Santa arrives at the Dayton mall
2009 Ohio State football
Trotwood-Madison vs. Winton Woods
OHIO STATE 30, MINNESOTA 7
Buckeyes likely to rise in polls after victory
Sunday, September 30, 2007
MINNEAPOLIS — Ohio State didn't exactly shred Minnesota's notoriously porous defense. But on a day of upsets in college football, no one in the visiting locker room was worrying about the work-in-progress offense.
Quarterback Todd Boeckman threw two touchdown passes, and running back Chris Wells tallied two more TDs to lead the nation's eighth-ranked team to a 30-7 victory over the Gophers on Saturday night.
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The Buckeyes' win sets up a showdown between unbeaten teams next week at Purdue, and OSU (5-0, 2-0 Big Ten) could vault to fourth in the polls after losses by No. 3 Oklahoma, No. 4 Florida, No. 5 West Virginia and No. 7 Texas.
"All in all, we did what we had to do to get a Big Ten road win," coach Jim Tressel said. "But we know we'll have to do better than this a week from now."
Boeckman finished 18-of-29 passing for 209 yards with no interceptions, and Wells gained 116 yards on 24 carries, topping the 100-mark for the fourth straight game.
"I thought Todd did some good things," Tressel said. "He had a couple balls in the third quarter that didn't come off his hand as well as I would have liked. But he had a pretty high percentage. And he threw some balls to our receivers that (Minnesota) either had to interfere on or we were going to catch them."
Minnesota (1-4, 0-2) cut a 14-0 deficit in half with a second-quarter drive and was perched inside the OSU red zone again before cornerback Malcolm Jenkins ended the threat with an interception.
The Buckeyes were pinned at their 2-yard line after a turnover late in the first half and appeared content to run out the clock. But Wells ripped off a 27-yard run, and the Gophers were penalized 15 yards for a late hit.
One play later, Boeckman connected with Brian Robiskie for a 52-yard bomb with 57 seconds left, giving the Buckeyes a 20-7 lead and putting the Heimlich maneuver on a boisterous crowd of 51,611. Ryan Pretorius' 44-yard field goal in the third quarter made it 23-7.
The Buckeyes' first-string defense has given up just 20 points in five games.
