Marvin Harrison Jr. caught five passes for one hundred twenty-six yards, one of the catches a seventy-five-yard touchdown and Emeka Egbuka caught two touchdowns out of his four scores.
TreVeyon Henderson rushed for eighty-eight yards with two touchdowns and the Buckeye defense scored two touchdowns on their side of the ball.
Ohio State improves to 3-0 and will travel to Notre Dame next Saturday night for their first season test against the Fighting Irish.
Olentangy Offerings
1) Ryan Day announced earlier in the week that Kyle McCord had finally won the starting quarterback job over Devin Brown and the decision seemed to allow McCord to relax a bit.
McCord completed nineteen of twenty-three passes for over three hundred yards and three touchdowns and for the first time this season, looked comfortable and poised in the pocket.
2) McCord also played more than you would expect in a non-conference pummeling but that was more to get McCord extra snaps, which carries the risk of injury.
However, getting a quarterback who hasn't played that much in three years as many snaps as you can before the biggest game of the year to date is worth that risk.
3) Marvin Harrison Jr.'s seventy-five-yard touchdown catch and run showed why the numbers don't always matter and why he is still the nation's best wide receiver.
Give McCord credit for the throw but Harrison had five yards on the defensive back and it was just flawless how he shifted gears.
4) The offensive line protected Kyle McCord and later Devin Brown well in the game and the Hilltoppers finished with just one sack on the afternoon.
5) The Buckeyes scored thirty-five points in the second quarter and few teams can match that output but the thing that I liked best was getting the ball back with under a minute to go in the first half with Ryan Day throwing the ball to go for the throat of the Hilltoppers, ending with a fourteen-yard strike to Emeka Egbuka.
Day can be such a strong playcaller but tends to almost show mercy at times.
When Day is aggressive, Ohio State is tough to defeat!
6) Ohio State forced four turnovers, two interceptions, and two fumble recoveries and while Western Kentucky isn't a top team, they do move the ball and rank among the best offensive teams among the Group of Five level, which is very encouraging as far as my hopes for the defense.
7) I loved the physical play from the linebackers and secondary!
Denzel Burke and Jordan Hancock both delivered jarring hits that forced Western Kentucky fumbles that Ohio State recovered with Burke's hit resulting in a fumble recovery for a touchdown by Tyleik Williams.
8) TreVeyon Henderson has often been criticized for running "soft" but I have seen a difference this year with a willingness to put his shoulder down a bit more.
Perhaps that is due to the competition being smaller but Henderson is gaining a bit of physicality to his game, hope the trend continues.
9) The defensive breakout player so far has been defensive tackle Tyleik Williams, who made more impact than his fumble recovery in the end zone.
Williams finished with a sack, and a tackle for loss, and was in on seven tackles on the afternoon.
Williams is stuffing the run well and adding a pass rush up the middle from the interior line.
10) And now the preliminaries are over, it's on to Notre Dame and the conference schedule and even though the opener against Indiana is a league game, the feeling is that the real season starts next week in South Bend.
Things appear to be rounding into shape a bit but we will know far more after next Saturday!
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