What in the world did I just watch? The Ohio State Buckeyes somehow, someway pulled it off against the Indiana Hoosiers in Bloomington, Indiana, in a game that had everything except points.

Two quarterbacks went head-to-head, and neither one made it easy. Julian Sayin did not look like an NFL quarterback, which is exactly what I’ve been saying about him. He also got hurt and left the locker room with his arm in a sling. That’s a huge storyline for the Buckeyes moving forward after this game.

On the other side, Indiana quarterback Josh Hoover was up and down at best. The Hoosiers didn’t look like themselves, and that’s what makes this loss sting the way it does.

Indiana beat itself and still almost won against a Top-5 team

Indiana’s whole identity is letting the opponent make the mistakes and then capitalizing on them. On Saturday, the roles flipped. Indiana made mistake after mistake all across the field, the kind of sloppy football we just haven’t seen from this program.

And yet the Hoosiers still had a chance to win it.

Fourth-and-4, game on the line. Matt Patricia dialed up a cover zero blitz, and Nick Marsh came open. He catches the football, and you win the game. Then you realize his foot was out of bounds. This isn’t the NFL, where you need two feet down. In college football you need just one, and you have to make sure at least one of them is in. Just an inch on the white line, and it’s a critical mistake. Brutal.

I’m still underselling all the other chaos in this game. The roughing the passer call, that was egregious. Officiating that was up and down at best all game long. Plus a pile of little plays that were absolutely insane.

And you may say, Tegan, how can you call a game with this many mistakes an elite football game? Because this is living proof that you do not need a high-scoring affair for a game to be great. Every snap felt like it mattered, and every mistake felt like it could decide the whole thing. That was incredible and just a tough way for it to end for Indiana.

The biggest takeaway for Indiana

One thing’s for sure, Charlie Becker looks like a top-10 pick, and he showed it on an afternoon when points were hard to come by.

Now, overall for Indiana, I think they’re going to be fine. This is a punch in the gut, no doubt about it. But if the Hoosiers don’t make those mistakes, they’re in a really good position to win this game. Those are mistakes that are fixable. A team that can go toe-to-toe with Ohio State on its worst night is still a team I believe in come playoff time.

Indiana might be walking out of this game with a loss, but it’s walking away from this loss with a problem it can fix in practice. As for Ohio State, the Buckeyes leave Bloomington with a win but also with a quarterback question it can’t fix until it knows what’s under that sling. I’d take Indiana’s problem every single time.