Offensive Takeaways: Explosive Buckeye Attack Overwhelmed Arkansas State

C.J. Stroud was nearly perfect on the day as the Buckeyes racked up more than 500 yards of offense.

Final Score: Ohio State 45, Arkansas State 12

The first half featured some impressive highlights, the likes of which we didn't see many of last week. C.J. Stroud had 204 yards passing by halftime with two touchdowns - and a debatable call likely erased another one.

Stroud looked poised and threw a number of extremely good balls, including deep balls to Marvin Harrison Jr. and Cade Stover that were just perfect. TreVeyon Henderson and Miyan Williams both had carries for longer than 25 yards as the Buckeyes established their ground attack early on.

The 2021 Heisman finalist QB finished the day 16-for-24 for 351 yards, four touchdowns and zero interceptions. Harrison caught three of those touchdowns, Emeka Egbuka got the other one.

On the depth chart, Xavier Johnson appears to have jumped Jayden Ballard at wide receiver. Last week, Ballard committed a personal foul on a punt that Notre Dame fair caught, and when I asked Ryan Day about the four 15-yard penalties his team committed last week, I got the impression that Ballard was in the doghouse.

In fairness, Johnson was called for an unsportsmanlike foul on the Harrison Jr. touchdown at the beginning of the game, but given Ryan Day's lengthy reaction pleading with the officials after the P.A.T., I don't get the impression that Johnson will draw the ire of his coaching staff.

The Buckeyes scored on four of their first six possessions of the game, which is certainly a good ratio. But it was particularly frustrating to see them fail to put Arkansas State away before halftime. They inherited the ball on their own 48 yard line with 51 seconds left and the offense went 3-and-out. But any time you average more than 10 yards per play, good things are going to happen.

In the second half, Gee Scott Jr. made a GORGEOUS block to spring Henderson for a 23-yard touchdown.

In terms of playing some depth, it took longer than they hoped to get to that point. But the Buckeyes were able to get the second team offense some meaningful reps. The second team offensive line included Zen Michalski, Enokk Vimahi, Jakob James, Tegra Tshabola and Josh Fryar.

More to come from Columbus after Ryan Day's press conference wraps up.

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