Ohio State won the Big Ten Championship, again.

But the win wasn’t as dominant as many thought it would be, or as the Buckeyes needed it to be. Ryan Day’s squad needed a second-half comeback to beat Northwestern, after failing to reach the end zone in the first half – it was the first time since their 2018 loss to Purdue that had happened.

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The passing game never got going, and OSU quarterback Justin Fields was bailed out by Trey Sermon’s record-breaking day running the ball, along with three takeaways by the Buckeyes defense.

While the 22-10 win was enough to bring the B1G championship trophy back to Columbus, Fields will need to step up his game if Ohio State has a chance to keep up with Clemson and Trevor Lawrence in the national semifinal game on Jan. 1.

On the recent episode of ESPN’s CFB Podcast with Herbie, Pollack and Neghandi, analyst David Pollack called out Fields and the OSU team in general.

“And Ohio State — they’re not having a great team,” Pollack said. “You can spin it however you want. The way they started the season, I thought — dude, I watched Justin Fields and I was like, ‘Oh, my God. This dude has closed the gap with Trevor Lawrence,’ from one of those players that you go, ‘Oh, my God,’ like, ‘This dude comes around once every 15 years.’ And slowly, though, now you’ve seen, ‘Whoa, not even close.’ Taking a couple steps back, confused a lot, doesn’t know how to get rid of the football, doesn’t check the football down like you’d like to, not seeing it the way you would want to.”

Ohio State and Clemson square off in the Sugar Bowl on Jan. 1, 2021 in the College Football Playoffs national semifinal game. Kickoff is scheduled for 8:00PM on ESPN.