Pryor’s legend growing as Ohio State improves to 3-0 under his lead
Terrelle Pryor kept a perfect record as a starter. Chris “Beanie” Wells kept things loose.
That’s all Ohio State (5-1, 2-0 Big Ten) needed to stay at the top of the class in the conference with a 20-17 win over Wisconsin on Saturday night. The Buckeyes moved up to No. 12 in the AP poll Sunday.
“A lot of people have been questioning our mental toughness,”
Ohio State linebacker James Laurinaitis said. “This is one of those wins that will definitely stick in my mind forever.”
It certainly should after the performance of Pryor, the poised freshman who moved to 3-0 as a starter and is the type of playmaker the Buckeyes need to compete with the likes of Southern California, which embarrassed Ohio State last month.
Wells didn’t play in that game because of a toe injury and Pryor hadn’t yet been named the starter.
Facing the most important game since that Saturday night debacle, the duo scored Ohio State’s touchdowns: a 33-yard run by Wells and a game-winning 11-yard scamper by Pryor.
No disrespect to Troy or Minnesota, but beating Wisconsin (3-2, 0-2) on the road — the first opponent to do so since Iowa on Nov. 12, 2005 — was a much bigger indicator of how far the Buckeyes’ budding star has progressed.
“You know Terrelle didn’t have everything go his way, but he kept hanging in there,”
said Buckeyes coach Jim Tressel, who improved to 3-3 against Wisconsin — the only conference opponent that had a winning record against him. “We made enough mistakes to make it hard on ourselves, and now we’ve got to work on getting a lot better.”
Pryor was at the center of most of the mistakes, but his athleticism propelled the Buckeyes when it counted against the Badgers, who had squandered a 19-point lead in a loss to Michigan the week before.
“Michigan, that was more stunning than anything else,”
Badgers safety Jay Valai said. “This game was just hurtful because we know we played hard. It’s a terrible thing right now, I don’t like thinking about it.”
Wisconsin, which fell out of the Top 25, never took a lead bigger than 17-13 off P.J. Hill’s goal-line run with 6:31 left. That gave Pryor plenty of time to atone for an early interception and the four sacks he took trying to make plays.
“Even on the last drive, things went wrong,”
Laurinaitis said. “As a young kid, you can get frustrated. But there’s a reason why he’s here at Ohio State.”
The drive finished with a flourish after a rocky start.
Receiver Brian Hartline dropped a pass. Pryor fumbled. Hartline fumbled, too, on a 27-yard completion.
But the breaks kept going Ohio State’s way with recoveries, and Pryor came through when it counted.
“He was everything the coaches said he would be,”
Wisconsin defensive end Matt Shaughnessy said. “It’s tough when it’s second-, third-and-long and they get a first down.”
On second-and-14 at Wisconsin’s 28, Pryor completed a 13-yard pass to Ray Small to bring up third-and-1 at the 15. After Pryor pushed ahead on a sneak for a first down, Wells fed off the crowd’s energy to gain the final 2 of his 168 yards.
“Coach told us this week, the louder the stadium, the tougher we get,”
Wells said. “The stadium got real rowdy out there and our guys were just taking it all in and enjoying every moment of it.”
Pryor reached the end zone by himself on an option.
“I saw Beanie right there and then I saw someone cutting,”
Pryor said. “So I just gave a pump fake to make sure he goes to hit Beanie.”
Allan Evridge, who committed both of the Badgers’ turnovers, threw an interception on the next play with 53 seconds remaining to leave Wisconsin’s season in shambles and end a 16-game home winning streak.
The Badgers thought they could make a major bowl if they could begin 3-0 in conference play with wins against the rebuilding Wolverines followed by home games at night with Ohio State and No. 6 Penn State this Saturday.
Now Wisconsin must settle for a spoiler role, likely to spend another holiday at a midlevel bowl in Florida.
“You keep beating yourself up after the last two games, the snowball effect can be pretty bad. Right now we’re 3-2, we started 3-0. It can get a whole lot worse than that,”
Valai said. “Ohio State, they’re the kings of the Big Ten.”
