That was Chris Ash's defense at tOSU

He had great success with it in 2014, and especially in 2015 (#2 defense in the nation). Then again, when you have Tyquan Lewis (DT, 2nd round pick), Joey Bosa (DT, 1st round pick, 3rd pick overall), Adolphus Washington (DT, 3rd round pick), and Sam Hubbard (DE, 3rd round pick), you don't need to blitz, since those lines wreak havoc on their own.

Each of those guys could command a double team.

He tried using that same defense for the first three games in 2025, and we got torched.

We didn't have the defensive line personnel to run his defense. Marco Rubio and Donovan Hinish played their guts out for us, but they weren't nearly the caliber of the above guys, and behind them wasn't anyone ready to step in at the same level.

That's why we finally saw a lot more blitzing starting in that 2nd half of the Purdue game. Since we did have an excellent secondary, we could get away with more aggressive blitzing.

Still, that passive defense that Ash used cost us the first two games of last year. Had we played TAMU or Miami in a rematch, we would have thumped them.