On Friday January 10th at 7:30 pm eastern time, the 6th ranked 12-2 Ohio State Buckeyes will travel to Arlington Texas to play the 3rd ranked 13-2 Texas Longhorns in the Cotton Bowl for the College Football Playoffs semifinals. The Buckeyes last game was a blowout win over the top ranked Oregon Ducks in the Rose Bowl on New Years Day 41-21. The Longhorns defeated the 12th ranked Arizona State Sun Devils in overtime at the Peach Bowl 39-31 on the same day. Ohio State is a 6-point favorite in this game and has looked impressive thus far in the inaugural College Football Playoffs.  Texas appeared to have struggled against Arizona State.

The Buckeyes in their last two games have jumped out to early leads. They did this against both Tennessee and Oregon. With the level of talent on offense at both quarterback and wide receiver, the Texas defense will have their hands full the whole game. Texas is not short of talent though; quarterback Quin Ewers is talented even though he has had to deal with recent injuries. However, on paper the Ohio State Buckeyes are the better team.

I would expect Ohio State to win this game. It appears since the Michigan loss the team has played with more purpose. They also have stuck to what they are good at doing on the football field. In the Michigan game they went away from their offensive identity. They tried to run the ball on the Michigan defensive line while they had offensive line injuries. The Michigan loss was a needed wake up call for the Ohio State Buckeyes. That call was answered in the last two College Football Playoff games for this team. I believe the answered call will continue, and this Ohio State Buckeyes team will be playing in the National Championship game on January 20th. I also don’t think it will matter who they play in that game. This Buckeyes team is on a mission to win a National Title.