James Franklin had a ten word response to playing Ohio State

James Franklin spoke to the media this week about playing Ohio State and what he’s seen from their run game.

Opening Statement

“When you talk about Ohio State…Ryan Day, his career there, the program in general, obviously I have a ton of respect for what they've been able to do for a long period of time under a number of different coaches. Then obviously how they're playing again this year.

You look at them statistically, they're playing really good football pretty much across the board. Offensively Chip Kelly there, I think Chip has a reputation of a guy with a spread background, throwing the ball around. I get that. But if you really study Chip, he's always had a strong running game. You see that this year. It's a big part of what they're doing. 11 and 12 personnel.

Their quarterback Will Howard who transferred from Kansas State is a big guy and playing really good football for 'em. Touchdown-to-interception ratio, QBR, all those things, doing some really good things. Obviously a young man from Pennsylvania, so he'll have a bunch of support here from his family and friends.

TreyVeyon Henderson is explosive, one of the most explosive running backs in the country who we recruited out of high school and are very, very familiar. Quinshon Judkins, we're also familiar with. Two really good running backs. Then obviously there's a bunch of receivers you could talk about. The guy that's getting a lot of buzz right now is Jeremiah Smith, a freshman. But there's a number of receivers that we could be talking about.

Obviously we all know this is going to be a challenge. We're going to need a tremendous environment in that stadium on Saturday. Home-field advantage is going to be something that is going to be very, very important for us. So we need this place rocking no matter what time the game is. We need a great environment. We need everybody in the stadium early. We need that place rocking. We need everybody standing and screaming on third down and critical downs and possessions. This is going to be an all-hands-on-deck game.”

Ohio State over the last couple of years seems to have made the transition to be a more physical team and run game oriented. How have they done that?

James: Obviously the last two years they've played really good defense. Really over the last number of years they've played really good defense. But I think since Coach Knowles has been there, he's taken them to a whole 'nother level.

Offensively this year, like I mentioned in my opening statement, when you talk about Chip, there's a commitment to running the ball. I don't think there's any doubt about that. I think that's always been the case if you look back at Chip over his history. I think Chip has the experience and the ability to play to the strengths of his team. I think he is clearly doing that right now.