PISCATAWAY, NJ - AUGUST 30: A Rutgers Scarlet Knights helmet sits on the sideline during the fourth quarter against the Massachusetts Minutemen at SHI Stadium on August 30, 2019 in Piscataway, New Jersey. Rutgers defeated UMass 48-21. (Photo by Corey Perrine/Getty Images)Give Rutgers some serious credit: the Scarlet Knights, in their first year back under Greg Schiano, are very plucky. On the road at Ohio State, they just pulled off one of the coolest touchdowns on the season this year.
Down 42-15, Rutgers had Ohio State pinned deep. After stops on three straight Trey Sermon runs, they forced a Drue Chrisman punt from Ohio State’s end zone. Schiano has always been opportunistic when it comes to special teams, and drew up something really cool for tonight against his old Ohio State colleague Ryan Day.
Defensive back Avery Young fielded the punt by the sideline at the Rutgers 42. He had some space, and threw a long, accurate lateral all the way across the field to receiver Bo Melton. He got some good blocking, and cut across the field for an awesome 58-yard punt return touchdown.
Down 49-27 late in the fourth quarter, Rutgers is probably not going to win this one. They kept it fairly interesting, and given where the program is coming from, where any game against one of the Big Ten powers was an assured blowout, that’s a pretty good place for the Scarlet Knights to be.
This Rutgers trick play TD was WILD 😳
(via @CFBONFOX)pic.twitter.com/HdqhMNugeL
— Bleacher Report CFB (@BR_CFB) November 8, 2020
It isn’t all rosey for Rutgers, of course. Ohio State has outgained them 510-296 total yards, and Justin Fields is having another Heisman-worthy performance.
Fields is 24-for-28 for 314 yards and five touchdowns today. Once again, he has more touchdowns than incompletions, something that has been a regular occurrence for him this year. It is hard not to see him as the Heisman favorite at this point.
Still, Rutgers has looked about as competitive against the Buckeyes as most middling Big Ten teams can hope to be. That’s a big improvement for the program over basically the entire time that Schiano was gone.
