Tressel: Troy Smith will start Saturday

Justin Zwick and Troy Smith replaced each other five times against Texas.
COMBINED DISPATCHES
COLUMBUS -- It would be hard to say Justin Zwick's late fumble cost Ohio State the game in Saturday's 25-22 loss to No. 2 Texas, but it helped him lose his starting job.
Troy Smith, who alternated duties under center with Zwick, will get most of the practice work with the starting offense this week and will start Saturday against San Diego State, Buckeyes coach Jim Tressel said Monday.
"We're going into this week with the thought in mind that Troy will be the quarterback and have the most significant number of reps in practice, perhaps 75 percent to 80 percent," Tressel said on the Buckeye Roundtable radio show.
Zwick started for the then-No. 4 Buckeyes against Texas and led the offense to three points on the six series he played. Zwick completed 9-of-15 passes for 66 yards.
Smith led Ohio State on six series, guiding the way to the Buckeyes' first 19 points and finishing 5-of-11 for 78 yards.
After a Longhorns touchdown and extra point gave them a 23-22 lead with about 21/2 minutes to play, Zwick came on to try to lead the Buckeyes back. Scrambling to his left, he lost a fumble that essentially sealed the outcome.
Ohio State's final possession ended when Smith was sacked for a safety. The loss dropped them to No. 9.
"I didn't take care of the ball, and I've got to do that," Zwick said after the game. "We needed to make a play, and that's what I was trying to do."
No reason
"We had discussions throughout the course of the whole evening as to who would have opportunities," Tressel said of his quarterback-go-round, "but I can't give you one particular reason for it. We just thought that was the way to go right at that point."
The Buckeyes had the ball 14 times in the game and scored just one touchdown, relying on five Josh Huston field goals.
Zwick, who said he went into the game expecting to see some orderly sharing of duties at quarterback take place, said Ohio State's inability to score touchdowns added to the frustration.
"The rotation [at quarterback] really went out the window after the first quarter," Zwick said, "and they started going with who they wanted to. I don't have a problem with that -- you just have to be ready to go whenever your number is called. I don't think that was the problem -- we just didn't put enough points on the board."
Tressel avoided the opportunity to grade out the performances of his two quarterbacks when asked to do so after the game.
No grades yet
"Oh, probably not," Tressel said. "You'd have to go back and watch the film. There were some times where we didn't do what we needed to do and there were other times where we did, and I'm a little bit too close to the situation without the luxury of watching it to be able to go back and do it play-by-play."
OSU center Nick Mangold said the fuss over the quarterbacks missed the mark, because he thought the real problem was Ohio State's inability to capitalize on the three turnovers the defense came up with in Texas territory, all of which ended in field goals, not touchdowns.
"That was a huge problem," Mangold said. "When our defense gets us great field position like that, we can't let them down. As an offense, we all have to do a better job in those situations. We can't blame that on our quarterback, no matter who it is at the time."