Sunday Morning Coming Down // Week 12

By GoForThree Nov 21, 2021, 8:43am CST

Ten B1G Things

Hope Mel Tucker got that extension paperwork signed last week
Kenneth Walker III ran for 25 yards....4 yards more than OSU’s single longest rush
Chris Olave has now eclipsed David Boston’s record for most TD catches in OSU history with 35
Chris Olave was a 3-star recruit
CJ Stroud is the first player ever to throw 6 TD passes against MSU in one half, and tied the OSU record of 6 TDs in one contest
OSU and Michigan will face off in a top-7 matchup for the B1G East for the first time since JT Barrett buried Michigan’s 2016 with a first down run
Michigan surpassed the 50 point-mark for the second time this season, and first against P5* competition
*Maryland
Tagovailoa’s name is a living reminder that the people who brought us Coca-Cola also gave us New Coke
Rutgers and PSU have written another chapter in this storied rivalry, with PSU claiming the Wooder Ice Trewphy once again
Who goes first, Tom Allen or Scott Frost? This horserace is a dead heat between 0-fer-8 and Tyranny of Expectations
Purdue is coming dangerously close to an 8-win season
In tangential B1G news, Oregon finally got unmasked in a fashion so dramatic, they’ve virtually ensured the Pac-12 will miss the CFP for the 5th straight year
Speaking of bowl games, the B1G will be lucky to go .333 in the post-season...between MSU’s non-existent pass defense, PSU’s here-today-gone-tomorrow offense, Iowa’s mayonnaise-flavored ambivalence, and whatever the hell Wisconsin is, this conference is set up to get absolutely trucked in December/January

The Rundown

Michigan State at Ohio State | Sparty remembers their place 59-7

GF3, your esteemed author: The only criticism I have of this game is Ryan Day calling off the dogs so early. In the late season, style points count, and 60+ says a lot more psychologically to your critics—who just watched the team who handed you your one loss get dismembered by beefy Mormons in the shadow of the temple—than 56. But as far as final home games go, this is one for the ages. Sure, it’s always better for seniors to beat the little gold pants off Michigan in Ohio Stadium to close out their Buckeye careers, but MSU is a reasonable facsimile. Chris Olave set the OSU TD receiving record in front of a home crowd, the offense put up 655 yards, and OSU was penalized once for 5 yards. All in all, that’s about as good as it can get.

MaximumSam: Buckeyes looked good. Glad to see the defense play all right.

Admirably Kontentski: Keon Coleman had a nice touchdown catch, and the leaves certainly got raked. And that’s all I have to say about that.

Michigan at Maryland | Yellow M beats Plaid M, 59-7

RMB: What a wonderful finish to the season. Michigan scored their 4th most points ever in a road game, getting TDs from the offense, defense, and special teams. Freshman RB Donovan Edwards set a Michigan receiving yardage record for RBs with 170. Overall Michigan had over 500 yards of offense and Hassan Haskins got over 1000 on the year. It was a great conclusion to a great season, a season I predicted would have 4 wins. It’s really kind of sad that it’s over. It’s been a lot of fun. See you all next year.

GF3: Nice try on the reverse jinx, pal.

Nebraska at Wisconsin | Badgers win Red, White & Blah showdown, 35-28

Beezer07: Uhhh they won and I will acknowledge both that Braelon Allen is very good and there was a brutal uncalled DPI on the final play

Jesse Collins: We lost. It was one possession. While I’m not surprised, I kinda am. They continue to try and that’s admittedly admirable.

Dead_Read: Yeah, we did it again. The team played well at times, yet still lost a close one. Only one more of these left (this year). (edited)

BRT: I didn’t watch a lot of this one. Why bother? I’ve seen this game before.I really do feel for this team. Remarkably, after a season of gut-punching losses that are perhaps unmatched in their sheer unluckiness, they haven’t quit. I think a lot of teams would have. It says a lot about them, and possibly even something about Scott Frost— whatever his coaching shortcomings, and in spite of being endlessly vilified by outside observers, he doesn’t seem to have lost his team. A team that has quit probably doesn’t hang 452 yards on a top defense in the country without an offensive staff. Then again, maybe a psychologically healthy team doesn’t keep playing one score under their opponent.Still, admirable as the effort may be, the result was once again remarkably similar to so many others this season— another close loss. There’s probably an interesting sports psychology paper on this team, but it’s not making this record go down any easier.On Friday, this season ends, mercifully. The hopeful money is that a season of pent-up frustration unloads on Iowa. The smart money though, is on a close loss— say, 1-7 points?

Illinois at Iowa | A Berting avoided, 33-23

stewmonkey13: Is Iowa good? Ehhhhh… Did Iowa win? Yes! This game was dictated by offensive incompetence, on both sides. For much of the game it seemed as if the goal was to not score, as there were no touchdowns from the first minute of the 2nd quarter to the last minute of the game. Iowa refused to clinch the game by predictably not learning anything last week, where they were dominated in every category, except for redzone efficiency. On Saturday, Iowa decided to be the dominating team, while refusing to put the game away by attempting 5FGs (making4). The offense stuff sucks. The special teams is borderline elite, and the defense is still very, very good. Iowa did manage to score TDs in all 3 phases. Bit this is a team with a governor put on by the coaching staff.

