Latest Vegas Odds Add Even More Ohio State Hype, but Is It Too Much to Handle?

COLUMBUS, Ohio — From the moment the clock struck zeroes inside of Arlington's AT&T Stadium in January, one word seemed to be on the mind of every Ohio State fan: repeat.

The Buckeyes had captured the first-ever College Football Playoff championship, but even in postgame interviews, the attention was already turning toward the next year. After all, Ohio State just beat Oregon—and Alabama in the semifinal Sugar Bowl a week prior—with a team whose core predominately consisted of underclassmen.

If the Buckeyes were good enough to win a championship this young, how good would they be the following season, when losses to the roster would be minimal and only improvement from their juniors, sophomores and freshmen would be expected?

"I've got a bunch of really good players. I love our coaching staff. The word 'repeat,' we'll have that conversation, certainly not today," Ohio State head coach Urban Meyer said the day after the national title game. "It's about enjoying it."

Meyer may not have been looking forward at the time, but the rest of the college football world was, with the Buckeyes listed as 6-1 favorites to win the 2016 national title on OddsShark just a day after they put a championship bow on their 2015 campaign.

In the four months that have followed, the Ohio State hype train has hardly slowed down, with the oddsmakers' latest list making the Buckeyes 7-2 favorites to capture a second consecutive college football crown (via OddsShark).

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The expectations for Ohio State in 2015 don't stop there either, with running back Ezekiel Elliott's chances of winning the Heisman Trophy at 6-1 on OddsShark—the best odds of any player in the country.

"It's something you dream about as a kid when you're playing NCAA Football and you create your little player, and he wins the Heisman," Elliott answered when asked by Bleacher Report about his Heisman chances just moments after the title game. "Just thinking that I'm going to have the opportunity next year to compete for the Heisman, just it means everything."

Elliott isn't the only Buckeye coming back with Heisman hopes either, as each of Ohio State's three quarterbacks are currently represented on OddsShark's list of Heisman favorites. Cardale Jones has the nation's sixth-best odds at 12-1, while Braxton Miller measures in at 25-1, and J.T. Barrett is listed at 28-1.

Obviously, those odds will change as the season nears and Meyer settles on a starter at quarterback, but there isn't another team in the country that possesses three players on that Heisman list, let alone four.

"I'm not going to change; I'm going to keep grinding," Elliott insisted, before adding, "I'm going to do all I can to win it."

That might be the right attitude to take into this offseason, a cautious confidence that's well aware of all the Buckeyes are capable of and how quickly it can go away. There may not be a better pilot to navigate this situation either than Meyer, who has twice before found himself in the position of defending national champion.

And although Florida wasn't able to repeat in either 2007 or 2009, Meyer learned plenty of lessons while with the Gators that should aid his efforts in 2015.

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"There's a lot of uncles, aunts, and so‑called uncles and aunts and third parties trying to get involved, and the negative is a lot of times when you're that young, that influences you," Meyer said. "I'm worried about that with our program. I'm watching it very closely, and I'm going to visit with each individual because there's some very, very talented guys on our team right now, very talented.

"The human element is very dangerous if those talented individuals open up to people that have their own—they have their own desires or they're trying to gain something from it."

Even with spring football having been in the books for a month now, it's still too early to tell whether or not the sudden celebrity of the Buckeyes—which is always a factor in football-crazed Columbus—has had a negative effect on next season's team. But it's not a coincidence that Meyer routinely downplayed his team's ability during the spring session, even though several of Ohio State's key players only saw limited reps.

"We did not improve as a team. That was not a good team out there," he said following the spring game. "You can tell my mind's spinning here a little bit. How do we get better as a team after we get them out here for a couple of weeks?

"This is a critical offseason for us. This is really critical."

Meyer's motivational tactics may work inside the walls of Ohio State's Woody Hayes Athletic Center, and now more than ever, they'll need to be put to good use. For as heavily hyped as the Buckeyes are heading into 2015, several questions still hang over the team, the most important of which is who will play quarterback for the defending national champions this fall.

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But partly because Meyer's track record speaks for itself, Ohio State's expectations for the upcoming season aren't going to die any time soon. This is the reality of playing for an Urban Meyer-coached team, where Heisman candidates line the roster and nothing less than a championship season is seen as a success.

Unlike last year, however, the Buckeyes will enter 2015 with these expectations from not only the inside, but from outside of their program as well. Injuries and youth can no longer be used as excuses in Columbus, as the most hyped team in college football attempts to defend its title.

"The chase is on," Jones said after the national title game.

At Ohio State, it never stops.

Ben Axelrod is Bleacher Report's Big Ten lead writer. You can follow him on Twitter @BenAxelrod. Unless noted otherwise, all quotes were obtained firsthand. All statistics courtesy of cfbstats.com. Recruiting rankings courtesy of 247Sports.