OHIO STATE

OHIO STATE

news & notes

ROAD WARRIORS: A lot of people say a lot of things about what it’s like to be an opposing player at Wisconsin’s Camp Randall Stadium. The real competitors embrace the challenge of being booed, called bad names and occasionally being pelted with trash.

C Corey Linsley, a Boardman High graduate, says there’s a way to subdue the crowd.

“Coach (Urban Meyer) tells us every away game, ‘You want to take the crowd out of the game and take the team out of the game,”’ Linsley said. “Everybody talks about the crowd noise. It’s there in the first quarter. From then on, we control the crowd. If they’re loud, that obviously means that we’re not doing our job and we are continuing to have them in the game.”

LB Zach Boren said he loves playing at Wisconsin because it brings a team closer together.

“When you go into those kind of places like Penn State, those 70 guys you’re with, and the coaches you’re with, it’s like a gladiator mentality,” he said. “It’s kind of a fun thing. I remember the last time we were up there, the ‘Jump Around’ was one of the craziest things. We were jumping around; we were having fun with it. It’s a great environment. That’s what makes college football so much fun.”

It is a difficult — yet oddly inspiring — atmosphere, even for visitors.

“Their stadium is a tough place to play. The student section, the fans, everyone in the stadium, it’s an awesome environment,” Linsley said. “It’s one of the best environments in college football. But we control whether they’re loud or not. If we want to take the crowd out of the game, we’ve got to start playing better and we have to start fast.”

THEY SAID IT: Ohio State TE Nick Vannett, after Wisconsin’s third-quarter break song “Jump Around” was blared over the speakers at practice all week: “You know, it gets a little annoying after a while.”

THEY ALSO SAID IT: Meyer on hearing “Jump Around” repeatedly during practice: “I’m going to have to change that. We always do crowd noise. I told them to get (rid of ‘Jump Around’). We’ll hear that enough (in Camp Randall).”

Associated Press