Who you got? LGHL staff predicts the score of Saturday’s Ohio State-Rutgers

We are now just hours away from the No. 4 Ohio State Buckeyes kicking off their first conference game of the season. At 3:30 p.m. ET, the Buckeyes will play host to their Big Ten East foe the Rutgers Scarlet Knights in a game that will be broadcast on the Big Ten Network.

Over the course of this season, we here at Land-Grant Holy Land are competing to see who the best prognosticator is on staff.

How this is working is that every week our writers and editors will predict what think the final score of the Ohio State game will be. If a forecaster foresees the game’s correct winner, he or she will receive 75 points. If the expert gets the score exactly right, they will receive a bonus 25 points. However, for every point that a prediction is off, one point will be subtracted—with a max total of 25 points getting subtracted. Get it? Got it? Good.

With every new week of predictions, we will update the standings, so that you can follow along and see who the best handicapper on the LGHL staff is. Current standings are below this week’s predictions.

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Matt Brown

Ohio State 56, Rutgers 14
Season Point Total: 50

(He’s THE Matt Brown, he doesn’t need to give an explanation.)

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Alexis Chassen

Ohio State 68, Rutgers 10
Season Point Total: 50

Chris Ash has done a lot with the Rutgers team since he took over the New Jersey program, and while the players might be gigantic, they are ultimately still Rutgers. Which means, they might find a way to score once or twice, but I have a feeling it’ll be more of what we saw last week against Oregon State, and OSU -- especially with Urban Meyer back at practice -- rolls over their first Big Ten opponent of the season.

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Colton Denning

Ohio State 62, Rutgers 2
Season Point Total: 50

Tate Martell takes a safety and accounts for Rutgers’ first points against Ohio State since 2015.

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Geoff Hammersley

Ohio State 59, Rutgers 16
Season Point Total: 50

Just like Oregon State, Rutgers has injuries in the secondary to one of their best tacklers in Blessuan Austin. While there are leaders in the secondary who will be playing, Haskins will have another performance like last week, where he’ll collect TDs off short passes.

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Dan Hassler

Ohio State 58, Oregon State 20
Season Point Total: 50

While Rutgers is a better team this season compared to last, I still think Ohio State wins this game easily. Dwayne Haskins and the Buckeye offense should be running on all cylinders again this week, but I think the defense still has some work to do, allowing a couple big plays again Saturday.

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Meredith Hein

Ohio State 45, Oregon State 7
Season Point Total: 50

Rutgers is (slowly) getting better under Chris Ash and they’ll probably manage to get some points on the board at some point in the game.

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Caleb Houser

Ohio State 56, Oregon State 7
Season Point Total: 50

Ohio State doesn’t miss a beat again. Dwayne Haskins Jr. throws for 4 TDs and passes 345 yards. He’ll throw TD passes to Austin Mack, Johnnie Dixon, Bin Victor, and one to Parris Campbell.

J.K. Dobbins - 120 yards - 1 TD

Mike Weber - 110 yards - 2 TD (one in 4th quarter)

Tate Martell - clean-up duty late in game 4th quarter TD run. Typical OSU red-zone zone read situation.

Defense gives up one score in 2nd quarter, but holds them to only 7 in a true Big Ten opening beat down.

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Max Littman

Ohio State 56, Rutgers 7
Season Point Total: N/A

For the first time in three years Rutgers will get a mop-up time TD on the Bucks. Raheem Blackshear is too fast not to gash the OSU LBs a bit. With heavy rain, Dobbins and Mike Weber will both easily hit over 100 yards each in the route.

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Brett Ludwiczak

Ohio State 55, Rutgers 10
Season Point Total: 50

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Matt Tamanini

Ohio State 56, Rutgers 17
Season Point Total: 50

Despite a forecast that’s calling for tropical storm remnants, I think that Haskins will throw for 250 yards—mostly on yards after the catch—before exiting the game mid-third quarter. I think that because of less than ideal passing conditions, both Weber and J.K. Dobbins will go for over 100 yards. On defense, there’s no need for Jordan Fuller or Tuf Borland, who are both recovering from injuries, to play that much, meaning that the defense will still give up some big plays on the sloppy track. But on the whole, the Buckeye back seven will play better than they did against Oregon State.

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Matthew Torino

Ohio State 67, Rutgers 14
Season Point Total: N/A

Rutgers passes surprisingly well between the 20s and we hold our breath for the defense vs TCU.

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Dan Vest

Ohio State 63, Rutgers 3
Season Point Total: 50

Since 2015, Ohio State and Rutgers have matched up three times. In those three games the Scarlet Knights have put up a combined seven points. All seven came in the 2015 game when quarterback Hayden Rettig tossed a touchdown pass with 0:14 remaining in the fourth quarter to bring Rutgers within 42 points of Ohio State. Obviously history suggests points will be at a premium for the visiting team this weekend, but I’m not so sure. Ohio State’s defense gave up quite a bit against Oregon State and I think Rutgers stands an excellent chance of eclipsing the 2.3 points per game it averaged over the last three meetings. An early field goal will give Rutgers a huge three points and the lead, but in the end, the Buckeyes will prove just a little bit better by scoring the next 63 points.

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So, to recap our oddly overly complicated scoring system:

Correct Winner Prediction: 75 points
Perfect Prediction Bonus: 25 points
Point Total Deductions: Subtract 1 point for every point off total score (cap 25 points)

Thanks to the surprisingly high-scoring season opener, all of our prognosticators picked the correct winner, but lost 25 points on the point differential, which is why everyone has the same 50 points, except for the staff members who didn’t submit their Week 1 picks, but are going to try and catch up here in Week 2.