Cleveland, OH
An Ohio State touchdown vanished, and Kyle McCord showed Ryan Day something new
COLUMBUS, Ohio — Kyle McCord did not want to become the new topic of Ohio State football injury speculation.
The quarterback did appear to wear some extra tape or wrap on his left ankle Wednesday when he came off the practice field into the Woody Hayes Athletic Center. Asked for a status update, McCord offered only a “Nah, I’m good.”
McCord threw for a career-high 320 yards on that ankle last Saturday against Maryland. He followed a shaky start — incompletions on four of his first five attempts — with an efficient and at times explosive second half.
Two passes in particular stood out to coach Ryan Day, and the first one didn’t even count.
Midway through the fourth quarter, McCord ripped a 12-yard touchdown pass to Marvin Harrison Jr. to give OSU its largest lead of the game to that point, 34-17. As the celebration began in the end zone, however, a yellow flag laid on the Ohio Stadium turf. Xavier Johnson had been called for illegal motion for turning upfield too quickly while in motion.
So McCord reloaded and on the next snap hit Harrison on a nearly identical route for a 17-yard touchdown.
“That was the most confident I’ve seen him in the pocket back-to-back two in a row like that,” Day said. “That was well done. “
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McCord described those plays as indicative of his growing comfort level. His demeanor, arm talent and familiarity with the offense helped him win the starting job after a two-game audition with Devin Brown. Other finer points, such as processing and anticipation, are understandably still being refined with more reps.
Also, Ohio State’s touchdown percentage in the red zone of 52.94% ranks only 105th nationally. McCord and the rest of the offense showed some progress, then came right back and showed it again.
“With both of those plays that (Day) called, I got a good pre-snap look at the defense and then confirmed that post-snap,” McCord said. “Obviously, Marvin did a great job on both of those plays, getting open. In the red zone, nothing’s really ‘open.’ You just have to trust that your guy’s gonna make a contested catch, and that’s exactly what he did.
“So that was good to see — myself and the whole offense — take a step in the right direction in that area, because obviously, early on, that was one of the areas we struggled in.”
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