Ohio State Football: What's Wrong with the Buckeyes' Run Defense?

With less than a minute and a half remaining in the second quarter of the Ohio State - Minnesota game, Gophers running back David Cobb burst past the Buckeyes' defensive line and raced to the end zone for a 30-yard touchdown. It was his second score of the afternoon—a score that tied the game at 14—and it pushed his rushing total to 96 yards in just two quarters of action.

Cobb's early success sent Ohio State defensive tackle Michael Bennett into a fury. The senior ripped his defensive teammates in the locker room at halftime for allowing the Gophers' running back to bully his way through the defense.

“I let them know that I wasn't happy about it, and I felt like there was a lot of apathy like, ‘Oh, we only let them get 14 points,' and I felt like we shouldn't have let them get any,” Bennett said, according to Patrick Maks of Eleven Warriors. 

"It was mostly just a call to action," the star lineman added. "We can’t be OK with that. You can’t let them run up the ball; we’re better than that. We need to form a wall and not let their running back get through."

That wall took shape after the break. Cobb had a much tougher time finding the lanes he cruised through to start the game—averaging just 3.7 yards per carry in the second half until he broke free on his final carry for a 12-yard touchdown. 

It's too early to tell if that second-half surge signified the end of Ohio State's struggles against the run. But with the Buckeyes shooting up the rankings and closing in on a coveted spot in college football's first playoff, coach Urban Meyer needs his defense to step up in a big way.

If those struggles continue, Ohio State could fall short of its lofty goals. 

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The Buckeyes will be challenged this week when they host Indiana. Hoosiers running back Tevin Coleman ranks second nationally with 1,678 rushing yards, and he has the speed and versatility to hurt Ohio State where it has struggled in recent weeks. 

The junior running back is coming off his best performance. He ran through—and past—Rutgers on his way to a career-high 307 rushing yards last Saturday. That performance put the Buckeyes on alert, and they know they'll need to be at their best when Coleman and the Hoosiers invade Columbus.

“We have to do our job, or this guy’s gonna run all over us,” Buckeyes linebacker Darron Lee said, according to Eric Seger of The Ozone. 

What does that entail? How can Ohio State get the job done after giving up a combined 282 rushing yards and six touchdowns to Cobb and Michigan State's Jeremy Langford over the last two weeks?

Meyer doesn't believe that any wholesale changes are needed schematically. The Buckeyes are comfortable in what they do—each defender just needs to do his part and rely on the formation to take care of itself.

"We just got to make sure we're gap sound—be very smart," Meyer said, according to Bill Landis of The Plain Dealer. "We're facing one of the best rush teams certainly in the Big Ten, and we're just, I think we're comfortable with the style of defense we're planning to go play Indiana and stop that run, limit that run offense."

Darron Cummings/Associated Press

The players tasked with stopping Coleman agree with their coach, and they're confident that the adjustments they made in the second half against the Gophers will carry over.

“I think you go from the Michigan State game to the Minnesota game, and really, we’ve got to wrap up and finish tackles in a couple of situations,” Lee said (via Seger). “But for Minnesota, I felt in the second half, we did a much better job of that. All that comes down to assignment, really.”

If the Buckeyes halt the Hoosiers and come out with a victory on Saturday, they'll clinch a spot in the Big Ten title game for the second consecutive year. That's where a matchup with the nation's top runner, Wisconsin's Melvin Gordon, potentially awaits. 

The Badgers are in the driver's seat for the West Division after Gordon set a single-game FBS rushing record with 408 yards in a 59-24 demolition of No. 16 Nebraska. If Wisconsin can close out the year with victories over Iowa and No. 25 Minnesota, it will book a trip to Indianapolis to play for the Big Ten title.

And if the Buckeyes need to stop Gordon in order to win their first Big Ten Championship since 2009, they'll need their run defense to improve in a big way. 

All stats via NCAA.com.

David Regimbal covers Ohio State football for Bleacher Report. Follow him on Twitter @davidreg412.