The Ohio State game doesn’t matter anymore.
The biggest home opener in IU football history is a week in the past, and the only thing that matters now for the Hoosiers is the remaining 11 games on their schedule. How their season goes will not be shaped by how Ohio State sophomore defensive end Nick Bosa obliterated IU’s running game or how junior wide receiver Parris Campbell danced into the end zone on a crossing route.
Those plays don’t matter anymore. The only thing that matters is the game against Virginia.
“And I told our guys when we met on Saturday, Virginia is the biggest game of the season,” IU Coach Tom Allen said at his Monday press conference. “Why? Because it's the next game. And that was the approach. There's no question there's a lot put into that.”
While its cliché to say the next game is the most important game of the season, Saturday's contest at Virginia will go a long way in defining the trajectory of IU this season. This is the type of road game that has eluded the IU program in recent years. Allen’s team has a chance to beat a weak Power Five team on the road.
A victory over the Cavilers won’t be a crowning achievement as Bronco Mendenhall’s squad will likely reside in the basement of the ACC standings this season, but it will go a long way to prove what type of team this team is.
One of the most dangerous parts of this game is how different it is from the Ohio State game. There’s zero buzz surrounding this game because it nearly wasn’t going to be shown on TV.
Winning on the road is never easy, especially after a hyped season opener. The game screams “trap game.”
But, the players aren’t worried.
“It’s part of the Big Ten, honestly in my opinion,” senior safety Chase Dutra said. “You’ve got to learn at the big games and then flush it all. You have a whole new team, whole new schemes, whole new checks. You’ve got to be able to adapt.”
Ohio State was an impossible litmus test. The questions the game brought up about the Hoosiers might be meaningless against teams that aren’t in the stratosphere of the College Football Playoff. The Buckeyes are the best team on IU's schedule and pose problems for even the best teams in the Big Ten Conference.
Virginia, on the other hand, won only two games last season, losing by 17 to FCS school Richmond. Not exactly the same type of team as Ohio State.
This is the type of team that at this point in the IU program’s ascent that IU should beat. The Hoosiers talent alone should overwhelm the Cavaliers and help them get out of Charlottesville, Virginia, with Allen’s first win as a head coach at IU.
The last two seasons, IU has reached six wins and bowl eligibility in the final game of the season. The last time IU won more than six games was 2007, where the Hoosiers went to the Insight Bowl. Since 1995, IU has only won seven games twice.
If the Hoosiers want to reach that mark or further, beating Virginia is essential to that happening. Allen talks of a breakthrough, and beating Virginia won’t be that type of win, but it will set the table for future opportunities to do so.
One game at a time.