Creighton: I’ve seen a lot of football games in my life, and that was certainly one of them.

Thumpasaurus: Well shit, I mean, it would have been interesting to see how things would have played out had Iowa not been gifted a free touchdown as soon as we went up 10-0, but at the end of the day this is what it looks like when you lack depth. We couldn’t survive the loss of half our interior DT’s and Iowa settled in on 3rd downs and was able to get yards with qb rushes. Illinois fell behind and gave up on the run entirely instead of trying to keep it close, and Brandon Peters missed a few throws with perfectly clean pockets. Whatever man, we’re not due for a bowl for another 3 years

Still might make it there a year or two ahead of schedule

What a bizarre path we’ve taken to 4-8

He was a high school QB: Just like last year, we got 1 quarter of good Brandon Peters against iowa and that wasn’t enough. Let me point out some of the Tony Petersen decisions that infuriate me. Getting the ball with a minute to go in the half and three timeouts and running three consecutive plays. Either take a knee or try to score. On a third and five from Iowa 30 yard line down 7, we run a dive up the middle and have 4th and 2. That’s a fine call if you plan to go for it on 4th and short, but we kick a FG. Why not try for a 1st down if you plan to kick a FG if you don’t get it? Williams got four touches and got 53 yards, way more efficient than any other player. He’s been very good all year, but we rarely get him the ball. Petersen just doesn’t seem to play calls with any thought for the game situation or the capabilities of his personnel. Fire Tony Petersen!

Purdue at Northwestern | Extry! Extry! Engineers Hammer Journos, 32-14

BoilerUp89: Purdue abused the Northwestern corners with the same route and Milton Wright ended up with 213 yards, 3 TDs as a result. O’Connell had another 400+ yard passing performance and the defense limited big plays forcing Northwestern to drive the whole field without making mistakes. I’d also like to take a moment to thank Tom Ricketts for going super cheap on the turf covering the infield so that it was a dangerous hazard for the players. Glad Purdue and Northwestern could help him pad his pockets with more cash.

LPW: Wheee! Another Saturday. Another loss. Let’s just get this damn season over with. It looked like the game would be competitive after the first quarter, but that was a mirage. Purdue outplayed us, and I’m glad I didn’t take the Clark bus to Wrigley to watch this debacle (edited)

Rutgers at PSU | PSU cruises “down the sho-ure”, 28-0

misdreavus79: 35 players came down with the flu. Sean Clifford nearly puked on the field. That’s how sick everyone was. If there was a time for Rutgers to pull out the win, this was it.Instead, Christian Veilleux balled out in his first game since high school, in 2019, throwing for 235 yards and three touchdowns, on the way to the largest margin of victory since Saquon Barkley was terrorizing people.If y’all can’t win under those circumstances, well, I don’t know what to tell you. (edited)

87townie: Penn State had 35 kids out for today’s game with the flu. Not Covid, just a plain old flu. Which meant a lot of new faces and players in positions we haven’t seen before. Redshirt senior safety Jonathan Sutherland wound up starting at Sam linebacker because we had no more depth. That also included QB Christian Veilleux, a redshirt freshman who was buried on the depth chart last year. He was third string until starter Sean Clifford went down in the first and second stringer Taquan Robinson was a scratch. Veilleux stepped in and played very well against a solid Rutgers defense. He went 15 of 24 for 235 yards and three touchdowns. Color me impressed. But it was the defense, featuring many new young players, that really stood out. They stonewalled the Rutgers offense repeatedly. They held Rutgers to just 67 yards on 32 rushes and just 93 yards receiving. Strong showing on senior day. Let’s hope the team gets well and we carry the momentum through the end of the season.

Minnesota at Indiana | Gophers serve a hotdish of existential pain, 35=14

WSR: Minnesota beat all of the dogcrap out of Indiana. Indiana’s not good, but it is was still a boring, effective win. The defense did a great job. The first drive, following the Gophers being stopped on 4th down on the 8 yard line, went for 92 yards. The last drive in garbage time went for 69 nice yards. Between those two? 57 yards on 9 possessions. That’s just damn fine murderball. The offense did enough without anyone being really spectacular. Tanner Morgan was good, Ky Thomas is a star in the making, and Chris Autman-Bell is really fun when he’s healthy because he makes insanely good TD catches. (edited)

BuffKomodo: At the time of writing, thru 8 B1G games Indiana has 9 Touchdowns. If you subtract the Maryland game, it’s 4 touchdowns thru 7 games. There’s not defense on Earth that can salvage that. One more game left until the official look for a new OC begins. If Nick Sheridan isn’t fired, then Tom Allen might just have his seat turned up to 7 or 8 at the onset of next season.