Indiana football coach Curt Cignetti and Ohio State coach Ryan Day had differing views of how the No. 6 Hoosiers (6-1, 3-1 Big Ten) slowed down Heisman frontrunner Jeremiah Smith.
They addressed Smith's performance on their respective weekly radio shows.
On Thursday night, Cignetti nodded along as host Don Fischer talked about how IU limited Smith to "one significant play" in OSU's 19-15 win over the Hoosiers.
"True," Cignetti said to laughs from the crowd at Yogi's Bar & Grill.
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Smith had four catches for a season-low 68 yards — he came into the matchup averaging 152.6 yards per game — with much of that production coming on a 38-yard touchdown early in the fourth quarter.
"The one touchdown pass was an underthrown ball," Cignetti said. "Good for them."
Cignetti described IU's strategy as "tilting" their coverage toward Smith with a healthy dose of double teams. The Hoosiers also placed an emphasis on pressuring OSU's quarterbacks before they had a chance to target Smith. The Buckeyes were pressured on 14 of their 38 dropbacks.
"They asked me the best way to stop Jeremiah Smith, get to the quarterback before he can throw it," Cignetti said of his pregame interview with Jenny Taft. "That always works."
Hours earlier, Ohio State's radio broadcast team of Paul Keels and Jim Lachey brought up the topic during their weekly chat with Day. The Buckeyes coach started out by offering a general overview of Indiana's defensive game plan for Smith.
"They had a couple different ways to cloud his side, put a corner down and a half-field safety there," Day said. "They had some things where they would play man-to-man, just take another guy and literally just run him over, you saw some of that. They worked hard on collisioning him, so he doesn't get free runs down the field."
But Day didn't stop there.
"Although he only had four catches, there were two of them there that we didn't get calls (on) that we really had opportunities to do something with," Day said.
Day usually sends about 10 plays after each game into the league office for review, but exceeded that number after OSU's win over Indiana.
On his radio show, he specifically expressed "frustration" over defenses getting away with committing penalties on Smith that would otherwise get called for a receiver that didn't have his size or strength, non-calls that Day felt IU benefited from.
"I don't want to break any (confidentiality) of what goes on, I think it's fair to say, we all saw, you can see the still pictures," Day said. "Those are game-changing plays. I know they are working hard to make sure it's right and get it right, but there were a handful of plays in that game that were certainly big plays."
Michael Niziolek is the Indiana beat reporter for The Bloomington Herald-Times. You can follow him on X @michaelniziolek.
This article originally appeared on Indianapolis Star: Ryan Day says officials missed calls on Jeremiah Smith vs. Indiana