QB Stroud awaits his first trip to New York
Road to Heisman finalist unexpected, impressive
NEW YORK — This weekend’s Heisman Trophy ceremony is Ohio State quarterback C.J. Stroud’s first-ever trip to New York.
“I’m really excited,” he said. “I’ve never been before.
I’m a West Coast guy.”
Stroud, who grew up in Southern California, said the closest he’s been to the city came in October when the Buckeyes traveled to New Jersey for a conference game against Rutgers.
With those victories (plus their earlier dispatching of then top-ranked Duke), OSU enters a top-25 matchup Saturday against Wisconsin riding a three-game winning streak.
The Buckeyes will also enter Saturday's game as one of only two Big Ten schools relying so heavily on multiple freshmen. Kenpom.com computes a statistic tracking percentage of possessions used, assigning a value to a player “when his actions end a possession, either by making a shot, missing a shot that isn’t rebounded by the offense, or committing a turnover.”
Nebraska’s Trey Mcgowens leads the league’s freshmen with a 24.2% usage rate. Teammate Eduardo Andre, who like Johnson played last season, is at 23.0%. Mcgowens enters the weekend averaging 16.4 points while playing a team-high 34.4 minutes per game, ahead of Andre’s 4.1 and 11.1, respectively.
Johnson's and Branham's usage numbers, in that order, are 21.6% and 20.7%. That places them second and third on Ohio State's roster behind only E.J. Liddell's 34.6%.
The Cornhuskers are 5-5, 0-2 in the Big Ten. Ohio State is 7-2 and 1-0 in league play and doing it with two guards considered freshmen. In other words, no Big Ten team winning at the rate Ohio State is winning relies on youth quite as much.
It’s shown at times. Johnson scored 14 points in a loss at Xavier and hit the game-winning shot against Seton Hall in the Fort Myers Tipoff but was scoreless against Duke and had two points and three turnovers in the loss to Florida. He’s averaging 6.6 points and playing 20.5 minutes per game after starting the season opener.
“I’ve grown a lot,” Johnson said. “I’ve had some big games where it was big for me and some games that was, ‘what the heck, man?’ That’s basketball. It’s a long season.”
Branham has been a little more consistent, scoring between 7-11 points in seven of Ohio State’s nine games. In the two on-site games in Fort Myers, though, Branham scored six total points on 2-of-8 shooting and had five turnovers.
Both players have talked about learning through their mistakes in the early going. Against Florida, Branham had a two-handed dunk blocked from behind and later said that’s the first time something like that has ever happened to him in a game.
“On that play, I felt like I came up slow and it was kind of easy to block it,” Branham said. “If I would’ve went up fast I would’ve easily got the bucket. Just stuff like that, I work on things in practice. Adjusting and playing at a faster pace.”
The usage rates for Branham and Johnson don’t figure to be decreasing anytime soon. The Buckeyes have consistently preached that the duo’s growth will pay dividends as the season progresses.
Holtmann said the Buckeyes work to make sure players dealing with adversity for the first time in their careers don’t get too down on themselves. Veterans like Liddell are used as examples of players who, after encountering bumps along the way, grew into All-big Ten players. In recruiting, Holtmann said the coaches quiz players on personal adversity and take notes on how potential future Buckeyes have responded.
The final step is trusting the process — and maybe downing some antacids.
“Our young guys, Malaki and Meechie both, and our sophomores too, have all progressed well,” Diebler said. “We’ve got to keep doing that. Their willingness to learn and hear out and give an ear to our upperclassmen has certainly been beneficial.” ajardy@dispatch.com @Adamjardy