COLUMBUS, Ohio — Nico Iamaleava’s return to Ohio Stadium was supposed to be the most intriguing storyline entering Saturday’s matchup between Ohio State and UCLA football. That is no longer the case.

The UCLA quarterback won’t play due to a concussion, according to a report from On3. The injury was suffered during last week’s loss against Nebraska.

Iamaleava finished the contest, but concussion symptoms didn’t surface until postgame, per the report. Sophomore Luke Duncan will likely start in Iamaleava’s place.

COLUMBUS, Ohio — Ohio State’s offense ran the most plays it’s had in one game since the 2022 season on Saturday.

The 76 plays, which accounted for 34 points and 473 yards, are the most since Ohio State ran 77 plays in a loss to Michigan. The higher play count was more common in the 2022 season, when the Buckeyes averaged 67.4 plays per game.

That has significantly dropped in the years since.

Ohio State is averaging just 63.1 plays this season, according to TruMedia, and Saturday marked the second time this season that the Buckeyes ran more than 70 plays.

Much of that has to do with Ohio State’s defense. Led by defensive coordinator Matt Patricia, the top-ranked Buckeyes held Purdue to just 44 plays Saturday. Purdue had 13 first downs in the game; that type of dominance will show a large discrepancy on the play sheet.

Still, there’s been a fundamental change in how coach Ryan Day is running his program.

The pace of play has slowed. Entering Saturday’s game vs. UCLA, the Buckeyes rank No. 120 nationally in total plays (568) and average three minutes and 19 seconds of possession per drive, the slowest in the Day era. That’s not by coincidence or because Ohio State has a young quarterback in Julian Sayin.

Due to the expanded College Football Playoff and the sport’s ever-changing nature, Day has intentionally lowered his team’s play count. The only way to do that and remain a national title contender is to be efficient on offense. That’s the battle Day has been fighting for two years now, and winning.

“Efficiency is what we’re after because when you’re efficient and you’re playing like that, a three-score game can feel like it is way out of reach. Where I feel like maybe in the past it was like, ‘OK, we’re just getting started on the game,’” Day said on his radio show last Thursday.

Day hasn’t been afraid to embrace change in his seven years leading Ohio State’s football program.

A year ago, he decided to give up playcalling, putting his ego aside to help his program get over the hump and win its first national championship since 2014.

Although he was still involved with the practice and offensive game plan, with the name, image and likeness and transfer portal era taking over college football, he felt his time was better suited as the program’s CEO than everyday play caller.

Then, more change came, and he had to make another decision. Day knew that the time of up-tempo offenses finding success every down was over.

Defensive coordinators realized how to defend most up-tempo offenses, and when mixed with the ability to decode signals and the player-to-coach communication, it led Day to move to a huddled offense.

“Now they can’t see your formation, they don’t know your plays and can’t see your signals,” Day said. “Now, when you need to change pace and go tempo, it’s a good change of pace, but teams got really good at just seeing your formation and calling plays based on your formation. And then you’re shifting, and by that time, you might as well have just huddled up honestly.”

Ohio State’s pace slowed down in the 2023 season. It averaged 63.9 plays per game with Kyle McCord leading the offense, but at times, the efficiency wasn’t consistent. The Buckeyes averaged only 2.56 points per drive and scored a touchdown on just 31 percent of their drives, both career lows for a Day-led offense.

In 2024, things started to mesh better. Ohio State had a veteran roster, and with the player-to-coach communication approved for that season, the Buckeyes embraced being a huddle team and thrived.

They ran 61.8 plays per game, ran a play every 29.4 seconds, averaged 3.12 points per drive and scored a touchdown on 41.3 percent of their drives. It wasn’t the best year from an efficiency standpoint, but a drastic improvement from the 2023 season. That’s what Day wants: efficiency.

It’s the key to success if the play count is going to drop.

Efficiency isn’t everything, though. In the first year of the expanded playoff, Ohio State’s average total play count of 989 was still lower than playoff teams Texas, Penn State and Notre Dame, who each played 16 games, and Clemson, who played 14 games.

It kept Ohio State healthy throughout the championship run.

“When you look at it from the beginning of the season, you look at it from a 20,000-foot view and say, ‘OK, we can cut down on the number of plays to keep our team healthy at the end of the season,’” Day said.

Now, with a year under its belt, Ohio State has been even slower and more efficient with its pace, despite a new quarterback and a completely new running back room.

The Buckeyes don’t just have their slowest time per possession under Day. They also have the slowest time per play at 31.6 seconds. Still, one could argue this is also Day’s most efficient offense.

Ohio State is averaging 3.56 points per drive and scoring a touchdown on 45.6 percent of its drives, both marks are the second highest in the Day era. It averaged 3.57 points per drive in 2021 and scored touchdowns on 46.5 percent of drives in 2019.

Those numbers will likely drop as the season goes on and the competition gets tougher, but it’s a sign of an offense that is extremely comfortable with its new identity.

“But once you get into the rhythm of huddling, you get used to that and guys get comfortable in it,” Day said.

He still believes there’s more Ohio State can accomplish.

Day wasn’t pleased with his program running 26 plays in the third quarter and the beginning of the fourth quarter and getting just three points. A 15-play drive to open the third quarter ended in a Sayin interception in the red zone.

“We had a lot of plays to only get three points, that’s not ideal,” Day said after the Purdue win. “Other than that, I thought there was a lot of good play.”

But more than anything, he juggles the need to play at the pace he wants while also becoming more explosive.

This has been the least explosive offense Day has had since taking over in 2019. Ohio State’s explosive rush rate is 7.8 percent, the lowest during his tenure. The explosive pass rate is 18.4 percent, although that’s not far off from last year’s 18.9 percent. The Buckeyes’ total explosive play rate is 12.7 percent, also the lowest in that time frame.

Day demands perfection from his offense, and he’s rarely satisfied. This year’s offense, while sometimes not flashy, has been one of the most efficient in his career, and though statistically it’s the slowest-paced offense, Day knows they can go tempo when they need to.

“We’re not going to go tempo just because we want to go tempo; it has to give us an advantage,” Day said. “When we are on the same page and we are being efficient and executing at a high level, that’s what’s most important, period. We are still chasing that. We aren’t there. But changing the tempo helps.”

As Ohio State enters the final postseason push, with a matchup with Michigan three weeks away, its pace of play has become a bigger national topic each week. The goal is for the Buckeyes to save themselves for the biggest moments, and when the time comes, they can play however they want.

“When it’s time to turn up the game, we will,” Day said.