Finally, Ohio State Buckeyes' quarterback and Heisman Trophy hopeful Julian Sayin has something to work on!

The redshirt freshman signal-caller for the Buckeyes has been nearly perfect through the first 12 weeks of the 2025 season. He constantly makes the right decisions, surgically accurate, and is a huge reason why Ohio State entered Saturday night undefeated.

Unfortunately for the highly-acclaimed playmaker, he did not have his best stuff.

Sayin finished the night completing 23 of his 31 pass attempts for 184 yards and one touchdown. Yes, I understand how wild it is to say a 74-percent completion rate in a contest where his team won 48-10 was an off night, but the sporadic play came in waves.

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As he always does, Sayin came out of the gates perfect. The first-year starter began the game completing his first 11 passes. It was made clear that Sayin would be forced to get a couple of other wide receivers involved, but early on, he was relying on star wide receiver Jeremiah Smith and Brandon Inniss to make spectacular plays.

After starting a perfect 11-for-11, Sayin finished the night completing 12 of his 20 attempts through the air and specifically, came out in the second half going 5-10 for just 37 yards. He looked uncomfortable as a result of Smith being banged up, along with junior wideout Carnell Tate being out. In addition to the injuries within the wide receiver corps, Sayin even experiencing an ankle injury himself.

However, Sayin still managed to continuously put the Buckeyes in positions to make plays and score. He learned midway through the second quarter that when numbers 4 and 17 are out, he has to take his precision to another level. 

Smith's impact on Sayin is simply unmeasurable by a number. There are four or five times every game where he makes a play or a catch that would be an incompletion if it were any other wide receiver in America.

FOX College Football (@CFBONFOX) on X JEREMIAH SMITH ONLY NEEDS ONE HAND 😱 📺:NBC @OhioStateFB

So, when the young quarterback throws a post route to freshman receiver Mylan Graham up the middle of the field and it gets batted away, he now knows that he has to be much more precise with the rest of his guys.

This is not a shot at anyone, and it is a compliment to Smith, who makes the life of a quarterback so much easier.

Grade: B-

Going forward for Sayin, he now has something to improve on for the rest of the season. 

It was the perfect week for him to face this kind of adversity as Ohio State hits the home stretch. Sayin now has one game left before taking on the Michigan Wolverines, two games till the Big Ten Championship, and then hopefully the Buckeyes do their job and are playing in the Playoffs.

If Sayin can take today's performance and up his game even more, he is going to be even more dangerous in the weeks to come.