Sports
Ohio Must Avoid Penalties, Red Zone Droughts Against Kansas
By: Mike Rizzo
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Ohio football coach Frank Solich made it clear on what his team has to avoid going into their game against Kansas.
Penalties.
Ohio will play the Kansas Jayhawks this Saturday in Lawrence Kansas at Memorial Stadium and Solich’s game plan is to not shoot themselves in the foot.
“Number one we can’t hurt ourselves.” Solich said. “We did that repeatedly in the game against Texas State. It is one thing to have some errors and penalties, but it is another thing to have them happen where they are just senseless penalties.”
Ohio managed to rack up 14 penalties for more than 140 yards against Texas State. Ohio had more total yards and sacks and had fewer turnovers but still let the game slip from their grasp.
Against Kansas, Solich said that Ohio can’t put themselves in situations on offense where they are starting their drives and already being penalized. Solich stated that this happened three different times last game due to the special teams being flagged for holding and or unsportsmanlike conduct.
However, Ohio has a bigger problem on their hands than penalties and that is its red zone performance. Ohio’s offense struggled in these situations and had to settle for field goals five times and converted on four of them.
“We settled for field goals offensively too many times rather than touchdowns.” Solich said. “That is a huge problem for us. We didn’t do a great job in the red zone on either side of the ball, which is a huge problem.”
Last season Texas State ranked dead last in defense in Division I football. Ohio struggled in the first half by only putting six points on the board compared to Texas State’s 14.
Ohio can’t do this in Lawrence on Saturday. Even though Kansas didn’t even manage to win a game last year, the Jayhawks won their season opener and do play in the Big 12, a power conference that sent a team to the College Football Playoff last year in Oklahoma.
Ohio quarterback Greg Windham was stagnant in the red zone in the first half and did not manage to have a touchdown in three trips. Although his second half was very impressive, Windham has to find a way to put points on the board early in this week’s game.
“I thought Greg did a good job for what is considered his first start.” Solich said. “I think he got better as the game went on. You can’t just throw it up every time you get in the red zone and want to try and score points. It comes back to having a strong running game and then winning one-on-one battles in the receiving game.”
The last time Ohio played Kansas on the football field was in 1967 where Ohio won the game 30-15. Now 50 years has passed by and these two teams will meet on the gridiron for the second time.
This time around Ohio is looking for its first win while Kansas is trying to get win number two and erase the debacle that happened last season. Kickoff is scheduled for 2:30 p.m. EST.