakdown of Matt Patricia’s defense, and on this wonderful Friday, I’ll share breakdowns from Jake Butt, Urban Meyer and Eleven Warriors’ Kyle Jones, who may be the greatest of the three names I mentioned.
A two-time All-American tight end at Michigan from 2013-16, Butt had effusive praise for Ohio State, his old rival. “Matt Patricia dominated,” he said.
@Jbooty88's tape breakdown of the win over Texas is a MUST-WATCH for @OhioStateFB fans
— Big Ten Network (@BigTenNetwork) September 3, 2025
And Jake will be on the call Saturday vs. Grambling St. on BTN.
Cliffs Film Room pic.twitter.com/7tv7J8ZJVu
A national champion Ohio State head coach with a 7-0 record against That Team Up North, Meyer said he could not think of “a worse scenario” for Arch Manning and Texas than facing Patricia in the season opener. “Arch Manning, the Texas quarterback, making his first start. I know he’d started some games, but not like this. I called it his first start. They confused him,” he said.
I wrote earlier that Jones may be the greatest of the three names I mentioned. Some will contend with this claim, but you cannot dispute the fact that Jones’ breakdown outshines Butt’s and Meyer’s in both quantity (it’s 29 minutes!) and quality. “The three-time Super Bowl winner (Patricia) put ‘the best play-caller in college football’ (Steve Sarkisian) into a blender for three hours,” Jones wrote.
More film! More film!
“WE REALLY DIDN’T GET ALONG.” C.J. Stroud and Ryan Day now seem to have an unbreakable bond. However, that wasn’t always the case.
In an appearance on Greg Olsen’s Youth, Inc. podcast this week, Stroud reflected on his relationship with Day while discussing his preferred coaching style.
“Coach Day is the perfect example of the style that I wanted, and I didn’t want,” Stroud said. “And he’ll tell you this… we didn’t always have the best relationship.”
Stroud said neither he nor Day took enough time to learn about each other’s backgrounds. That was ironic, he said, considering they share such common ground — especially with their paternal relationships. Neither had their father around during their more formative years, Stroud due to his dad being incarcerated and Day due to his dad’s suicide.
“We didn’t know because we didn’t spend the time to know one another, so a lot of it was just miscommunication,” Stroud said. “But one day, out of nowhere, (Day) called me into his office, and we just had a talk for, I would say, six, seven hours.”
That conversation changed everything.
“At the time, we really didn't get along,” Stroud said. “I’m a starter at Ohio State. This is into the season. We were doing well. You’d think everything was fine, and deep down, we both had some things that we had to be men about and put on the table. After that, our relationship has been great. I consider him not only a great coach of mine but also a father figure and somebody who I look at as a friend, as a brother, and somebody I know I can call if I really need him, and he can do the same with me.”
Their heart-to-heart not only reshaped Stroud’s view of his head coach but also reflected the culture Day has worked to build at Ohio State — one where connection and honesty matter as much as playbooks and schemes. For Stroud, it turned a rocky start into a relationship that felt like family. For Day, it showed that the most important victories sometimes happen far away from the field.
ALL IN THE FAMILY. Sydney Reeves, a fourth-year sousaphone player from Dublin, will dot the ‘i’ during Ohio State’s alumni band show on Saturday. She’s a little nervous to do it — for a lot of reasons.
“When she was 2, she said she wanted a little tuba to keep under her bed, and her whole life and adolescence was dedicated to this one goal,” her mother, Wendy Reeves, told NBC4’s Jerod Smalley this week.
Wendy understands the nerves because she’s been in the same situation. Yes, indeed. Wendy is a TBDBITL alum, and she dotted the ‘i’ in 1992. And get this: Wendy dotted the ‘i’ one year before her boyfriend, Chad, did the same. Not long after, Wendy and Chad got married.
“He proposed at a Skull Session in front of 10,000 people, and we got married before we got married before we were done with band, so we were actually a married couple in the band,” Wendy told Smalley, who shared that Wendy and Chad dotted the ‘i’ at the same time during a Cleveland Browns game, becoming the first married couple to ever dot the ‘i’ together.
Ohio State vs. Grambling State is the school’s alumni band game, where Script Ohio is performed to all four sides of the Horseshoe. Sydney will dot one of the four i’s (she will also dot the ‘i’ at the Minnesota game) while Wendy watches from the stands. Sadly, Chad will not. He died unexpectedly four years ago.
“He would have loved it so much,” Wendy told Smalley. “And he’s — he was so proud of Sydney. He and Sydney were incredibly close. I just know he’s smiling down on her.”
Sydney knows that, too.
“I have a Buckeye on a string that he wore when he was in the band,” she said. “I wore it all my first year. It’s old. It’s kind of falling apart. I’ve saved it to wear only when I dot (the ‘i’) just so that I have that with me. It’s a tradition, and I’m really excited to continue on this and continue the legacy of my family.”
DAILY DUBCAST. The final Eleven Dubcast this week enlists the help of Dan Hope to examine the Ohio State vs. Grambling State game on Saturday given that even the Tigers' head coach admits, "we understand what's going to happen."
SONG OF THE DAY. "Ramp and Script Ohio" - TBDBITL.
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