After J.J. McCarthy follows through on vow to ‘kill’ Ohio State, how do Ryan Day and Kyle McCord respond?
COLUMBUS, Ohio — On Ohio State football safety Malik Hartford’s lone defensive play against Michigan on Saturday, the true freshman locked eyes with Michigan quarterback J.J. McCarthy.
As Wolverines receiver Roman Wilson’s route carried him in Hartford’s direction, the safety’s head turned slightly. McCarthy, in that instant, rifled a pass between Hartford and cornerback Denzel Burke into Wilson’s hands for what stood up as a 22-yard touchdown reception.
Stood up, since replay review called into question whether Burke took the ball from Wilson before he completed the catch. Regardless, the decisiveness of a second-year starter — built upon the 600-some pass attempts that came before it — kept showing up on McCarthy’s essentially mistake-free day.
And so he did. And now Kyle McCord and Ryan Day must respond — not to McCarthy’s words, but to his performance.
A good example, should they choose to accept it, is McCarthy. His sophomore-year reputation was of a risk-taker who kept tiptoeing to the edge of disaster. Over the course of two seasons, he refined his performance. He made the conversion from fire hazard to freelancing gunslinger.