College Football Playoff seeding, a Heisman Trophy and a Big Ten title.
The stakes are as high as a college football game can offer between No. 1 Ohio State and No. 2 Indiana on Saturday night.
There are zero losses between these two teams, but a 4.5-point spread favoring the Buckeyes.
Ohio State’s regular season was as close to flawless as one could script. It’s a resume that needs no introduction, but Indiana is looking at the No. 1 team in SP+, a plus-29.3 scoring margin, a top-five rank in both offensive and defensive EPA per play and a surgical 69 percent conversion rate in the red zone.
Opponents have been running through wet cement against the Buckeyes defense, which has conceded just 7.8 points per game.
Ohio State vs. Indiana odds, prediction
It’s not to discount the Hoosiers’ capabilities with the ball; they’re the best offense that Ohio State will have seen this season, ranking No. 3 in Offensive SP+. Fernando Mendoza’s blend of downfield precision and mobility pulls chunk plays out of a hat, helping to generate 20-plus yards or more on nine percent of plays.
But the Buckeyes suffocate quarterbacks like no other defense, forcing them into high-difficulty, low-efficiency throws that have amounted to a 3.9 yards per dropback, a 34.3 percent success rate and the fewest explosive plays allowed.
When Mendoza faced Oregon, the No. 5 SP+ defense, he was held to 215 yards and the offense gained 4.8 yards per play in contrast to its season average of 6.8. I’m finding it hard to imagine those numbers progressing against the best pass defense in college football.
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On the other side of the football, Indiana brings a formidable front of its own, ranking as the second-best unit overall. There’s a kryptonite, however, and that’s the deep ball. According to Sharp Football Analysis, opposing signal callers have completed 45 percent of throws of 15 yards or more outside of the red zone.
I’m expecting Julian Sayin to exploit that for everything it’s worth with Jeremiah Smith and Carnell Tate at his disposal; he leads the country with a 63 percent completion rate from that depth.
If the Hoosiers can’t get to Sayin, Smith and Tate should be well-fed as downfield separators that have both fueled an attack that’s completed its passes at another nation-best mark of 77.8 percent. Michigan, who the Buckeyes swallowed 27-9 last week, couldn’t — and they were a top-five pressure rate that is relative to Indiana.
Ohio State’s offensive line ranks third in limiting pressure and Sayin has been sacked on only 1.8 percent of dropbacks. Even considering the Hoosiers’ elite havoc generation, he should have clean pockets to make his choices.
It’s been a great story for the Hoosiers, who will appear in their first-ever Big Ten Championship. The Buckeyes have been here plenty of times before, and the pressure margin here projects wider than the point spread.
THE PLAY: Ohio State -4 (-110, DraftKings)
Why Trust New York Post Betting
Sean Treppedi handicaps the NFL, NHL, MLB and college football for the New York Post. He primarily focuses on picks that reflect market value while tracking trends to mitigate risk.
[Notigroup Newsroom in collaboration with other media outlets, with information from the following sources]
